Please note that this is not a verbatim transcript of the Press Briefing. It is merely a summary.

Date: 26.04.2006
Time: 12:15

Registry and Chambers:

Christian Chartier, Senior Information Officer, made the following statement:

Good Afternoon,

Let me first wish a warm welcome to a number of additional journalists, from Croatia and The Netherlands, who are in attendance of today’s briefing.

This briefing is a weekly forum at which representatives of the various organs of the Tribunal inform, explain, comment and dialogue with reporters. My name is Christian Chartier and I am speaking on behalf of the President, the Chambers and the Registry. I am joined today again by Anton Nikiforov, who will be speaking on behalf of the Prosecutor and her Office.

So, welcome. And please feel free to ask whatever question you wish!

Your presence today allows me to start by telling a story which shows an unknown facet of the Tribunal.

The Registry of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) is about to dispatch a shipment containing 306 used computers which, instead of being thrown away, will be donated to schools, youth centers and non-governmental organisations in the Republika Srpska and the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The computer equipment is donated through the AidNet Foundation, a humanitarian organisation based in Sarajevo, which will distribute the computers to the end-user organizations. The equipment will be transported from The Hague to Sarajevo by Voerman International moving company, free of charge.

This is the 24^th donation made by the ICTY over the past year. In March 2005, a special Unit was established within the Administration Department which endeavors to supply replaced office equipment to those in the former Yugoslavia who may benefit from it. This is unique initiative within the UN system, and we are proud to invite you to witness the send-off of this new shipment.

The shipment will be officially sent off by Registrar Hans Holthuis, the Ambassador of Bosnia and Herzegovina, His Excellency Fuad Sabeta, and Robert-Jan Voerman, manager of the moving company transporting the shipment from The Hague to Sarajevo. Starting at 1pm., the official dispatch ceremony will be held on the steps of the Tribunal's entrance if the weather remains dry. Otherwise the ceremony will occur in this press briefing room.

Please note that because of time constraints, there will be no opportunity to ask questions; so if you have any questions regarding the donation, this briefing is the only appropriate forum.

Tomorrow afternoon, 25 members of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe will be paying a working visit to the Tribunal. All members of the Assembly’s Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights, they will meet with the President, the Prosecutor and the Registrar.

The backdrop of their visit is the completion strategy and their focus will be "the cooperation between States and the ICTY, stressing on national judicial means (already in place or to be developed) in order to continue this work."

Following the visit to the ICTY, the Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights will hold in Budapest on 18 May an audition on the subject-matter. It is expected that the Ministers of Justice of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Serbia and Montenegro will be in attendance to this audition.

Both the visit to the ICTY and the Budapest audition are designed to help the Committee in preparing a report (to be issued by early next year) dedicated to the "prosecution of offences falling within the jurisdiction of the ICTY, both from the perspective of the continuing work of the ICTY itself and from that of domestic jurisdictions." This Report will include "appropriate recommendations, including to the Committee of Ministers."

WITH REGARDS TO COURTROOM PROCEEDINGS, the event of the day is the opening of the trial of Jadranko Prlic, Bruno Stojic, Slobodan Praljak, Milivoj Petkovic, Valentin Coric and Berislav Pusic at 2.15pm, in courtroom 3.

They stand accused for the alleged ethnic cleansing of Bosnian Muslims and other non-Croats from areas in the territory of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina which were claimed to be part of the so-called Herceg-Bosna, declared as a Croatian political and territorial entity in November 1991.

Most of the accused are former high-ranking political and military officials of the then Herceg-Bosna. This trial is also the largest held at the Tribunal since the Kupreskic et al. case (also six accused) in 1998.

An important pre-trial conference was held yesterday at which a number of issues were discussed. A written Decision is expected today which will sum up the Judges’ views on issues such as the testimony of expert witnesses, the admission of exhibits or the right of the accused to ask questions to witnesses. Most importantly, the Chamber yesterday decided that the Prosecution case will last a maximum of one year, being 46 weeks or 920 hours in court. This time will be divided as follows: 400 hours for the examination of Prosecution’s witnesses and evidence, 400 hours for cross-examination by the Defence of the six accused jointly and 120 hours for Chamber’s question and procedural hearings.

When you attend the trial session, you will notice four Judges on the Bench. This is due to the appointment, the first ever in the Tribunal’s history, of a Reserve Judge, namely Judge Antoine Mindua, from the Democratic Republic of Congo. As a "reserve Judge", Judge Mindua will be present in court at each stage of the proceedings and will replace any of the three other Judges who would become unable to continue sitting (Article 13 quarter of the ICTY Statute and Rules 15bis (G) and 15ter of the Rules of Procedure and Evidence). The appointment of Judge Mindua marks the first implementation of the resolution adopted on 28 February 2006 by the Security Council.

2) Two on-going trials have resumed and will continue in the coming days:

- the trial of Milan Martic, former President of the war-time Croatian Serb entity. It will sit tomorrow at 14:15 and on Friday at 9:00 in courtroom II, and continue next week in the same courtroom, again in the afternoon.

- and the Vukovar trial against Mile Mrksic, Miroslav Radic and Veselin Sljivancanin, all former Yugoslav Army high-ranking officers. It will continue on Friday 9:00 in courtroom I. The hearing will sit next Tuesday all day. Due to the Martinovic/Naletilic appeals judgement, on Wednesday the case will only be heard in the morningC.

3) Yesterday’s event was the resuming of the trial of Momcilo Krajisnik with the long-awaited beginning of the accused’s testimony.

Momcilo Krajisnik will be on the witness stand for a maximum of seven weeks, as an Order issued on Monday by the Trial Chamber says that the accused's testimony "must come to a close on or before 13 June 2006." During his testimony, the accused "may not speak to anyone," including his Defence lawyers unless he is authorized to do so by the Chamber, which has designed a specific procedure for Momcilo Krajisnik to seek the Chamber's permission on a case-by-case basis. The detailed Chamber's filing sets forth a "finalized procedure for Chamber witnesses," and disposes of a number of "evidentiary and procedural matters," including scheduling matters. Paragraph 24 reads as follows: "The Chamber will deliver its judgement in the case on or before 29 September 2006."

The trial will sit today tomorrow at 9:00 in courtroom I and next week in courtroom II, again at 9:00.

4) Also scheduled is a status conference in the Blagojevic et al. case this Friday at 14:15 in courtroom II.

AS FAR AS FILINGS ARE CONCERNED…

The usual weekly list will be handed over after the briefing. I would like to single out two filings both related to Rule 11 bis cases:

1) On Monday, Pasko Ljubicic filed a Notice of Appeal against the Decision of the Referral Bench on 12 April to refer his case to Bosnia and Herzegovina for trial before a domestic court.

2) The week before, the Prosecution had filed an application requesting a hearing to discuss the case of Vladimir Kovacevic, who, as you may know, was recently found "unfit to stand trial."

FINALLY, I would like to remind you that the Tribunal has a holiday next Monday.

Office of the Prosecutor:

Anton Nikiforov, Advisor to the Prosecutor and acting Spokesperson of the Office of the Prosecutor, made no statement.

Questions:

Before any questions were asked, Chartier mentioned that he had no further details on the reports into the deaths of Milan Babic and Slobodan Milosevic.

A journalist asked whether we could confirm that Prosecutor Geoffrey Nice is facing a sexual harassment complaint and if this is connected with his departure from the Tribunal. Nikiforov said that this question has also been raised yesterday by the same agency (AFP) and that he did not know anything about this particular case. He continued that as he mentioned yesterday the termination of Geoffey Nice’s contract is because he was here for the Milosevic case and since this case was finished his post was in the process of being abolished in mutually agreed terms, there was no other reason. He added that Geoffrey Nice was assigned to the post of Principal trial attorney specifically for the Milosevic case and there will be no such position in the Office of the Prosecutor further; there are only posts of Senior trial attorneys. He continued that in respect to any other information of a personal nature which, if there was anything like this, would be conducted by the Human resources department in New York. He ended that there was no connection.

Asked if the Prosecutor would change her opinion about the cooperation of Serbia if by the end of this month Ratko Mladic has not been arrested, Nikiforov answered that as he already had mentioned on many occasions and was misquoted on many occasions as well, the Prosecutor will not commend until the end of the month and we will give our assessment in due course, no date has been set, in the beginning of May.

Asked if the Prosecutor would accept any other sign of cooperation less than the arrest of Mladic, Nikiforov said that at this particular moment the priority was Mladic and we have said it quite clearly when the previous deadline was passed that we saw the positive progress and there was some need for additional time, the additional time and the promises was that they would deliver Mladic by the end of April. We will make our assessment of that basis once the deadline has been passed. He added that he saw some speculations about new dates like the 3^rd and the 11^th of May which has nothing to do with the actual deadline which is by the end of April.

Asked if on this Saturday, when the Netherlands is celebrating Queens day the Tribunal could operate under normal circumstances, Chartier answered that the Tribunal is used to work whenever the situation requires regardless of any kind of external circumstances.

Asked if the Tribunal has only donated computers or whether other materials have been donated in the past, Chartier said that mainly computers have been donated but that we also have donated a mini-van to an orphanage in Kosovo. Other donations have been given to organizations in Zagreb, in Belgrade and in Macedonia. Nikiforov added that the OTP had donated some forensic equipment and expendables to different organizations.

In relation to an indictment issued by the Serbia’s War Crimes Prosecutor’s Office against eight policemen related to crimes committed in Suva Reka in Kosovo a question was asked if there was any cooperation within the OTP and the local prosecutor. Nikiforov answered that indeed that was the case and he hoped that this was not the last indictment in relation to crimes committed in Kosovo. The OTP was constantly in touch with the war crimes prosecutor and his people, they conducted several investigations in relation to Kosovo and he added that this specific case of eight accused was related to the Suva Reka the execution of 48 people but in the mass grave in Batajnica more than 800 bodies were found.

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