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The Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals in The Hague said on Thursday that it has rejected a request to introduce new evidence about the Srebrenica massacres and the wartime siege of Sarajevo at appeal hearings in the trial of former Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic.
Mladic’s defence had asked for documents related to the shelling of the Markale in Sarajevo, the Srebrenica violence in 1995 and the shelling of Sarajevo be included as evidence.
It claimed that the evidence undermined the court’s finding in the first-instance verdict handed down in November 2017 that he participated in four ‘joint criminal enterprises’ during the Bosnian war.
Among the documents that Mladic wanted to be introduced as evidence were a transcript of the British House of Lords’ questioning of former UN peacekeeping force commander Michael Rose, three declassified documents from the CIA’s Balkan task force, and an encrypted message from UN secretary-general Kofi Annan to UN peacekeeping force general Lars-Eric Wahlgren.
Although the request was rejected, appeals chamber chairwoman Prisca Matimba Nyambe filed a separate opinion from other members of the judging panel, saying that all five of Mladic’s requests should be approved in their entirety.
Nyambe said that she thought that “the requested material relevant, credible, of high probative value and exculpatory, adding that an obligation to reveal exculpatory evidence was essential for a fair trial”.
The UN court sentenced Mladic to life imprisonment in November 2017, finding him guilty of genocide in Srebrenica in 1995, the persecution of Bosniaks and Croats throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina, terrorising the population of Sarajevo during the siege of the city, and taking UN peacekeepers hostage.
Mladic appealed against the verdict, as did the Hague prosecution, which is calling for him to be found guilty of genocide in six other municipalities in 1992.
The UN court announced on Wednesday that it has postponed the appeal hearings, which were initially set for March 17 and 18, because Mladic needs an operation to remove a polyp in his colon.
The hearings should now place around six weeks after the operation, the court said.
Mladic, 76, has had several serious health problems while in detention in the Netherlands and has suffered two strokes and a heart attack.
A date for his final verdict has not yet been set, but the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals has said it will be delivered by the end of this year.
