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Theodor Meron, the president of the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals, said on Tuesday that he has asked the UN court’s registrar to give him information about the establishment of a secure system for online video communication between people inside the detention unit and on the outside, after Radovan Karadzic asked for a Skype connection in custody.
Karadzic filed his first request to be allowed to communicate with his family via Skype in spring of this year, but the registrar rejected his request, saying that the video communicationapplication was not secure enough.
The former Bosnian Serb president then appealed against the decision.
The Office of the Registrar said it was considering various options for a secure video communications system, and that it had organised meetings with the Norwegian government, which had a programme for the video broadcasting of trials, and the International Red Cross Committee, which had a system of communication for detainees.
Meron gave the registrar until August 12 to carry out the checks and provide him with information necessary to make a decision on Karadzic’s request.
Meron said however that in principle, he considers that “Skype should be available to detainees at The Hague”.
In March last year, the Hague Tribunal sentenced Karadzic to 40 years in prison after having found him guilty of genocide in Srebrenica, the persecution of Muslims and Croats throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina, terrorising the population of Sarajevo and taking UN peacekeepers hostage.
However, he was acquitted of genocide committed in several Bosnian municipalities in 1992.
Karadzic then filed an appeal with the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals, which was established in order to complete the work of the Hague Tribunal after it closes at the end of 2017.
The Hague prosecution also filed an appeal, asking that Karadzic be pronounced guilty of genocide in 1992.
The second-instance verdict is expected to be handed down next year.
