BIRN – Justice Report has been told by the Public Outreach Section of the State Court that Momcilo Mandic has provided the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina with two addresses, one in Eastern Sarajevo and one in Belgrade, to which it can send a summons.
“Mandic informed the Court of his address. This means that he will be able to appear before the Court as soon as we have determined the date at which the hearing will be held,” the Section representatives say.
Mandic failed to appear before the Appellate Chamber of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina at a hearing scheduled for June 10 this year, because, as it was announced, “the summons could not be hand delivered to him”.
By a first-instance verdict Mandic was acquitted of the charges alleging that he committed war crimes against civilians and crimes against humanity in 1992 when he was a senior official with the Government
of the former Serbian Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
In July 2007 the Trial Chamber rendered a decision, determining that the Prosecution had failed to prove the indictee’s guilt beyond reasonable doubt.
The indictment charges him with the “establishment and functioning” of penal and correctional institutions in Sarajevo and Foca. He is further charged with having led an attack by Serb forces against the Training Center of the Interior Ministry of Bosnia and Herzegovina in Vraca, Sarajevo, in April 1992.
The Prosecution of Bosnia and Herzegovina appealed the first-instance verdict on grounds of “substantive violations of the Criminal Proceedings Code and wrongly determined and incomplete factual status”, as well as the pronounced sentence.
The hearing was scheduled to take place before the Appellate Chamber in order for the Prosecution to explain the appeal and the Defence to respond to it.
Momcilo Mandic’s name is mentioned several times in the indictment filed before the Hague Tribunal, against Radovan Karadzic, former President of Republika Srpska. According to this indictment, Mandic was a member of a joint criminal enterprise in cooperation with Karadzic and other military and political leaders of Republika Srpska. These allegations are not included in the indictment against him filed before the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
