I, FAUSTO POCAR, Judge of the Appeals Chamber of the International Tribunal for the Prosecution of Persons Responsible for Serious Violations of International Humanitarian Law Committed in the Territory of the former Yugoslavia since 1991 ("the International Tribunal"),

BEING SEIZED of the "Prosecution Request for An Extension of Time" filed on 26 January 2001 ("the Prosecution’s Request"), which moves for an extension of three months within which to file its response to the "Appellant’s Brief in Support of Motion to Admit Additional Evidence on Appeal Pursuant to Rule 115, in Accordance with the Appeals Chamber’s Decision of 26 September 2000" ("the Appellant’s Brief in Support of Rule 115 Motion") filed on 19 January 2001, and requests authorisation to file the response by 19 April 2001 in light of the large volume of documentary evidence tendered and the numerous assertions made vis-à-vis the judgement of the Trial Chamber;

NOTING that according to the timetable for the parties to make submissions on the applicability of Rule 115 set out by the Appeals Chamber in its "Decision on the Appellant’s Motions for the Production of Material, Suspension or Extension of the Briefing Schedule, and Additional Filings"("the Decision") issued on 26 September 2000, the Prosecution should have filed its Response 14 days after the filing of the Appellant’s Brief in Support of Rule 115 Motion;

NOTING the "Appellant’s Response to Prosecution Request for an Extension of Time"("the Appellant’s Response") filed on 7 February 2001, in which the Appellant does not object to the granting of an extension of time but does object to the length of time requested for the extension and submits that an extension until 7 March 2001 should be sufficient for the Prosecution to file its Response;

NOTING the "Prosecution Reply to the ‘Appellant’s Response to the Prosecution Request for An Extension of Time"’ ("the Prosecution’s Reply") filed on 9 February 2001, which advances, inter alia, the following reasons for an extension:

1. with the exception of some documents which were not translated, and those considered illegible by the Translation Unit, the Appellant received the translation of substantially all of approximately 200 documents by late September 2000, which means that the Appellant had all the official translations for at least three and a half months during which he was able to formulate his arguments as to the admissibility of the documents under Rule 115. Thus, a similar period of time is required by the Prosecution to review the 288 documents and to write its response;
2. the Prosecution received approximately 450 documents without any index or indication as to their relevance, therefore it made little sense for the Prosecution to start reviewing all documents and formulating a response without knowing whether they would be tendered on appeal and what would be the basis for their admissibility under Rule 115;

CONSIDERING that Rule 127 of the Rules of Procedure and Evidence of the International Tribunal ("the Rules") allows the Appeals Chamber to enlarge or reduce any time prescribed by or under the Rules, on good cause being shown;

CONSIDERING that the reasons advanced show that the Prosecution requires more time for the preparation of a properly considered Response and thus, there is good cause for enlarging the time-limit;

CONSIDERING however that, the extension requested appears to be exceedingly long;

PURSUANT TO Rule 127 of the Rules;

HEREBY ORDERS that the deadline for filing the Prosecution’s Response to the Appellant’s Brief in Support of Rule 115 Motion shall be extended to Monday 19 March 2001.

Done in both English and French, the English text being authoritative.

________________________________
Fausto Pocar
Pre-Appeal Judge

Dated this twentieth day of February 2001
At The Hague,
The Netherlands.