WELCOME TO IWPR'S TRIBUNAL UPDATE No. 497, April 13, 2007 SCORPIONS JUDGMENT SPARKS DEBATE IN SERBIA AND BOSNIA Two years after video showing brutal murder of Srebrenica youths first shocked the world, the controversy surrounding this case shows no signs of subsiding. By Merdijana Sadovic in Sarajevo
DEFENCE CONFLICTS CLOUD OPERATION STORM CASE Clashes on the Operation Storm defence benches cause further delays and present yet another obstacle to the tribunal's completion strategy. By Lisa Clifford and Sara Goodman in The Hague BRIEFLY NOTED: DATE SET FOR MACEDONIAN TRIAL Defendants charged with crimes in ethnic Albanian region of Macedonia. By Sara Goodman in The Hague NIKOLIC TRANSFERRED TO FINLAND Senior Bosnian Serb officer joins the more than twenty Hague convicts serving time in European jails. By Sara Goodman in The Hague OTHER NEWS: RADAK RETRIAL, SREBRENICA REMEMBRANCE, CAPTIAN DRAGAN EXTRADITION By IWPR reporters in The Hague **** NEW AT IWPR ****************************************************************** NEW PODCAST: THIS WEEK ON IWPR A regular audio programme produced by IWPR US, highlighting IWPR news and analysis on issues of conflict, human rights and international justice, written by our contributors around the world. To listen to the programme or for details on how to subscribe see http://iwpr.net/?apc_state=hen&s=u&p IRAQ PHOTO DIARIES, NIGHT RAIDS: Peter van Agtmael documents the late-night raids carried out by American and Iraqi troops against the homes of suspected insurgents. This series of photographs was awarded a 2nd place in the General News Stories category at the World Press Photo Awards in 2007. http://iwpr.net/?apc_state=henh&s=o&o=top_galleries_index.html 2007 KURT SCHORK AWARDS: IWPR has launched the call for this year's entries for the Kurt Schork Awards in International Journalism. The awards honour fearless freelance news reporting and local journalists who cannot leave their country when the story becomes secondary to survival. Full details of the 2007 awards and how to enter may be found on the Kurt Schork Award pages on IWPR's website www.iwpr.net INTRODUCTION TO THE INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT Available at http://iwpr.net/?apc_state=henotri&s=o&o=tribunal_icc_00.html **** www.iwpr.net ******************************************************************** TRIBUNAL UPDATE RSS: http://www.iwpr.net/en/tri/rss.xml RECEIVE FROM IWPR: Readers are urged to subscribe to IWPR's full range of free electronic publications at: http://www.iwpr.net/index.php?apc_state=henh&s=s&m=p GIVE TO IWPR: IWPR is wholly dependent upon grants and donations. For more information about how you can support IWPR go to: http://www.iwpr.net/donate.html **** www.iwpr.net ******************************************************************** SCORPIONS JUDGMENT SPARKS DEBATE IN SERBIA AND BOSNIA Two years after video showing brutal murder of Srebrenica youths first shocked the world, the controversy surrounding this case shows no signs of subsiding. By Merdijana Sadovic in Sarajevo Four former Serb paramilitaries who were filmed shooting dead six captured young Bosnian Muslims were convicted of war crimes against civilians at Serbia's War Crimes Court this week. The former commander of the Scorpions paramilitary unit, Slobodan Medic, and his main accomplice, Branislav Medic, were each sentenced to 20 years in prison, at the special war crimes court - established in 2003 to deal with lower-level cases referred to Serbia by the Hague tribunal. Pera Petrasevic, the only one of the five accused to confess to the crime, was given 13 years. The fourth defendant, Aleksandar Medic, received five years, while a fifth man, Aleksandar Vukov, was acquitted. The five were accused of killing in cold blood a group of Muslim civilians, captured after the fall of the eastern Bosnian town of Srebrenica to Bosnian Serb forces in July 1995. The youngest victim was 16 years old. After the fall of the enclave, Bosnian Serb forces executed some 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys in Europe's worst wartime atrocity since the Second World War. "Slobodan Medic ordered the three defendants and two others to execute the prisoners, take them away from the site, and make it seem as if they had been killed in conflict," said presiding judge Gordana Boilovic-Petrovic, explaining the trial chamber's decision rendered on April 10. "By committing such acts against defenceless civilians, by showing off their power and not showing remorse, the defendants did not give the court the choice to pass lower sentences." The main evidence in this case was an infamous video filmed by the defendants themselves. It shows members of the Scorpions taunt the six young men - who were dirty and bruised and had their hands tied behind their backs - before herding them off to a clearing in the woods and shooting them in the back. The executioners appear relaxed, as they casually smoke and chat. The footage had lain hidden for ten years before a former member of the Scorpions contacted Serbian human rights activist and lawyer Natasa Kandic with information on its whereabouts. It was then secretly passed on to war crimes prosecutors both in Serbia and at the Hague tribunal. The video first became public when it was used in evidence in the trial of former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic on June 1, 2005. The same month, it was broadcast on TV news bulletins across the former Yugoslavia and beyond, causing disbelief and outrage. The images shocked many Serbs who had previously questioned whether the Srebrenica massacre had really taken place. The five accused were arrested just hours after the video was broadcast on Serbian television, and their trial began in November 2005. Twenty-one witnesses testified at the proceedings which ended last week, including relatives of the murdered Muslim men and boys. The prosecution asked for a maximum sentence for the accused, while the defence called for their acquittal. On hearing the verdict, relatives of the victims - who were also present at the sentencing hearing in Belgrade - could not hide their disappointment. "As a mother, I feel terrible, I fee humiliated," said Nura Alsipahic, whose teenage son Azmir was identified as one of the victims. "I thought this tape would be a sufficient proof and that the perpetrators would get the sentence they deserved." Safeta Fejzic, the sister of Safet Fejzic, another Scorpions' victim, said she "couldn't believe the sentences were so mild and that one of the accused received only five years for the crimes he was charged with". Fejzic said families of the victims will demand a re-trial, which "should take place at the Hague tribunal". Kandic, who represented the victims' families at this trial, said she too was disappointed with the judgment. "Considering the seriousness of the crime committed, justice was not done with this verdict," she told reporters as she left the courtroom. "The verdict neither brings justice to the defendants for what they have done, nor for the victims killed only because they were Bosnian Muslims from Srebrenica." Most of the criticism leveled at the judgment was related to the length of the sentences, which many saw as inadequate, considering the seriousness of the crimes the accused were convicted of. However, it is not clear if the court could have handed down longer sentences even if it had wanted to. Under the old Yugoslav criminal code - which was in effect until 2004 - a maximum prison sentence was 20 years. The code also allowed for a death penalty, which was abolished in 2001, and replaced with a 40-year prison sentence. Since the crimes of the four men were committed when the old code was in force, they had to be tried under its laws. Therefore, Serbian legal experts say the maximum sentence for crimes committed before 2004 cannot exceed 20 years. This contrasts with the practice used at Bosnia's War Crimes Chamber, where sentences are delivered according to the new criminal code - even for crimes committed before it came into force in 2003. This means the maximum sentence possible is 40 years, rather than the 20 years allowed under the old code. The decision to apply the new code retrospectively led to dozens of prisoners and indictees at the Bosnian war crimes court going on a mass hunger strike in January this year, demanding to be tried under the former Yugoslavia's more lenient code, which was in force during the 1992-95 war - when the alleged crimes took place. It is not just the length of the sentences rendered which has sparked debates in Serbia and Bosnia. Trial observers have also objected to the wording of the judgment, which came less than two month after the International Court of Justice, ICJ, ruling in Bosnia's genocide case against Serbia, found that genocide took place at Srebrenica in July 1995, but acquitted Serbia of any direct involvement in this. Reading out the verdict on April 10, Judge Boilovic-Petrovic said the Scorpions were a paramilitary unit subordinated to the Vukovar Corps of the self-proclaimed Republic of Serb Krajina in Croatia, and were not controlled by the Serbian Ministry of Interior, MUP. But in an interview with Bosnian Federal television, FTV, on April 11, Kandic said she thought the judges had made a political, not a legal decision. "In the judgment, they said the Scorpions was a paramilitary unit and that it was not under Serbia's jurisdiction in any way," said Kandic. Kandic disagreed with this statement. "There was enough evidence to prove a direct link between the Scorpions and the Serbian MUP," she said. The Humanitarian Law Center - a Belgrade-based NGO headed by Kandic - issued a statement on April 12, which said that "the court was led by political rather than legal reasons in an effort to adjust its stances to those of the Serbian authorities regarding the responsibility for genocide committed in Srebrenica, in the context of the International Court of Justice verdict". The Croat member of the joint Bosnian presidency, Zeljko Komsic, agrees with this view. "It seems the Serbian court did everything it could to avoid establishing any connection between the Scorpions unit and the Serbian government," he said, commenting on the judgment. Both parties have 30 days to appeal the judgment. Merdijana Sadovic is IWPR Hague programme manager. DEFENCE CONFLICTS CLOUD OPERATION STORM CASE Clashes on the Operation Storm defence benches cause further delays and present yet another obstacle to the tribunal's completion strategy. By Lisa Clifford and Sara Goodman in The Hague The Hague tribunal's looming completion deadline looked less achievable than ever this week after further complications emerged in the case against three Croatian generals accused of crimes during Operation Storm. Lawyers representing Ivan Cermak and Mladen Markac confirmed they would ask the court's registrar and pre-trial judges to investigate an alleged conflict of interest involving the lawyer for the third indictee, Ante Gotovina. The start of the trial - which was supposed to begin on May 7 - was delayed last week after Cermak's lawyers Cedo Prodanovic and Jadranka Slokovic were removed from the case due to a suspected conflict of interest. Judges expressed concern that their other client, Croatian army general Rahim Ademi, could be summoned to testify as a witness. This came after Markac's lawyer, the former Croatian justice minister Miroslav Separovic, was dismissed in March when judges ruled he had a personal interest in the case and was likely to be called as a witness. In a further twist this week, Markac's remaining lawyer Goran Mikulicic claimed he had evidence that Greg Kehoe, a former Hague prosecutor who is now representing Gotovina, had investigated Operation Storm during his time on the prosecution benches. The Croatian generals are charged with the murder, persecution and deportation of ethnic Serbs during Operation Storm - a Croatian military offensive launched in the summer of 1995 to retake the Serb-held Krajina region. A spokesperson for the Office of the Prosecutor, OTP, this week said an internal review had been conducted into whether any conflict of interest exists over Kehoe's involvement in the case, but nothing was found in what is a standard procedure when a prosecutor switches to the defence. "We would have raised an issue if there was one to be raised," said Olga Kavran. Kehoe, who worked in the prosecutor's office from 1995-1999, where he won the conviction of Bosnian Croat general Tihomir Blaskic, also denied any conflict of interest. He said the majority of his time as a prosecutor at the tribunal was spent on Blaskic, though he also worked on the case against Milan Martic, the former leader of the rebel Serb authorities in Croatia. Nonetheless, the Operation Storm trial is now facing serious complications. Cermak's lawyers have said they will appeal their dismissal, and Separovic has already appealed, saying Markac has full faith in him and would suffer substantial hardship if not allowed to choose his own lawyer. Michael Karnavas, a defence lawyer at the tribunal and the president of the Association of Defence Counsel Practising Before the ICTY, said he has never heard of a case at the court with so many alleged conflicts of interests. However, it is to be expected, he said. "It's not surprising given the type of cases heard before the tribunal, the accused involved and the close-knit community of lawyers that are called on to represent the accused, especially in complex cases where a certain amount of inside knowledge is an added edge given the steep learning curve for outsiders," said Karnavas. He and other observers are critical, however, that the conflict issues are only now emerging, just weeks before this complex trial was due to begin. "I find it difficult to imagine that no one anticipated these sorts of complications," said Karnavas. "The trial chamber should have acted more robustly from the beginning, though the general culture at the tribunal is to be much more relaxed, if not lackadaisical, when it comes to conflicts. "In national jurisdictions such as the US, these sorts of issues are taken very seriously, and the courts are not shy of taking swift and strict action, generally erring on the side of caution by asking counsel to withdraw." Ivo Josipovic, a law professor at the University of Zagreb, is also critical of how judges have handled the conflict of interest issue. "The court was aware of the facts from the very beginning," he said. "They should have reacted much, much quicker. All the facts were on the table. It's a very unpleasant situation for the defence counsels and the accused." The judges have ordered Separovic to assist any new lawyer appointed in his place but should he, Prodanovic, Slokovic and possibly Kehoe be forced to withdraw, Josipovic believes their replacements would need at least six months to prepare. Prosecutors said last December that the trial would last 12-14 months, meaning it is now unlikely to be finished by 2008 as ordered by the United Nations under the completion strategy. Appeals must be finished by 2010. One option would be to move the case to Croatia under tribunal rules allowing the transfer of certain cases to local courts, though both Josipovic and Karnavas doubt this will happen. "It's unlikely," said Josipovic. But it's not just the Operation Storm trial preventing the tribunal from winding up on time. The trial of Vojislav Seselj has also been delayed after the Serbian ultranationalist went on a hunger strike. Seselj, a close ally of the late Yugoslav president Slobadan Milosevic, is charged with the extermination, murder, persecution, deportation and forcible transfer of non-Serbs in Croatia and Bosnia from 1991-1995. "It strikes me they are not going to finish by 2008," said William Schabas, director of the Irish Centre for Human Rights at the National University of Ireland "Everyone is resigned to the fact they aren't going to finish. The Security Council has known for some time that it's unrealistic." He points out that trials are by their very nature unpredictable and that delays are essential to ensure that the rules and procedures of international law are properly followed. Extending the court's mandate would require the backing of all Security Council members. At a meeting in December, the US, the UK and France supported keeping the ICTY open until all suspects were tried. Human rights groups and victims have also called for an extension but China, Russia and Japan are all opposed. Their argument is that even if the tribunal continues on, there is no guarantee that two of the most wanted indictees - Bosnian Serbs Ratko Mladic and Radovan Karadzic - would be brought to The Hague anytime soon. Whatever the Security Council decides, Schabas says it's important to keep the big picture in mind when thinking about the court's future. The issue of indicted war crimes perpetrators will be facing the international community for years to come, and he says that of how to best allocate resources so that justice is met is one that won't go away. Lisa Clifford and Sara Goodman are IWPR reporters in The Hague. BRIEFLY NOTED: DATE SET FOR MACEDONIAN TRIAL Defendants charged with crimes in ethnic Albanian region of Macedonia. By Sara Goodman in The Hague The trial of the only two Macedonian indictees before the Hague tribunal will start later this month. The former minister of the interior, Ljube Boskoski, and his ex-bodyguard, Johan Tarculovski, are charged with murder, destruction of cities, towns and villages and cruel treatment of the inhabitants of the predominately ethnic Albanian village of Ljuboten in Macedonia on August 12, 2001. At a pre-trial conference this week, Judge Kevin Parker said the trial would begin on April 16 with an opening statement from prosecutors. The trial will then break until May 7, when the prosecution will present its first witnesses. Judge Parker said there have been problems securing translations of important documents for the defence, and the three-week delay was necessary to allow the lawyers enough time to prepare properly. The judge accepted the defence's claim that technical problems, preventing it from using electronically submitted files from the prosecution, meant it took longer to translate and examine the documents. The three-week delay is "likely to overcome most of the problems with translation and resolve any other issues as well", said Judge Parker. He apologised to witnesses having to rearrange their travel plans, but said the delay was necessary for a fair trial. The trial is expected to be short, with prosecutors estimating they will need about 11 weeks to present their case. Sara Goodman is an IWPR reporter in The Hague *** NIKOLIC TRANSFERRED TO FINLAND Senior Bosnian Serb officer joins the more than twenty Hague convicts serving time in European jails. By Sara Goodman in The Hague A high-ranking member of the Bosnian Serb army was this week transferred to a Finnish jail to serve his 20-year sentence. Momir Nikolic, assistant commander for security and intelligence in the Bratunac Brigade, pleaded guilty in 2003 to charges of persecutions on political, racial and religious grounds. He was initially sentenced to 27 years for his role in the organisation and coordination of the 1995 Srebrenica massacre, as well as subsequent human rights abuses in the towns of Potocari, Bratunac and Zvornik. Under a plea deal, he testified at the trial of Vidoje Blagojevic and Dragan Jokic, who were also indicted for their roles in the killings in Srebrenica. Nikolic appealed his sentence in 2003, and it was reduced to 20 years in March 2006 after the appeals chamber found that the ruling failed to take his cooperation with the prosecution into account. The tribunal has ruled that the killing of Bosnian men and boys at Srebrenica was genocide, the only such classification from the 1992-1995 Bosnian war. Around 25 other persons convicted by the Hague tribunal are in prisons in Austria, Britain, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy and Spain. Sara Goodman is an IWPR reporter in The Hague. OTHER NEWS RADAK RETRIAL, SREBRENICA REMEMBRANCE, CAPTIAN DRAGAN EXTRADITION By IWPR reporters in The Hague Serbia's Supreme Court has ordered the retrial of a former paramilitary member, Sasa Radak, convicted of killing prisoners during the 1991 siege of the Croatian town of Vukovar. The Tanjug news agency reported that the court overturned the 20-year sentence handed down by the Belgrade war crimes court last September, citing "serious breaches of criminal trial regulations". According to Tanjug, the court ruled that "the verdict was based on insufficiently established facts". Radak was found guilty of participating in the November 1991 execution of 200 Croatian prisoners in Ovcara, near Vukovar. The victims were machine- gunned and their bodies buried in a pit at a pig farm in Ovcara. Fourteen other members of local territorial defence units and volunteers were tried separately for the same crimes. Their 20-year sentences were all overturned in December last year and their retrial began in March. All have pleaded not guilty to the charges. Radak will remain in custody until his new trial begins. *** Survivors of the 1995 Srebrenica massacre this week appealed to Bosnian authorities to make the anniversary of the biggest single atrocity in Europe since World War II a national day of remembrance. A group representing Srebrenica survivors and relatives of the victims sent this request to Bosnia's central government and parliament. Members of the Bosnian joint presidency have also been asked to support this initiative. Some 8,000 Muslim men and boys were killed in July 1995, when Srebrenica fell to Bosnian Serb forces on July 11, 1995. *** An Australian court has decided to extradite to Croatia former Serb paramilitary leader Dragan Vasiljkovic, accused of having committed war crimes in Croatia in the early Nineties. As Belgrade Television B92 reported this week, Vasiljkovic, also known as Captain Dragan, has 15 days to appeal the decision in Australia's Federal Court. Croatia holds Vasiljkovic responsible for torturing and killing Croat soldiers and civilians when he commanded a Serb paramilitary unit during Croatia's 1991-95 war of independence. The Croatian authorities believe he was a Serb paramilitary leader, personally responsible for a number of serious war crimes committed in the early 1990s. He is accused of commanding a unit of the Serbian Red Beret paramilitaries, which allegedly killed civilians, raped women and executed hospital patients. According to court documents, he had lived in Australia since 1969 but left the country in the early 1990s to fight in the Balkans. After the war, Vasiljkovic returned to live in Perth in Western Australia, where he worked as a golf instructor until his arrest in January last year. If he fails to win an appeal against the ruling, Vasiljkovic will become the first person to be extradited from Australia to face war crimes charges. **** www.iwpr.net ******************************************************************** TRIBUNAL UPDATE, the publication arm of IWPR's International Justice Project, produced since 1996, details the events and issues at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, ICTY, at The Hague. These weekly reports, produced by IWPR's human rights and media training project, seek to contribute to regional and international understanding of the war crimes prosecution process. The opinions expressed in Tribunal Update are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of the publication or of IWPR. Tribunal Update is supported by the European Commission, the Dutch Ministry for Development and Cooperation, the Swedish International Development and Cooperation Agency, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, and other funders. IWPR also acknowledges general support from the Ford Foundation. TRIBUNAL UPDATE: Editor-in-Chief: Anthony Borden; Managing Editor: Yigal Chazan; Senior Editor: John MacLeod; International Justice Senior Editor: Merdijana Sadovic; International Justice Project Manager: Katy Glassborow; Reporter: Caroline Tosh; Translation: Predrag Brebanovic, and others. IWPR Project Development and Support: Executive Director: Anthony Borden; Strategy & Assessment Director: Alan Davis; Managing Director: Tim Williams. **** www.iwpr.net ******************************************************************** IWPR builds democracy at the frontlines of conflict and change through the power of professional journalism. IWPR programs provide intensive hands-on training, extensive reporting and publishing, and ambitious initiatives to build the capacity of local media. Supporting peace-building, development and the rule of law, IWPR gives responsible local media a voice. Institute for War & Peace Reporting 48 Gray's Inn Road, London WC1X 8LT, UK Tel: +44 (0)20 7831 1030 Fax: +44 (0)20 7831 1050 For further details on this project and other information services and media programmes, go to: www.iwpr.net ISSN 1477-7940 Copyright (c) 2007 The Institute for War & Peace Reporting **** www.iwpr.net ******************************************************************** If you wish to change your subscription details or unsubscribe please go to: http://www.iwpr.net/index.php?apc_state=henh&s=s&m=p
