Prosecution Challenges Karadzic’s Request for New Trial
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The prosecution of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, ICTY, has said that Karadzics request is unwarranted.
The former Bosnian Serb leader and ICTY defendant stated on August 13, that the prosecution was supposed to disclose all evidence before the beginning of trial in 2009, but it has since been revealed that it failed to disclose the statements and testimony of 406 witnesses.
Furthermore, the Trial Chamber had ruled that the prosecution had violated its disclosure obligations on no less than 58 occasions during the trial itself.
?The prosecution responded by saying that the trial had been fair from the beginning and should be allowed to go on.
In his motion, the accused does not show that a new trial is warranted, either as a remedy or as a sanction. Since he acknowledges that the Chamber has already found that he was not prejudiced by the prosecutions discrete failures to disclose material in a timely manner,”
“His argument that he should be granted a new trial as a remedy for so-called cumulative prejudice must fail, argued the ICTY prosecutors.
Karadzic is charged, as president of Republika Srpska and supreme commander of its armed forces, with genocide, crimes against humanity and violations of rules and customs of war in the period between 1992 and 1995.
His trial started in October 2009, and the prosecution finished presenting its evidence in May this year.
Karadzic is due to start presenting his evidence in October.
