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sent a prominent Dutch lawyer, Professor Frits Rüter from the University of Amsterdam, to observe his trial in Belgrade.
In January 1975 about 100 young Albanians were arrested in Pristina, capital of the autonomous privince of Kosovo. Five Albanians received sentences of 3 to 9 years on "anti-Yugoslav” charges.
In mid-February 1975, after a three-month secret trial in the Dalmatian town of Zadar, 15 Croatians were given sentences ranging from 18 months to 13 years for alleged subversive activities. Two more groups of students are said to be held incommunicado in the Croatian capital Zagreb. No specific information about them reached the outside world because the police, at the time of writing, had not allowed either their parents or their lawyers to visit them.
In October 1974 the leading dissident writer Mihajlo Mihajlov was arrested. His trial, after being postponed twice, took place at the end of February 1975 in Novi Sad. It was attended on behalf of AI by Professor Rüter and by Dr Broekmeyer. Mr Mihajlov was found guilty of "hostile propaganda" and sentenced under article 118 of the Yugoslav Penal Code to 7 years' imprisonment and to 4 years' ban on publishing anything after his release. Mr Mihajlov refused to appeal against the sentence on political grounds.
Soon after the trial, both defence lawyers were threatened with suspension and possible prosecution; neither threat was carried out. Lawyer Kovacević had referred in his final plea to President Tito's speech of 25 February, made while the trial was in progress, and which attacked Mr. Mihajlov. The lawyer recalled the first Serbian Codex from the 14th century in which Tzar Dusan had admon- ished judges that they should not fear the Tzar but judge only in accordance with the law. Lawyer Barović's son, then in his final year of law studies, was suddenly called up for military service despite the fact that this was against the Yugoslav National Service Law.
Professor Rüter's trial reports significantly contributed to Al's knowledge about the judicial and penal system in Yugoslavia. In his assessment of the Djurović trial, Professor Rüter concluded that Dr Djurović's conviction was a foregone conclusion for political reasons even before the trial started; that the defence lawyers were denied those legal rights guaranteed under Yugoslav law; that the court had shown itself prejudiced against the accused; that important graphological testimony was inadequate; and that insufficient account was taken of Dr Djurović's state of health. The report was sent to the Yugoslav authorities and also to a number of European political leaders.
There have also been signs of increased pressure on the Roman Catholic Church particularly in Croatia and Slovenia, resulting in the confiscation of several issues of the Catholic periodicals Glas Koncila and Druzina, which defended religious freedom against discriminatory practices in Yugoslavia.
The prolonged campaign against unorthodox Marxists reached its peak in Jan- uary when eight dissident teachers from the Philosophy Faculty in Belgrade were dismissed from their posts and the well-known philosophy journals Praxis and Filozofija were banned from circulation. Further intimidation followed against philosophy teachers at Ljubljana and Split universities. This move against nonconformist thinkers was preceded earlier in 1974 by persecution of students who had taken part in drafting a resolution in support of the Praxis