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Please
note that this is not a verbatim transcript of the Press Briefing. It is merely
a summary.
ICTY Weekly
Press Briefing
Date: 17.07.2002
Time: 12:00 p.m.
REGISTRY AND
CHAMBERS
Christian
Chartier, Chief of Public Information Services, made the following statement:
Today
is the World Day for International Justice. We are very proud of being at the
service of international law, and we believe that the best way to celebrate
this day is by carrying on our work with clear determination and in full transparency.
In
this regard, I would like to state as strongly as possible that persons reporting,
as I have seen over the past two days, that the Tribunal has established a system
through which its accused would be authorised to receive up to 10% of defence
costs as compensation for their custody and/or in order to support their family,
are at the very least ill-informed. There is no such kick-back system in place
at the Tribunal, for obvious reasons. It has never been contemplated, it has
never been established, and it never will be.
In
the case The Prosecutor v. Nikola Sainovic and Dragoljub Ojdanic, the
Bench of the Appeals Chamber has granted the Prosecution leave to appeal against
the provisional release Decision of 26 June.
Next
Tuesday, the President, the Prosecutor and the Registrar will be in New York.
The President and the Prosecutor have been invited to appear before the UN Security
Council to discuss the Report, made public two weeks ago, on the Judicial Status
of the Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia and the Prospects for Referring Certain
Cases to National Courts.
As
previously announced, on Thursday and Friday of last week the Judges held their
regular summer Plenary Session. A press release will be issued in due course,
providing you with more details on the significant reforms adopted with the
view of strengthening the position of Defence Counsels appearing before the
ICTY.
On-going
trials continue as scheduled in the Milosevic, Galic, Stakic, Simic and others,
Brdjanin and Talic, and Naletilic and Martinovic cases. In the Naletilic and
Martinovic case, you will have no doubt noticed that the Defence case opened
yesterday.
Besides
the on-going trials, I would like to mention a number of additional proceedings
to take place in the two coming days:
On Thursday
at 2.15 p.m. in courtroom III, there will be a status conference in the case
The Prosecutor v. Enver Hadzihasanovic, Mehmed Alagic and Amir Kubura.
To be discussed among other topics is a request by Enver Hadzihasanovic
and Amir Kubura to change their conditions of provisional release, namely
to be authorised to travel beyond the limits of Sarajevo in order to visit
family members and to assist in the preparation of their defence cases.
On Friday,
in courtroom I, at 2.15 p.m., a status conference will be held in the case
The Prosecutor v. Vidoje Blagojevic, Dragan Obrenovic, Dragan Jokic and
Momir Nikolic; this will be followed by a hearing on the motion for provisional
release filed by Dragan Obrenovic on 11 June and on an expected motion for
provisional release to be filed by Vidoje Blagojevic. The Defence for Vidoje
Blagojevic informed the Chamber earlier this week that a provisional release
motion is about to be filed. This application brings up to nine the number
of accused currently seeking provisional release. One of the applications
filed is by Momcilo Gruban, I can now tell you that a Decision on his provisional
release is expected to be issued later today. Another of the accused seeking
provisional release is Mile Mrksic. His motion will be considered on Friday
afternoon at 4.15 p.m.
With
regard to recent court rulings:
In the cases
relating to the Omarska and Keraterm Camps, following the Prosecution’s motion
for joinder, on 16 July Trial Chamber III ordered the Prosecution to file
further clarifications on the charges, either new or existing.
In the case
The Prosecutor v. Milomir Stakic, on 10 July, Trial Chamber II dismissed
a confidential motion by the Defence to exclude the testimony of Mevludin
Sejmenovic.
In the case
The Prosecutor v. Momcilo Krajisnik and Biljlana Plavsic, on 12 July,
Trial Chamber III denied the Prosecution’s application for an appeal against
its Decision of 18 June to exclude evidence and to limit the scope of the
trial.
In
terms of legal filings, the following:
Firstly,
with regard to the cases in front of the Appeals Chamber:
In the case
The Prosecutor v. Radoslav Brdjanin and Momir Talic, on 15 July the
Prosecution filed its response to the submissions by Jonathan Randal’s lawyers
in support of their appeal against the Decision to compel him to appear as
a witness. Meanwhile, the Bench that will consider the merits of this appeal
has been constituted as follows: Judge Jorda, presiding, Judge Shahabuddeen,
Judge Güney, Judge Gunawardana and Judge Meron.
With
regard to cases in front of a Trial Chamber:
In the case
The Prosecutor v. Stanislav Galic, the Defence is seeking leave to
appeal against the Trial Chamber’s Decision of 3 July not to challenge the
qualification as expert-witnesses of two OTP employees.
In the case
The Prosecutor v. Blagojevic and others, on 16 July, the Prosecution
filed a consolidated response to Defence motions challenging the form of the
Indictment.
In the case
The Prosecutor v. Mile Mrskic, on 12 July, the defendant filed a motion
challenging alleged defects in the form of the Indictment.
In the case
The Prosecutor against Slobodan Milosevic, we have received two Prosecution
filings:
1.
a reply to the observations by the amici curiae on the Prosecution’s
appeal of the Decision of the Trial Chamber not to admit the testimony of
two OTP investigators
2. an application for an order directing the FRY to produce documents.
Finally,
I am glad to inform you that the following translations into French of documents
initially issued in English are now available:
1.
These are firstly la Décision du greffier de suspendre l’aide juridictionnelle
accordée jusqu’à récemment à Zoran Zigic
2. And secondly, two documents relating to two interlocutory appeals. The
first filed in the Milosevic case ‘appel en date du 27 juin contre la décision
relative à l’admission du résumé de prueve produits par
un témoin’ and the second filed in the Sainovic/Ojdanic case ‘oppostion
conjointe des défendants à la demande de l’accusation d’autorisation
d’interjeter appel, et la réponse de l’accusation à cette opposition
conjointe’.
As
usual, copies of most of the documents that have been mentioned have been prepared
for you. Copies of others can be requested from us, the only condition being
for you to be patient.
I
am now happy to turn the floor over to the Office of the Prosecutor.
Florence
Hartmann, Spokeswoman for the Office of the Prosecutor made the following statement:
The
Prosecutor will visit Belgrade on Friday. It will be a short working visit relating
to issues of cooperation and will last for only a few hours.
Questions:
Asked
for further elaboration, concerning the document mentioned relating to an
application by the Prosecution for an order directing the FRY to produce documents,
Hartmann said that this document highlighted the problems the OTP faced when
requesting specific documents from Belgrade. It explained why, in certain
cases, the OTP had to continually speak on the subject of cooperation, despite
the many public statements on the part of the Yugoslav authorities and other
authorities in the former Yugoslavia, that they were cooperating with the
Tribunal.
More
specifically, Hartmann added that the OTP had requested the statement Mr.
Milosevic gave when he was arrested in April 2001 in Belgrade. She added that
Milosevic’s lawyer had given large extracts of the statement to the public
and media. The statement was published in the former Yugoslavia and all over
the world and related to the support Milosevic had given to the Bosnian and
Croatian Serbs during the war. It was something that the OTP was interested
in and the OTP had requested a copy of the official statement from the authorities
since it did not want to have to rely on press articles. The OTP did not receive
any answer from Belgrade and the statement was not provided. This is why the
OTP was now asking for Trial Chamber support.
Asked
whether the motion related to one particular document, Hartmann replied that
the OTP faced this kind of problem constantly. This particular case led to
this request. The OTP had requested the Chamber to help with this particular
problem. Prior to this motion, the OTP had made constant requests to the authorities,
these were refused. This was a document that had been presented before a court
in Belgrade, it was an example of the kind of document the OTP was looking
for, she concluded.
A
journalist stated that the document was broadly used in the Morten Torkildsen
expert report. Asked whether this meant that he had also not received the
statement. Hartmann replied that the OTP wanted to use official documents
in the trial and not press articles. The document existed and it was something
the OTP wished to receive.
Asked
to confirm whether or not Torkildsen had seen the actual statement, Hartmann
replied that Torkildsen had written an expert report about the Milosevic trial.
The OTP wanted the document to be provided to them to be used in the trial.
The document could not fall under any special state secret act as it had already
been given to the press.
Chartier
added that from a procedural standpoint, a distinction had to be made between
an investigator accessing a document and being authorised to read and quote
from it and the Prosecution getting, through official channels, a copy of
a document. There was a difference between an expert report and a document
likely to be tendered in court as an exhibit, he added.
Asked
who was refusing to give the document to the OTP, Hartmann replied that all
the details were in the motion. The decision had been taken by the National
Council for Cooperation. All the answers could be found in the motion, she
concluded.
Asked
for a general impression on how good the cooperation was, as far as documents
were concerned, from the Council for cooperation, Hartmann replied that due
to the Prosecutor’s upcoming visit to Belgrade, she would not answer this
question now. Cooperation was not going very well, but she did not want to
give any details or qualify how it was going. It was better to allow the Prosecutor
to give a summary of this after her visit.
Asked
for further elements of the agenda of the Prosecutor’s visit, Hartmann replied
that it was a very short visit and she would not give details apart from the
fact that the Prosecutor would meet with officials at the Federal level and
at the level of the Government of Serbia.
Asked
how it was possible that Mr. Kastratovic, the lawyer requested by Mr. Martic
to defend him, had been assigned by the Registrar, Chartier replied that Mr.
Kastratovic had never been assigned to Mr. Martic and that another lawyer,
Mr. Knoops, had been assigned to him.
A
journalist stated that both Mr. Knoops and Mr. Martic had filed requests for
Martic’s provisional release despite the fact that Martic had complained about
Knoops filing anything on his behalf. Asked whether Martic was now being defended
by nobody and how would this situation would be resolved, Chartier replied
that there were problems with the requested appointment of a specific lawyer.
Awaiting a solution to this problem, and in order to protect the rights of
the accused to be defended and represented in proceedings before the Tribunal,
Knoops had been assigned to him. A few weeks ago the Trial Chamber dealing
with this case had ordered that all the parties including the lawyer requested
by Martic, the assigned defence lawyer and the registry to make submissions
to the Trial Chamber to clear up the matter. As long as a Decision had not
been taken everything stood as it was.
Asked
why Knoops was filing requests on his behalf, Chartier replied that it was
because he was the assigned lawyer and he was fully entitled to do so. He
was not aware that Martic ever filed any complaint in writing asking not to
be defended by this defence lawyer.
Asked
for a copy of the 92 bis statement submitted today in court, Chartier
replied that Rule 92 bis statements were subject to specific procedure.
So far, this procedure had been that the statements would be made public on
two conditions, that they had been submitted and that the witness had appeared
in court. In this case the second condition could not be met so he would have
to check how the Registry would deal with it.
Asked
to confirm that all documents not filed under seal should be public, Chartier
replied that this was a simplistic representation of the situation, and that
he would be happy to discuss the matter further after the briefing.
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