Tribunal Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia

Page 9332

1 Monday, 22 May 2006

2 [Open session]

3 [The accused entered court]

4 --- Upon commencing at 12.34 p.m.

5 JUDGE PARKER: Good afternoon.

6 Mr. Smith.

7 MR. SMITH: Good afternoon, Your Honours.

8 If I can just briefly interpose before the next witness; it's just

9 a housekeeping matter and it relates to the next, the following two

10 witnesses, which is Dr. Davor Strinovic and Colonel Ivan Grujic. These

11 are both witnesses that will be testifying in relation to the proof of

12 death of the victims at Ovcara, as well as the widespread and systematic

13 attack against the non-Serb population related to the indictment.

14 And briefly it is an application, Your Honour, in relation to

15 Rule 92 bis (D) which has been previously decided. What the Prosecution

16 would like to do is have the transcripts from both of -- of both witnesses

17 from the Milosevic case to be tendered as evidence and have both witnesses

18 be cross-examined on that particular evidence. Your Honours might recall

19 that the prior, or the expert statements of the witnesses you have

20 indicated that they are likely to be admitted once the witnesses testify

21 here. However, in relation to the transcripts it's not as clear. So it's

22 the Prosecution's position that both the expert statement and the

23 transcript really need to be read together to get the full amount of

24 evidence the Prosecution would like the Trial Chamber to hear. And it may

25 have been a little bit unclear on the applications earlier that prior

Page 9333

1 testimony in the Milosevic case really did dovetail into the expert

2 reports which were submitted. And perhaps it relates more in relation to

3 Mr. Grujic who will be next Monday. Mr. Strinovic will be here tomorrow.

4 And that would be our application.

5 JUDGE PARKER: Have you given notice of this to your Defence

6 colleagues?

7 MR. SMITH: I've briefly spoken to Mr. Lukic and Mr. Vasic and

8 unfortunately I didn't get to speak to Mr. Borovic just before the break.

9 And our main concern, especially with Mr. Grujic. And I mean, the reason

10 for the application is to keep the proceedings as short as possible. I

11 think it would probably add an extra day or day and a half's hearing time.

12 JUDGE PARKER: In essence, what you seek is to have both the

13 92 bis statement and the transcript of prior testimony treated as the

14 evidence in chief of the witness.

15 MR. SMITH: Yes, Your Honour. There will be some clarification

16 with the witnesses, but in general that would be the case.

17 JUDGE PARKER: And then both witnesses available fully for

18 cross-examination.

19 MR. SMITH: That's correct.

20 JUDGE PARKER: Yes.

21 Mr. Lukic.

22 MR. LUKIC: [Interpretation] Good afternoon, Your Honour.

23 All I would ask you to is allow us until the next break so that we

24 can consult. Mr. Smith only mentioned this to us a couple of minutes ago,

25 so we would like to have the opportunity to consult. I believe that we

Page 9334

1 will not be putting any objections to that in principle, but we would like

2 to agree on a common position on this matter and then we will be able to

3 state what that is after the following break.

4 JUDGE PARKER: Very well. That concludes these matters.

5 We're ready now for the next witness on videolink, and for that

6 purpose we need, pursuant to orders already given, to be in closed

7 session.

8 [Closed session]

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15 [Open session]

16 THE REGISTRAR: We are in open session, Your Honour.

17 JUDGE PARKER: Mr. Moore.

18 MR. MOORE: The next witness is an expert witness to be called by

19 Mr. Smith. It was anticipated that the cross-examination might take --

20 and indeed evidence in chief might take a little longer than has done

21 today. Therefore, I am afraid that we are not in a position to

22 immediately commence, but would only be able to start tomorrow morning.

23 We try and ensure that experts are not inconvenienced. And, as I say, we

24 try to estimate as best we can. We had two cross-examinations rather than

25 three today which is, I think, the first time.

Page 9403

1 JUDGE PARKER: It's the start of a new and very popular fashion,

2 Mr. Moore. Mr. Borovic is a trend-setter.

3 MR. MOORE: That I can believe.

4 JUDGE PARKER: Yes.

5 MR. MOORE: So can I apologise for that.

6 JUDGE PARKER: Very well.

7 MR. MOORE: But it's for the right reason, perhaps not the wrong

8 one.

9 JUDGE PARKER: In that --

10 MR. MOORE: May I deal with one matter of housekeeping.

11 JUDGE PARKER: Yes.

12 MR. MOORE: It's really simply this: We have now indicated to the

13 Defence the witnesses that we are proposing to call in the next two weeks.

14 As the Court is aware, we have sought witness summons on occasion, and we

15 are not in a position always to know if they are able to give evidence or

16 not, and I wasn't able to do so last week, that's why I performed a --

17 what I will call forensic minuet in reply in some respects. However, we

18 are able to estimate that the next weeks should be fully occupied.

19 The only thing that I would ask the Court and my learned friends,

20 perhaps, as we come towards the end of the trial, that it may be because

21 of the difficulties for witnesses that they may not be able to come in

22 exactly on the day that we have requested. And consequently, I would ask

23 that my learned friends be prepared for sometimes a change of witness

24 order outside the normal scale. But I would like to think that should not

25 create any significant difficulties for them, and I don't refer to the

Page 9404

1 military witnesses. They're entirely different.

2 JUDGE PARKER: Mr. Vasic.

3 MR. VASIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honour. I believe

4 it's only right that I should reply and the Defence should probably offer

5 a position.

6 We can understand this situation where certain problems occur with

7 the witnesses. One thing that is important to us, though, is to know

8 which witnesses will be heard over the next two weeks, regardless of the

9 exact chronological order of their appearance. We can always take things

10 in our stride, but the important thing for us is to prepare for all of

11 these witnesses, to know which witnesses will be testifying over the next

12 two weeks, and how much time the OTP are planning on spending with each of

13 these witnesses in terms of their examination-in-chief. Thank you.

14 JUDGE PARKER: Mr. Moore.

15 MR. MOORE: Well, we stick to our 65 ter estimate. I think 90

16 per cent of our witnesses have been actually below the estimate. And I

17 would anticipate that that will continue.

18 JUDGE PARKER: I'm sorry, Mr. Moore. The Chamber's very clear

19 impression is very different. And we have concluded that your estimates

20 were based entirely on Prosecution evidence and not on the whole of the

21 time for the witness, which is the requirement.

22 MR. MOORE: Well, if that's the case, then I apologise. But our

23 estimate, because we can only estimate how long that we will call a

24 witness, we estimate how long it will take for us to call the evidence.

25 We don't know how long cross-examination is going to take.

Page 9405

1 JUDGE PARKER: Well, you will find the whole estimation process

2 depends on you attempting what you don't know.

3 MR. MOORE: Well, my apologies for that.

4 JUDGE PARKER: I just reacted there, because we've been

5 significantly misled in estimates.

6 MR. MOORE: Well, it was unintentional misleading to the extent

7 that we believed we were giving estimates of how long our evidence would

8 take.

9 JUDGE PARKER: Not so. Now, the question is the witnesses for the

10 next two weeks.

11 MR. MOORE: The witnesses are as we have indicated, and I see no

12 reason to see them change.

13 JUDGE PARKER: Well, I don't know who they all are. You have

14 mentioned a Mr. Hartman.

15 MR. MOORE: I can help the Court. We have got Dr. Strinovic

16 coming tomorrow, or giving evidence tomorrow. That I believe on our

17 estimation of evidence in chief and cross-examination we believe will take

18 probably the rest of the week.

19 For the following week we have got Dr. Grujic. We again estimate

20 that the evidence in toto will take three days. Our estimate is that we

21 should take, I hope, less than a day.

22 And then we have P-030, whom again total estimate is two days.

23 And then for the 6th of June we have P-001 and another witness to follow,

24 and I can't remember if it's a protected witness or not. May I just

25 inquire.

Page 9406

1 [Prosecution counsel confer]

2 MR. MOORE: Yes, the second witness appears to be not a protected

3 witness. But in any event that should take, we hope, three days for those

4 two witnesses. And then we start coming into the area of expert witnesses

5 after that.

6 We have Hartman, and Hartman is a witness who is here in

7 The Hague, and we would hope that we would be able to bring that witness

8 in, if there were any gaps, so that we would not waste court time, to use

9 her as a fill-in witness. So as matters stand, we believe that there

10 should be no days lost.

11 JUDGE PARKER: Still concluding around the 16th.

12 MR. MOORE: Your Honour, it's very difficult to estimate. We know

13 how long we'll take in chief. I can only call witnesses. That is all

14 that I can actually do. Our experts, I'm going to try and use what I call

15 the 89(F) technique for both Pringle and Theunens.

16 JUDGE PARKER: Very well.

17 MR. MOORE: There are two other witnesses apart from that, but

18 there is not a significant -- that is the end of it as far as --

19 JUDGE PARKER: Ah, there are two witnesses in addition to those

20 you have mentioned.

21 MR. MOORE: Yes, there are, yes. And Your Honour is aware of a

22 motion in relation to one of them.

23 JUDGE PARKER: Thank you.

24 MR. MOORE: And that would conclude the case.

25 JUDGE PARKER: There you are, Mr. Vasic.

Page 9407

1 Mr. Lukic.

2 MR. LUKIC: [Interpretation] I think all of us here in the

3 courtroom, and especially my learned friend Mr. Moore seem to be in a

4 habit of taking the round about route when talking about witnesses.

5 I have a list based on the 65 ter rule list of the OTP. There

6 appear to be 29 witnesses left on that list, and these are referred to as

7 potential witnesses. The last two times Mr. Moore spoke about this, give

8 us an idea of what to do and what to prepare for over the next two weeks,

9 but I see that Mr. Moore is obviously trying to wrap things up, that he is

10 concluding the OTP's case. It would be nice to have some indication from

11 him which witnesses he has definitely given up on. I know that he is the

12 master of his own case, he decides which witnesses to call, but we still

13 have 25 or 26 witnesses on this list who are potential witnesses and yet

14 Mr. Moore never explicitly refers to them. And this is what I find

15 confusing within the overall framework of our preparations for the next

16 stage, for the final stage, the home straight, as it were, of the OTP's

17 case.

18 The OTP informed us about giving up two particular witnesses about

19 two months ago, but nothing since. We received a motion with some other

20 persons, although this was never made official, that were to be taken off

21 the 65 ter list, and we're still dealing with a relatively large number of

22 witnesses because nothing official has been provided in terms of which

23 witnesses will eventually be left off the list.

24 JUDGE PARKER: As I understand it, Mr. Lukic, you've got names now

25 or identifications of seven plus two that have not been specifically

Page 9408

1 identified. Nine to come. Any not among those names, I gather you can

2 take it are not to be called.

3 Mr. Moore.

4 MR. MOORE: As a general principle, yes, but not absolutely yes.

5 Because, I'm sorry, so often trying to work out exactly what a Defence

6 cross-examination is going to be, one has to keep so many options

7 available. I'm trying to anticipate what the cross-examination will be.

8 If the cross-examination is as I expect, then I would hope that that will

9 conclude the case. But I'm -- I'm loathe to say I will not be calling

10 such-and-such a witness. That -- those are the witnesses that I believe

11 we will require and that is really all I can say at this stage. We have

12 to rely on what we anticipate.

13 JUDGE PARKER: Thank you.

14 We will now adjourn until the morning, 9.30.

15 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 4.35 p.m.,

16 to be reconvened on Tuesday, the 23rd day of May,

17 2006, at 9.30 a.m.

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