Karadzic: Lessons Learned from Milosevic’s Trial
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Radovan Karadzic, former president of Republika Srpska, who is charged by the Hague Tribunal with genocide and other crimes committed in Bosnia and Herzegovina in the course of the war, asked the Hague Tribunal Chamber to reject the revised indictment proposed by the Hague Prosecution.
The Hague Prosecution filed the revised indictment in September last year. This indictment charges Karadzic, among other things, with genocide committed in ten municipalities and Srebrenica, as well as with participating in a joint criminal enterprise and crimes committed in 27 municipalities in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
“The proposed amended indictment is not much better. To prepare for and conduct a trial of such wide range charges will take years and years… If it grants leave to amend the indictment in its present form, the trial chamber must provide Dr. Karadzic with adequate time to prepare for one of the most complex, wide-ranging trials in history, and then spend many years holding a mega-trial on the prosecutor’s indictment,” the indictee claimed in his response.
Karadzic pointed to the length of time required to prepare and conduct the trials of Radoslav Brdjanin, Momcilo Krajisnik and Stanislav Galic, adding that the indictments against them mentioned the same crimes of which Karadzic now stands accused.
Brdjanin was sentenced to 30 years’ imprisonment for crimes committed in north-west Bosnia, Galic was sentenced to life imprisonment for crimes against civilians in Sarajevo, while Krajisnik was sentenced, after a first-instance verdict, to 27 years’ imprisonment for crimes committed on the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Karadzic specifically called on the Trial Chamber to bear in mind “the lessons learned” in the course of Slobodan Milosevic’s trial when it makes its decision concerning the Prosecution’s revised indictment.
“In its decision on the instant Motion to Amend the Indictment, the Trial Chamber has the opportunity to demonstrate that it has learned one of the lessons of the Milosevic trial. Dr. Karadzic respectfully urges the Trial Chamber to take control of the proceedings by limiting the charges in the proposed amended indictment,” Karadzic stated in his motion to the Tribunal.
Slobodan Milosevic, former President of Serbia, was charged by the Tribunal with crimes committed in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia and Kosovo. In December 2001 Milosevic pleaded not guilty to all counts contained in the indictment. His trial was never completed because he died in the Detention Unit in Scheveningen five years later.
Karadzic asked the Chamber to accept only a partial revision of the existing indictment.
“Amendments by the prosecution which would complicate the trial and thus delay its completion, should be denied,” Karadzic argued.
Radovan Karadzic was arrested in Belgrade in July 2008. He is now held in the Detention Unit at The Hague, where he is waiting for his trial to begin.
