ICTY Press Briefing - 9 April 2002
Please
note that this is not a verbatim transcript of the Press Briefing. It is merely
a summary
ICTY
Weekly Press Briefing
Date: 10.04.2002
Time: 11:00 a.m.
REGISTRY AND
CHAMBERS
Jim Landale,
Spokesman for Registry and Chambers, made the following statement:
- Three new ad
litem Judges will make their solemn declarations later this afternoon at 3 p.m.
The swearing in ceremony will be officially witnessed by the Registrar, Hans
Holthuis. The three Judges are Mohamed El Habib Fassi Fihri from Morocco, Volodymyr
Vassylenko from the Ukraine, and Per-Johan Viktor Lindholm from Finland.
- Judges Fassi
Fihri and Vassylenko are due to join Trial Chamber II along with Judge Schomburg
to preside over the trial of Milomir Stakic, which will begin next Tuesday 16
April at 9 a.m. in Courtroom III.
- Judge Lindholm
will replace Judge Singh on the Bosanski Samac trial, which will resume next
Monday 15 April.
- As you should
have seen from our press release, Drago Josipovic was transferred to Spain yesterday
evening to serve his sentence.
- This afternoon
at 4 p.m. there will be a hearing in the Banovic case before Trial Chamber III
in Courtroom I. This follows the Prosecution's Motion to withdraw the Indictment
against Nenad Banovic, dated 27 March 2002.
In terms of
court documents:
- On 3 April 2002,
in the Naletilic and Martinovic or Tuta and Stela trial, the Trial Chamber rendered
a "Decision on Motion of Accused Naletilic for a Trial Schedule which Incorporates
Reasonable Breaks". The Motion was denied.
- On 5 April in
the same case, an "Order for Additional Information" was issued by
the Trial Chamber ordering the Accused "to provide additional information
to the Chamber on the files from the High Court of Mostar".
- On 3 April,
we received Dragan Jokic's "Application for Leave of Court to Appeal Denial
of Provisional Release".
- On 3 April,
the Prosecution filed a Motion to join the Momir Nikolic case to the Blagojevic,
Obrenovic and Jokic case.
- On 4 April,
Judge Wolfgang Schomburg was appointed as the Pre-trial Judge in the Momir Nikolic
case.
- On 5 April,
the Prosecution's Final Pre-trial brief in the Stakic case was filed.
In addition on the same day, we received an Order providing the trial schedule
for the Stakic case.
- In the Krajisnik
and Plavsic case, on 8 April, the Trial Chamber, Judge May presiding, rendered
a "Decision on the Prosecution's Request and Second Request Pursuant to
Rule 75 (D) for Variation of Protective Measures".
- On 8 April we
received the "Notice of Filing of Corrected Amended Indictment" in
the Pasko Ljubicic case.
Copies of all
these documents will be available after this briefing.
Florence Hartmann,
Spokeswoman for the Office of the Prosecutor, made the following statement:
The
Prosecutor will be back in The Hague on Friday following two weeks spent at
the ICTR in Arusha.
At the end of
next week the Prosecutor will travel to the former Yugoslavia, where she will
visit Belgrade, Sarajevo and Pristina.
Questions:
Asked for the
OTP's reaction to the fact that the law on cooperation to be adopted in Belgrade
would exclude future indictees, Hartmann replied that the OTP's position on
cooperation and the law was well known. The OTP would not comment on the law
itself as this was an internal law and a problem of the country.
As far as the
OTP was concerned, however, no law was needed in order to implement the order
of the court and to comply with the obligation towards the International Tribunal.
The OTP expected Belgrade, as well as all other UN Member States, to comply
with their obligations and to provide complete and regular cooperation with
the Tribunal. The OTP expected Belgrade to remove all obstacles necessary
to do this and not to create new ones.
Landale added
that on behalf of the Registry and Chambers, cooperation had to be complete
and unconditional. First and foremost this meant the transfer of individuals
indicted by this Tribunal who had been at large for unacceptably long periods
of time.
Hartmann added
that compliance with the obligation meant compliance with the requests of
the court - those which had been made in the past and those which will be
made in the future.
*****