Nerma Jelacic
Director of Management and External Relations at CIJA; former ICTY spokesperson and BIRN co-founder
| Nerma Jelacic | |
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| Born | Višegrad, Bosnia and Herzegovina |
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| Nationality | Bosnian |
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| Occupation | Transitional justice specialist; communications director; journalist |
| Known for | Director of Management and External Relations, Commission for International Justice and Accountability; former spokesperson, ICTY; co-founder, Balkan Investigative Reporting Network |
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Nerma Jelacic (also spelled Nerma Jelačić) is a Bosnian transitional justice specialist, former journalist and communications professional who serves as Director of Management and External Relations at the Commission for International Justice and Accountability (CIJA). She previously spent more than six years as head of communications and outreach at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and was the first director and co-founder of the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN) in Bosnia and Herzegovina.[1]
Early career and journalism
Jelacic was born in Višegrad, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and was forced to leave the country during the wars of the 1990s. In the 1990s she worked as a London-based journalist, notably for The Observer and the Financial Times, covering foreign affairs and specialising in war crimes and organised crime. From 2003 to 2005 she was editor and country director for the Institute for War and Peace Reporting (IWPR) in Bosnia, organising training for regional journalists on transitional justice.[1][2]
Balkan Investigative Reporting Network and ICTY
In 2005 she became the first director and co-founder of the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN) in Bosnia and Herzegovina, an award-winning media NGO focused on investigation of war crimes, organised crime and corruption. She also edited the Balkan Insight news service and the Justice Report. In January 2008 she was appointed spokesperson (and later head of communications and outreach) at the ICTY in The Hague, a role she held for over six years.[1][2]
CIJA
Jelacic joined CIJA in 2014. As Director of Management and External Relations she oversees relationships with policy, political and diplomatic actors, civil society and the media, and is responsible for securing resources and sound project management. CIJA materials state that she has twenty years’ experience in transitional justice and has worked as a consultant on transitional justice issues in Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Uganda and Egypt. She specialises in securing governmental, media, victims’ and public support for justice and accountability processes.[1]
She has spoken publicly on CIJA’s evidence collection and its use in universal-jurisdiction cases (including in Germany, France, Austria and elsewhere), on the limitations of trials alone for transitional justice, and on the need to strengthen national institutions of justice and interior in post-Assad Syria. In a 2021 Index on Censorship article she defended CIJA’s 2021 sting operation against the Working Group on Syria, Propaganda and Media and described the group’s activities as disinformation coordinated with Russian actors.[3][4]
In coverage of the OLAF investigation into CIJA and Tsamota she has rejected the findings, stating that the organisation and its staff had done nothing wrong and criticising the investigators’ conduct.[5]
See also
- Commission for International Justice and Accountability
- William Wiley
- International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia
- Balkan Investigative Reporting Network
External links
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 Commission for International Justice and Accountability, Nerma Jelacic CIJA, accessed 10 October 2026.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 BIRN, Nerma Jelacic is new ICTY spokesperson BIRN, 20 January 2008.
- ↑ Nerma Jelacic, “Spinning bomb,” Index on Censorship, 20 July 2021.
- ↑ Levant 24, More Than Trials: Lessons from Bosnia and Beyond – Part 1 Levant 24, 25 June 2026.
- ↑ Trouw / Raad voor de Journalistiek materials, 2020–2021 (reporting Jelacic’s statements on the OLAF investigation).