Tribunal Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia

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1 Monday, 17 July 2000

2 [Status Conference]

3 [Open session]

4 [The appellant entered court]

5 --- Upon commencing at 4.17 p.m.

6 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: Madam Registrar, will you please call the

7 case?

8 THE REGISTRAR: This is case number IT-95-10-A, Prosecutor versus

9 Goran Jelisic.

10 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: Mr. Jelisic, can you hear me? Mr. Jelisic

11 says yes, he can hear me. Now, I should explain that under Rule 65 bis,

12 these proceedings can be held either by the whole Appeals Chamber or by a

13 Judge of the Appeals Chamber, and as you will see, a single Judge is

14 sitting today. I take it that you would appreciate that that in no way

15 diminishes the authority or status of our proceedings today.

16 Now, may I take the appearances, first the Prosecution.

17 MR. YAPA: May it please, Your Honour. Upawansa Yapa appearing

18 for the Prosecution, with Mr. Norman Farrell and Mr. Roeland Bos.

19 Ms. Carmela Annink-Javier is the case manager.

20 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: For the Appellant/Defence. Perhaps I should

21 have asked. There is only the Defence is appealing in this case, is that

22 right, or is the Prosecution also appealing?

23 MR. YAPA: Yes.

24 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: You're also appealing. So,

25 Defence/Appellant.

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1 MR. GREAVES: I appear on behalf of the appellant. My name is

2 Michael Greaves, and I have with me today Mr. Michael Levy from the bar of

3 England and Wales. Your Honour, could I just mention one thing, to see

4 Your Honour's leave to have sitting with us our interpreter. Neither

5 Mr. Levy not I speak the language of Mr. Jelisic, and we need to take

6 instructions in the course of this hearing, we will need to speak through

7 an interpreter. May I have Your Honour's leave to have her sit with us,

8 please?

9 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: Mr. Yapa, I take that it there is no

10 opposition to this request which repeats a request made on the last

11 occasion.

12 MR. YAPA: No objection whatsoever.

13 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: That is granted.

14 MR. GREAVES: I'm most grateful to Your Honour. I, therefore,

15 introduce to Your Honour Ms. Ratislava Mirkovic.

16 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: Now, may I just read the applicable Rule

17 which controls our proceedings this afternoon. It is Rule 65 bis and it

18 says: "The Appeals Chamber or an Appeals Chamber Judge shall convene a

19 Status Conference within one hundred and twenty days of the filing of a

20 notice of appeal and thereafter within one hundred and twenty days after

21 the last Status Conference to allow any person in custody pending appeal

22 the opportunity to raise issues in relation thereto, including the mental

23 and the physical condition of that person."

24 The last Status Conference was held on the 4th of April, and that

25 Status Conference visualised a second Status Conference could be held at

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1 or around the second week of July this year, and on the 12th of April,

2 2000, we issued a scheduling order summoning this Status Conference for

3 today.

4 Now, the purposes of the conference have been read out in brief.

5 They are to afford to the appellant an opportunity to make any

6 representations about his conditions of detention or any representations

7 about his appeal, the status of his appeal, and also to give to the Court

8 an opportunity to indicate the position regarding the prospect of the

9 appeal being heard.

10 So now, are there any representations, Mr. Greaves?

11 MR. GREAVES: Your Honour, there's nothing in particular that I

12 would wish to address Your Honour sitting alone on. Of course, there is

13 the matter of the request for an extension of time, but that's a matter

14 that all five Judges of the Appeals Chamber are seized of, so it would not

15 be proper of me, at this stage, to address Your Honour in any way on that,

16 so I don't. Beyond that, I have no other observations to make either

17 about the appellant or his conditions of detention.

18 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: Yes. Very good of you, Mr. Greaves, to

19 recognise the limitations on the competence of a single Judge. But we can

20 notice, can we not, that the Prosecution was asked to respond to that

21 motion, and the Prosecution has responded?

22 MR. YAPA: We have. We have responded, Your Honour, and also we

23 have filed our brief in appeal.

24 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: Yes. Yes.

25 Now, that motion brings me to this point, Mr. Greaves: that we

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1 have in the interval since the end of the trial in the Trial Chamber had a

2 series of motions for extensions of time and that has occupied this space

3 between the termination of the proceedings in the Trial Chamber and

4 today's date, and that affects the prospect of the appeal coming on for

5 hearing. We have in mind that the appeal would come on for hearing very

6 shortly after the beginning of September/October, somewhere there. Would

7 that meet with your expectations, Mr. Greaves?

8 MR. GREAVES: Your Honours, certainly bearing in mind what Your

9 Honours said on the last occasion, that is something that we've been

10 working, as it were, towards.

11 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: Yes.

12 Mr. Prosecutor?

13 MR. YAPA: Yes.

14 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: Yes.

15 Should we hear from Mr. Jelisic himself, if he has any particular

16 thing to say to the Court?

17 MR. GREAVES: Your Honour, I think it is usual to ask the

18 appellant himself personally.

19 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: Very good of you, Mr. Greaves.

20 Then, Mr. Jelisic, would you like to say whether you have any

21 particular representation to make to the Court?

22 [The appellant stands]

23 THE APPELLANT: [Interpretation] Yes, Your Honour.

24 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: You accept what Mr. Greaves has said?

25 THE APPELLANT: [Interpretation] Yes.

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1 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: Is there anything you would like to add to

2 what Mr. Greaves has said?

3 THE APPELLANT: [Interpretation] I don't understand these matters

4 so well. I don't know what he explained.

5 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: Well, then, do I take it that you have

6 confidence in Mr. Greaves and in what he would have said on your behalf?

7 THE APPELLANT: [Interpretation] Yes, absolutely, I do have

8 confidence, and whatever you agree with my counsel, I accept.

9 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: Thank you very much.

10 [The appellant sits down]

11 JUDGE SHAHABUDDEEN: Shall we, then, note that the present state

12 of affairs is controlled by the pendency of a motion for extension of

13 time, and that subject to that our anticipation is that the hearing of the

14 appeal would take place sometime in September/October coming.

15 Unless, then, there are other matters to be discussed, may I

16 suggest that we now take the adjournment. Thank you.

17 --- Whereupon the Status Conference

18 adjourned at 4.29 p.m.

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