IN THE TRIAL CHAMBER

Before:
Judge Richard May, Presiding
Judge Mohamed Bennouna
Judge Patrick Robinson

Registrar:
Mrs. Dorothee de Sampayo Garrido-Nijgh

Order of:
4 May 2000

PROSECUTOR

v.

DARIO KORDIC
MARIO CERKEZ

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ORDER ON DEFENCE APPLICATION FOR VIDEO-CONFERENCE LINK

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The Office of the Prosecutor:

Mr. Geoffrey Nice
Ms. Susan Somers
Mr. Patrick Lopez-Terres
Mr. Kenneth Scott

Counsel for the Accused:

Mr. Mitko Naumovski, Mr. Leo Andreis, Mr. David F. Geneson, Mr. Turner T. Smith, Jr., Mr. Robert A. Stein, Mr. Stephen M. Sayers and Ms. Ksenija Turkovic, for Dario Kordic
Mr. Božidar Kovacic and Mr. Goran Mikulicic, for Mario Cerkez

THIS TRIAL 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 SEISED OF "Dario Kordic’s Application for Video-Link Conference Concerning a witness who will testify the week of May 15, 2000" filed by the Defence for Dario Kordic ("the Defence") on 28 April 2000 ("the Application"), requesting that the witness identified in the Application be permitted to testify on behalf of the Defence by means of a video-conference link,

NOTING that the Defence case has only recently commenced and that there may be other witnesses in respect of whom similar applications for permission to testify by means of video-conference link may be made,

CONSIDERING that the Trial Chamber is of the view that, where possible, it is preferable for as many witnesses as possible to be heard by means of video-conference link during an agreed time-frame, and encourages the Defence so to organise its witnesses,

CONSIDERING, therefore, that it would not be in the interests of justice, nor would it make for judicial economy, for separate arrangements to be made on each occasion for individual witnesses to testify by means of video-conference link,

PURSUANT TO Rule 71 bis of the Rules of Procedure and Evidence of the International Tribunal

HEREBY DENIES the current Application.

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

_____________________________
Richard May
Presiding

Dated this fourth day of May 2000
At The Hague
The Netherlands

[Seal of the Tribunal]