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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: 24 April 2002
Time: 2:00 p.m.
REGISTRY AND CHAMBERS
Jim Landale,
Spokesman for Registry and Chambers, made the following statement:
- I am on my
own today. Florence is on business with the Prosecutor. She will then be going
on two weeks leave and will be back in The Hague in mid-May. You can ring Liljana
(Florence's colleague) on extension 8958 and she will seek answers or clarifications
to any questions for the OTP you might have in the coming days.
- I should alert
you that Judge May, the Presiding Judge in the Milosevic case, will be making
a statement at the beginning of this afternoon's session at 2.30 p.m. concerning
the facilities available to the accused, Slobodan Milosevic, in order for him
to properly prepare his defence case. This might be of some interest to the
media, therefore, I will endeavor to be finished in good time for you to make
it up to court to hear it.
In terms of
court documents:
- On 18 April
the 'Decision on the Prosecution Request for Agreement of Trial Chamber to
Amended Schedule of Filings' was filed. The Trial Chamber ruled that 'the
Prosecution shall file its pre-trial material by 1 June 2002 and that thereafter
any pre-trial material may be admitted only on good cause being shown'.
- On 19 April,
the 'Response by the Amici Curiae to the Prosecution's Application for Leave
to File an Interlocutory Appeal' was filed.
- On 22 April,
the 'Prosecution's Motion for Variation of an Order of the Trial Chamber'
was filed.
- On 23 April,
the 'Prosecution's Reply to the "Response by the Amici Curiae to Prosecution's
Application for Leave to File an Interlocutory Appeal"' was filed.
- In addition,
on the 22 April, two signed declarations from Dragoslav Ogjanovic and Zdenko
Tomanovic were filed giving their consent to act as Legal Associates for Milosevic
and agreeing to be bound by the provisions of the Statute and Rules of Procedure
and Evidence, as well as the Code of Professional Conduct for Defence Counsel
Appearing before the ICTY, the Rules of Detention, and any other Rules and Regulations
of the ICTY and Judicial Orders which might apply to them.
Copies of those
documents will be available after this.
- In the Krajisnik
and Plavsic case, we have received a scheduling order of 19 April setting a
status conference for Friday 10 May, commencing at 9.30 a.m. in front Pre-trial
Judge May.
- In the Dragan
Jokic case on 18 April, a Decision was rendered by a bench of the Appeals Chamber
allowing Jokic's appeal against the Trial Chamber's decision of 28 March 2002,
refusing his provisional release.
- In the Krnojelac
appeal, the President of the Tribunal, Judge Claude Jorda, has appointed Judges
Shahabuddeen, Guney, Gunawardana, Pocar and Meron to the Appeals Chamber to
hear the appeal.
- ICTY Outreach
is hosting a visit by 'Medica Mondiale', a Cologne-based organisation that assists
women traumatized by war. Two women from their Cologne office and three from
their legal department in Kosova participated in the three-day visit.
- And, this Thursday,
Friday and Saturday, Christian Rohde, the Chief of the Office for Legal Aid
and Detention Matters, along with ICTY Outreach representatives will be in Belgrade,
Nis and Novi Sad to give presentations and answer questions from members of
the Serbian Bar Association on applicable law and defence matters.
Questions:
Asked for a
reminder of the Rules concerning detainee telephone calls at the Detention
Unit, Landale replied that there were two phones, one for privileged calls
and the other for general calls made on a non-privileged basis. An accused
could use the latter with a phone card, at their own expense and could call
whomever they wished to call. The privileged phone was for communication between
a defendant and his lawyers or legal associates, he said.
Asked for confirmation
that an accused could make calls to any number they wished on the non-privileged
phone (bound by certain Rules, like not giving interviews), given the fact
that Milosevic said this morning that the phone he used showed the number
he had dialed to be an unaurthorised number, Landale replied that this was
the case.
Asked whether
there were numbers that the accused were not authorised to call, Landale replied
that there were specific technical arrangements and adjustments that could
be made to the phones to ensure that only the numbers authorised for privileged
communications could be dialed from the phone for privileged calls.
Asked whether
this referred only to phone calls that were privileged and not monitored,
and that on the phone that was monitored an accused could dial anywhere, Landale
replied that this was correct.
Asked whether
there was any news from Belgrade concerning possible surrenders, when the
Tribunal expected them to arrive and whether the Tribunal was prepared for
them, Landale replied that the Tribunal was prepared. Everything was in place
to receive and to welcome any of the indictees who were currently at large
who might arrive. The Tribunal had ample space in the Detention Unit to accommodate
them and the Tribunal looked forward to their arrival in order to get on and
process their cases. In terms of specific information, he could not go into
details. The Tribunal never went into details as to what logistical arrangements
might have been put into place to assist any transfer. He concluded that he
would keep the media up to date when any individual arrived at the Detention
Unit.
Asked if he
could say whether he expected anyone to arrive tomorrow or Monday, Landale
replied that they had all seen what had been said in the media and a lot of
that spoke for itself. The practice of the Tribunal was not to make any comment
or confirmations before something actually took place.
Asked whether,
if any of the Vukovar three came to The Hague, any of the materials used as
evidence in the Dokmanovic case would be available for use in this case or
whether these documents would have to be re-tendered again as evidence, Landale
replied that this would be a question for the Trial Chamber to which this
case would be assigned. The first step for the Tribunal was to ensure that
all three individuals on that Indictment were transferred together, or close
together, to make sure that the Tribunal could put all of them on trial at
the same time for that Indictment. The question of use being made of any materials,
testimony, evidence that came up in the Dokmanovic trial was a question of
admissibility and was one for the Judges.
Asked whether
it was correct that following the Rule 61 hearing some rights of the three
had been cancelled, for example that they could not question witnesses who
had testified in the Dokmanovic case, Landale replied that any accused had
a fundamental right to cross-examine any witness who testified in court, in
their trial, against them. That was something that would not change.
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