The Public Defender responds to the confrontationover allocation of plot of land for cemetery that took placebetweenChristian and Muslim communities in the village of Adigeni, Adigeni municipality, on February 29, 2016.

The verbal dispute turned into physical abuse that extremely tensed the situation.

The Public Defender's representative arrived in Adigeni as soon as reports about the tension were disseminated. The Muslim community of Adigeni village does not have a cemetery and they have to use Muslim cemeteries of the neighboring villages or their yards. In order to solve the problem, the State Agency for Religious Affairs presented a recommendation on allocation of plot of land for a Muslim cemetery in the village of Adigeni. However, the local Christian population did not agree with the recommendation that was followed by verbal and later by physical confrontation. As a result, three representatives of the Muslim community were beaten.

Unfortunately, this is not the first case of persecution of people of different beliefs and hindrance to performance of their religious rites in this region. Those violations have not been investigated properly and the impunity encouraged a new incident on religious grounds, which poses a threat to co-existence of people of different faiths in a democratic society.

The Public Defender closely watches the developments and advises local population to keep the peace in order to avoid further escalation of the situation and strengthening of religious strife.

The Public Defender calls on both the local and central governments to use all reasonable means to prevent tension and to defuse the situation. He also calls on the law enforcement agencies to investigate the physical confrontation in the shortest period of time, in order the delayed or improper response of the law enforcers not to encourage violence once again.