War Crimes Prosecution Watch

The Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, War Crimes Chamber

Lazarevic et al: A total of 27 years' imprisonment
BIRN Justice Report
September 29, 2008

The State Court has announced a first instance verdict against the four former members of the reserve police forces for crimes against civilians in Zvornik.

The Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina announced a first instance verdict, sentencing Sreten Lazarevic, Dragan Stanojevic, Mile Markovic and Slobodan Ostojic to a total of 27 years' imprisonment.

The most severe sentence was the one pronounced against Sreten Lazarevic. The deputy commander of the prison, located in the offence court and "Novi izvor" buildings in Zvornik is sentenced to ten years' imprisonment. Dragan Stanojevic was sentenced to 7 years, while Mile Markovic and Slobodan Ostojic were sentenced to five years each.

"The indictees are guilty of war crimes against civilians. They deliberately violated the international humanitarian law, by mistreating detained civilians in the prisons and causing them severe physical and mental suffering," Trial Chamber Chairwoman Mira Smajlovic said. The Trial Chamber found Lazarevic guilty of crimes described in seven counts of the indictment. The Prosecution's allegation that he "forcefully slapped detainee Fahrudin Memic on an unknown date" was rejected, as this act "could not be characterized as causing of severe physical suffering". Among other things, Lazarevic was found guilty of having "beaten up detainees Ramiz Smajlovic and Nurija Nuhanovic", as well as allowed "various paramilitary groups" enter the prison and "mistreat detainees". "Sreten Lazarevic personally unlocked the door to members of those groups, who came to the prison buildings. This resulted in the severe abuse of detainees. Among other things, detainees were forced to put each other's genital organs in their mouth. This was confirmed by Ramiz Smajlovic, who was forced to do that to another prisoner," judge Mira Smajlovic said.

Indictee Dragan Stanojevic was acquitted of the charges contained in two counts but he was found guilty of having "unlocked the prison several times, thus allowing groups of Serbian soldiers to come in and mistreat detainees". Therefore he "encouraged causing of severe pain to detained civilians". Indictees Markovic and Ostojic were acquitted of the charges contained in one count of the indictment. Markovic has been sentenced for having "beaten up detainee Nurija Nuhanovic, together with Sreten Lazarevic, in July 1992". Ostojic has been found guilty of having "severely beaten Ramiz Smajlovic, in the summer of 1992, on the basis of an alleged suspicion that he had tried to escape from the prison".

Explaining the verdict, the Trial Chamber said that "the indictees undoubtedly committed the crimes charged upon them", adding that "it has been proved that the detainees, who were held in the prison, were unarmed and non-uniformed persons or civilians at the moment when they were captured". "The Court considers the facts that the indictees are family men, that they behaved in a correct manner during the course of the main trial and that there were numerous paramilitary groups in Zvornik in the period when the crimes were committed, as mitigating circumstances," the justification of the verdict states.

The four indictees do not have to cover the trial costs, because the Trial Chamber has concluded that "they do not have sufficient financial resources to pay for the costs". The Court has referred the injured parties to this proceeding to file civil suits in order to settle their property and legal claims.

Both parties have the right to appeal this verdict.

Bosnia ‘Needs to Unify Criminal Codes’
BIRN Justice Report
October 1, 2008

Constitutional reforms need to be stepped up and the Criminal code must be unified, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe urges Bosnia in a new resolution.

The Parliamentary Assembly in its latest resolution, regarding the rule of law in Bosnia and Herzegovina, noticed "progress made in the field of judicial reform" but also some remaining problems that are "the poor material working conditions of the courts and the lack of consistency in judicial practice as between the entities."

The Assembly welcomed the work of the War Crimes Chamber of the State Court in prosecuting war crimes, "while regretting the fact that inconsistencies still exist in the application of criminal law by various courts at a State and Entity level with respect to war crimes, which leads to inequality in the treatment of citizens, in light of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR)".

In Bosnia and Herzegovina currently five criminal codes are in place, one at the state level, two different ones at entity levels, the criminal code of Brcko district and in same cases even the old Yugoslav code is in use. The War Crimes Chamber has been performing work in Sarajevo, as a part of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, since 2004.

The Parliamentary Assembly has called on the authorities of Bosnia and Herzegovina to "further pursue the judicial reform, in particular, by improving the material conditions of courts, strengthening co-operation between judges, prosecutors and the police and promoting better consistency in the judicial practice at Entity and State level, notably by considering the creation of a state level Supreme Court."

Nevertheless, the Assembly calls on the state to "ensure the uniform application of the Criminal Code of Bosnia and Herzegovina at entity and state levels, in particular with respect to war crime cases and finalize without further delay the strategy to deal with the remaining war crimes cases."

In the resolution, the Assembly concluded that without proper reforms, "and in the absence of co-operation between the various structures and institutions at the level of the state and the entities, Bosnia and Herzegovina will not be able to make full use of the benefits of European integration.”

The Assembly congratulated to the country for signing a key pre-membership deal with the European Union called the Stabilization and Association Agreement, in June this year, but reminded that lot of has to be done. "Without fully-fledged constitutional reform, police reform, which was one of the preconditions for the signing of the SAA with the European Union, will be blocked and the recently adopted legislation may become inoperative," reads the resolution. "In particular" the Assembly called all the political leaders to "re-launch dialogue about the various reform proposals immediately after the October 2008 local election, in close co-operation with the European Commission for Democracy through Law (Venice Commission), with a view to drafting and adopting a new constitution before October 2010." The Assembly also drew attention to the "increase in nationalist and ethnic rhetoric," ahead of the October 2008 local elections which are due to be held on Sunday.

The same resolution condemned "the discrimination and violence against" against organizers and participants of the Sarajevo Queer Festival and journalists.

Bosnia was accepted as a Council of Europe member on 24 April 2002, while the government was headed by non-nationalist parties, in the only period after the war. To date, Bosnia and Herzegovina has signed and ratified 64 Council of Europe conventions.

Radomir Vukovic pleaded not guilty
State Court of BIH
October 1, 2008

At the plea hearing before the Section I for War Crimes of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) in the Radomir Vukovic case, the accused Radomir Vukovic pleaded not guilty. Radomir Vukovic is charged with the criminal offense of Genocide.

As alleged in the Indictment, there is grounded suspicion that as a member of the Special Police Force Unit of the II Šekovici Detachment, during the period from 10 to 19 July 1995, with the intent to partly exterminate a group of Bosniak people, the accused Radomir Vukovic participated in a joint criminal enterprise with the aim of forcibly removing around 40 thousand civilians from the UN Safe Area Srebrenica and execute more than 7,000 Bosniaks.

According to the Indictment, on 12 July 1995 the accused Vukovic participated in the search of Bosniak villages around Potocari aiming to expel them to the territories controlled by the Army of RBiH. On 13 July 1995 as further alleged in the Indictment, the accused Vukovic participated in capturing thousands of Bosniak men who were trying to escape from the UN Safe Area. On the same day, the accused Vukovic allegedly participated in escorting a column of about thousand of captured Bosniaks from the village of Sandici to the warehouse of the Kravica Farming Cooperative, knowing that they would be executed. After detaining the captured Bosniaks in the warehouse, II Detachment members started killing the captured Bosniaks by firing from automatic weapons and by throwing hand grenades. The Accused Vukovic allegedly participated in the liquidation of the detained Bosniaks by throwing grenades on them.

Warrant issued against Vlahovic
BIRN Justice Report
October 3, 2008

The Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina has decided to issue an arrest warrant against Veselin Vlahovic, known as Batko.

Acting on the State Prosecution's motion, the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina ordered Veselin "Batko" Vlahovic into one-month custody. Vlahovic is suspected of having committed crimes against civilians. The Court has ordered the issuance of an international warrant.

Vlahoviv has been on the run for several years already. The Prosecution considers him linked to several crimes, or actually 54 legally criminal actions committed against Bosniak and Croatian civilians in the Sarajevo settlement of Grbavica. Media suggest that Vlahovic was in Montenegro until June 2001, when he escaped from a prison, in which he was serving his sentence for banditry and violent behavior.

Although the Bosnian judicial organs have requested his extradition several times already, the authorities in Montenegro refused to extradite him, as he possesses the citizenship of their country.

Kovac: Trial postponed
BIRN Justice Report
October 6, 2008

The State Prosecution completes the presentation of evidence by examining a witness, who confirms that Pincic did take witness 'A' in order to rape her.

The continuation of the trial of Ante Kovac has been postponed due to the fact that a Prosecution witness and court expert failed to appear in the courtroom. According to the State Court, the court expert was not able to come "because he is abroad" but the witness did not provide the Court with a justification for his absence, though the Prosecution indicated that there might have been an attempt to put pressure on this witness.

“The witness was invited to testify at this trial at an earlier stage but he failed to appear. He did not specifically say that he did not want to testify but he did say that he was afraid, because somebody had tried to stop him on his way to his weekend house," Prosecutor Mirko Lecic said. The State Prosecution charges Ante Kovac, as commander of the Vitez Brigade's Military Police Squad with the Croatian Defense Council, HVO, with having ordered and approved the detention of Bosniak civilians in the premises of Radnicki University, cinema hall and the Public Accounting Service in Vitez. Besides this, the indictment charges Kovac with having raped witnesses A and B, who were detained in Vitez.

Judge Saban Maksumic says that that, after the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina has been provided with an explanation of this witness' absence, the Trial Chamber shall decide whether to issue an apprehension order. The trial is due to continue on October 10.

Djukic: Agreeing on evidence
BIRN Justice Report
October 7, 2008

At the trial for the massacre in Kapija in Tuzla, the Trial Chamber says that it had still not rendered a decision concerning the custody termination motion filed by the Defense of Novak Djukic.

The Trial Chamber has still not rendered a decision concerning the custody termination motion, filed by the Defense of Novak Djukic, in which the Defense called on the Court to release him on bail. "The Court is undertaking the appropriate checking. We shall render our decision once the checking has been completed," Trial Chamber Chairman Darko Samardzic said.

The State Prosecution considers that Djukic ordered the shelling of Tuzla on May 25, 1995, when 71 people were killed and more than 200 were wounded. In early September Djukic requested the Court to let him defend himself while at liberty, offering his apartment and a friend's apartment as a guarantee that he would appear at the court. The former commander of the Ozren Tactical Group with the Republika Srpska Army, VRS, was arrested in early November 2007. He has been held under custody since then.

At the hearing held on October 7 the Prosecution intended to examine medical expert Vedo Tuco, who was supposed to speak about the cause of death and types of injuries found on the bodies of the victims, whose names are mentioned in the indictment. "Considering the largeness and complexity of this case, the time, which has been made available to me, is extremely short. I would need a month or two to complete the task properly, in line with the technical and scientific standards," Tuco said.

The Trial Chamber proposed to the Prosecution and Defense to agree on the number of victims, whose cause of death is "not disputable", on the basis of the previous testimonies. This would reduce the number of documents to be considered by the court expert prior to making his findings.

It was also planned to present the Prosecution material evidence at this hearing but the presentation has been postponed until October 20. The Trial Chamber proposed to the two parties to "agree on which pieces of evidence can be considered disputable and non-disputable" in order to reduce the time needed for presentation of evidence.

Gasal et al: Witness apprehension warrant
BIRN Justice Report
October 8, 2008

The Prosecution asks the Court to issue a witness apprehension warrant.

The Trial Chamber will issue a warrant, ordering the apprehension of witness Kazimir Kajic, who failed to respond to the invitation and appear in the courtroom.

Prosecution witness Kajic was invited on several occasions but he never appeared before the Court. He was supposed to testify at the trial of Nisvet Gasal, Musajb Kukavica, Enes Handzic and Senad Dautovic. The four men are charged with crimes committed against Croatian civilians in Bugojno in the course of 1993 and 1994.

The Prosecution considers Gasal and Kukavica responsible for the functioning of the detention camp at the "Iskra" stadium. Enes Handzic, former assistant commander for security with the 307th Brigade of the Bosnian Army, ABiH, and Senad Dautovic, former member of the Joint ABiH Staffs in Bugojno, are charged with having participated in capturing of civilians and its planning.

If the court police apprehends witness Kazic, he is due to be examined at the hearing, scheduled for November 5, when two other witnesses will also be examined.

Veselinovic: Witnesses ask for protection measures
BIRN Justice Report
October 8, 2008

The trial of the former member of the VRS Military Police Squad has been postponed due to a request made by witnesses, who want to be granted certain protection measures, because they were exposed to "unpleasant situations".

The continuation of the trial of Rade Veselinovic has been postponed because the State Prosecution has filed a motion, requesting the introduction of protection measures in favor of two witnesses.

"Prior to this hearing I spoke to the witnesses, who asked for protection measures, including exclusion of the public, claiming that they were exposed to certain pressures after having testified at some other trial," said Prosecutor Vesna Budimir, who replaced Prosecutor Milorad Barasin at this hearing.

The Prosecution of Bosnia and Herzegovina charges Rade Veselinovic with crimes against humanity committed against the non-Serbian population in Hadzici municipality. The indictment alleges that Veselinovic, as member of the Military Police Squad with the Republika Srpska Army, participated in "the murder, forcible resettlement, detention and causing of suffering and bodily injuries".

Budimir explained that, "due to media reports", witnesses, who appeared at the trial of Boro Krsmanovic before the Cantonal Court in Sarajevo, "are judged and threatened by other citizens, who qualify them as good or bad Bosniaks". Boro Krsmanovic was sentenced, by a first instance verdict, to four years' imprisonment for war crimes.

The Trial Chamber asked the Prosecutor to submit the proposal for the introduction of protection measures, as well as an explanation, to the Chamber in writing. After that the Chamber will render its decision concerning the request.

The trial is due to continue on October 14.

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Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC)

Official Website of the Extraordinary Chambers
Official Website of the Khmer Rouge Trial Task Force
Official Website of the United Nations Assistance to the Khmer Rouge Trials (UNAKRT)

U.S. Supports Cambodia Tribunal
VOA News
September 25, 2008

The United States Department of State has announced that it intends to work with Congress to provide $1.8 million to Cambodia's cash-strapped Khmer Rouge war crimes court. If approved, it would be the first U.S. donation to the U.N.-backed genocide tribunal aimed at trying regime leaders. The court faces a shortfall of $40 million. Foreign donors have been reluctant to provide additional funds due to the allegations of graft and corruption by the court.

U.S. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack says the Cambodian tribunal has taken important steps to clean up corruption:

"While the court still has more to do, the ECCC [Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia] has made significant strides to overcome international concerns about corruption, mismanagement, and political influence, including adding a new international deputy administrator, strengthening management practices, and establishing procedures to deal with allegations of wrongdoing."

"Nonetheless," said Mr. McCormack, "the court must still take appropriate steps to address the current allegations and hold responsible those involved."

Much is at stake for the Cambodian people. The war crimes court is a means of long-delayed justice for those who suffered under the Khmer Rouge government. The regime was responsible for the deaths of more than 1,700,000 Cambodians from torture, executions, starvation, and forced labor between 1975 and 1979.

The United States strongly supports bringing to justice senior leaders responsible for the atrocities committed under the Communist Khmer Rouge regime.

Virtually all of Cambodia's 13 million people have relatives who perished under the Khmer Rouge. In order for the country to move forward, it is vital that Khmer Rouge leaders be held accountable for their crimes. Respect for the rule of law and the existence of institutions of justice are Cambodia's best defense against future abuses and a fitting memorial to those who lost their lives or loved ones to the Khmer Rouge.

Dispatches: Anglong Veng
Granta Magazine via The Women’s International Perspective
By Elena Lesley
September 29, 2008

Chit Leang does not know his real name or his age or who his parents were. He was a small child in 1975 when the Khmer Rouge seized control of Cambodia, he tells me, and his memories from that time come back as disjointed images. We talk outside his modest restaurant, our faces damp from the mid-day sun, and Chit describes, in vivid detail, the gunshots that called him to lunch each day and the flat plates on which his Khmer Rouge comrades spooned out watery rice porridge. What happened to his entire family, Chit does not know. Like so many other Cambodians, they disappeared.

Pol Pot’s grave is a short walk from Chit’s restaurant. The site is unmarked from the main road and it was Chit who showed me where to find the narrow path that leads to the grave, a mound of dirt covered by a rusty corrugated metal roof. Flowers and sun-faded glass bottles frame the place where Pol Pot was supposedly cremated in 1998, on a heap of rubbish and old tyres. An old man in poor health, he died in his sleep.

It was a quiet end for a man responsible for the destruction of his country. Between 1975 and 1979, the Khmer Rouge killed a quarter of Cambodia’s population – roughly two million people – through overwork, starvation and execution. Chit’s family were among the victims. Yet Chit remains friendly with his next-door neighbour, the grandson of an infamous Khmer Rouge military leader nicknamed ‘the Butcher’. And he politely serves customers who come to pay their respects at Pol Pot’s grave, those faithful Khmer Rouge holdouts who light incense and carry offerings of fruit and chicken. ‘They have their understanding and I have mine,’ Chit says.

After suffering through the nightmare of Khmer Rouge rule and a decade of civil conflict, most Cambodians have adopted a similar survival strategy – try to feed your family and refrain from becoming actively involved in politics. Although none of those responsible for Khmer Rouge atrocities had been punished for their crimes, the people of Cambodia understood they had to move on. Their momentum pushed the country forward, but crookedly, like a broken bone that heals without a cast. They opened shops and restaurants amid rubble and landmines. They struggled to raise children – roughly sixty percent of Cambodians were born after 1979 – who don’t learn about the Khmer Rouge in school and have trouble believing their parents’ and grandparents’ stories. Much of the population just tried to forget, to ‘dig a hole and bury the past and look to the future,’ as Prime Minister Hun Sen told them to do in 1998, after a series of senior leaders defected from what was left of the Khmer Rouge movement.

In this climate of pragmatism, some Cambodians believe that spending millions of dollars to put on trial a handful of elderly former leaders is absurd. It has been nearly thirty years since the Vietnamese ousted the Khmers Rouge from power. But domestic and international political interests have prevented the trials from happening until now.

That doesn’t bother the tribunal’s supporters, who believe a verdict on the Khmer Rouge period must be rendered before Cambodia can truly advance. For years, former Khmers Rouge have lived freely in the country, often side by side with those they persecuted. The country’s lack of historical accountability has created a lawless society, where rampant land grabbing forces the poor off of their newly valuable property and justice always has a price tag.

When I first came to Cambodia as a journalist in 2004, I saw the Khmer Rouge’s insidious legacy everywhere. In the twisted faces of beggars who had been permanently disfigured through contract acid attacks. Amid the ‘broken girls’ who turned tricks on Phnom Penh’s crumbling boulevards and the street children who huffed glue from dirty plastic bags. When a bright young student I knew was killed over a romantic dispute, I tried to find a way to write about it for my newspaper. The twenty-two-year-old had been gunned down in front of a popular nightclub, surrounded by witnesses, but because the triggerman was the son of a powerful official no one was ever arrested. After struggling with several potential angles for a story, I finally had to accept the fact that in Cambodia, the student’s death was not newsworthy. He was just another casualty of what scholars have come to call the country’s ‘culture of impunity’.

I returned to Cambodia this spring to write about the Khmer Rouge tribunal. While the society’s dark undercurrents continued to haunt me, even after I left the country, the warmth and resilience of its people had an equally profound impact. Through improving coverage of the tribunal, I hoped to play a small role in the country’s recovery, to help Cambodians confront and exorcise the demons of their recent history.

After a three-year hiatus, I found the country greatly changed, at least superficially. Cambodia’s first suburban developments (cookie-cutter mansions with reflective glass and neocolonial flourishes) are under construction outside of Phnom Penh. Several skyscrapers, including a gleaming gold-coloured tower, are planned for the downtown area. Yet the country’s feeble infrastructure can’t accommodate this scale of development, and the huge strain of such vanity projects frequently plunges much of the city into blackouts.

As Cambodia’s growth accelerates, so too does the disparity between the tiny elite and the impoverished masses. Impunity is endemic. Weeks before July’s national elections, an opposition-aligned newspaper journalist and his adult son were shot to death in the middle of a busy Phnom Penh street. Witnesses said the gunmen, who rode on a motorbike, made no effort to conceal their identities and even circled back to make sure they had hit their target. It was a brazen act. Yet there are no suspects in custody and little hope among Phnom Penh’s beleaguered journalists that the killers will ever be punished.

‘I want justice for the future, not for us,’ says Chhang. In his Phnom Penh office, surrounded by boxes of books, newspapers and archived documents, he describes how the Khmer Rouge cut open his sister’s stomach after she was accused of eating stolen rice and, thus, trying to sabotage the revolution. The survivors ‘are too broken and divided,’ Chhang says, ‘no one can compensate what the victims lost. But we need to leave a legacy for the country’.

That can only be achieved if those in custody actually face trial. And given their frail health and the glacial pace of the law, many Cambodians worry the defendants may yet elude justice.

‘The court moves too slowly. It needs to move fast, before the defendants die,’ Chit Leang tells me, lowering his voice and glancing nervously toward his neighbour’s house. ‘There are no words to say how angry I am. I want to know why they killed their own people. I want answers.’ Chit wishes he could travel to see the court himself, but the daylong trip to Phnom Penh isn’t practical. He has a restaurant to run.

If he could go, I am not sure how worthwhile he would find the experience. Although a tribunal lacking outreach and education will be meaningless, sometimes I think that the process underway is too abstract, too disconnected from everyday life in today’s Cambodia. A sleek, new complex on the outskirts of Phnom Penh, populated by international lawyers and judges who seem plucked from their homelands – robes, wigs and all – and deposited on this strange judicial island, the tribunal could not be more foreign to people like Chit. It was not designed to be accessible, physically or conceptually, to average Cambodians.

And yet, they come.

From the tribunal’s dusty parking lot, I watch survivors arrive for the pre-trial hearing of Ieng Sary, whose Foreign Ministry underwent a series of radical purges during the Khmer Rouge period. Organized and transported by various NGOs, the old men and women stream out of their buses. Most are peasants, with rough hands and wide feet, and they’ve dressed as if they were going to the pagoda – probably the only opportunity for formal wear in their home villages. The men seem a little uncomfortable in their button-down shirts, slacks and flip-flops; women are wrapped in long traditional skirts paired with sparkly, handmade tops.

Once they pass through parking lot security, they shuffle along a covered walkway that leads to the central court building. To the left, across a small field and past the wall looped with razor wire, they can see the yellow villa where the five defendants are kept. The court itself is impressive, but sterile.

The survivors settle into their seats. They watch as a man enters the courtroom from a side door, bowed over a cane, his free hand gripping a security guard for support. Thick spectacles, a hairline receded to the back of his head, Ieng Sary is the very picture of infirmity. He stares straight ahead, expressionless.

The scene unfolds in what looks like a giant fishbowl. A long, curved glass panel separates actual courtroom actors – Sary, the lawyers and judges – from those observing the process. In the front rows of the audience section are court staff and students. With their stylish haircuts and smart professional attire, they remind me of the young men and women I often see after work at the new Lucky Seven fast food restaurant, members of the country’s burgeoning middle class sharing gossip and study tips over gelato.

Just a few rows behind them, the Khmer Rouge survivors seem to occupy a different space and time. Men and women with deeply grooved faces, their eyes betray an expression I have seen too often in Cambodia. It’s a look I saw in Chit Leang, a glassy and disconnected gaze so unsettling it makes me want to turn away.

When the court breaks for lunch, observers discuss their plans for the afternoon. Having found the morning’s proceedings hard to follow, many confess they won’t be returning for a similarly tedious afternoon session; I worry that their time at the court had little impact. Until an overheard exchange gives me hope.

‘Are you going to come back for the rest of Sary’s hearing?’ an aid worker asks one of the departing men.

He pauses to think. ‘I’ve seen his face,’ he answers triumphantly. ‘That’s enough.’

Cambodian court ends prisoner segregation
Australian Network
October 1, 2008

Judges at Cambodia's UN-backed Khmer Rouge court have ended the segregation of five leaders to be tried for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The ruling lifts an earlier order keeping the jailed suspects apart to stop them possibly colluding to pressure witnesses or victims.

The judges noted investigators had had enough time to collect evidence over the past year while the suspects were in prison.

The five senior Khmer Rouge leaders, mostly in their 70s and 80s, are locked up in a one-storey bungalow just 50 metres from the courtroom where they are expected to go on trial within a year.

The first trials are expected to begin late this year or early 2009.

Lengthy pretrial detention at KRT sets bad precedent: experts
The Phnom Penh Post
By Georgia Wilkins
October 2, 2008

AS the lawyers for former "Brother No 2" Nuon Chea prepare to appeal an extension of his pretrial detention, legal experts have expressed concern that pretrial detention is becoming a norm rather than an exception at Cambodia's Extraordinary Chambers.

This week Nuon Chea's defence lawyers will file an appeal against their client's extended detention, claiming that there is insufficient evidence to renew the octogenarian defendant's imprisonment.

"So far there is no evidence [to justify] Nuon Chea's detention," said Son Arun, his co-lawyer. "They cannot find anything."

The former leader's detention was extended by a year earlier this month when his original one-year sentence came to an end.

Lawyers are concerned there is less of an imperative to follow the procedures of international law, which stipulates that detention before trial must be supported with evidence.

"When it comes to pretrial detention, the position in international human rights law is clear: Liberty is the rule and detention is the exception," Richard Rogers, head of defence at the ECCC, said in an email to the Post Wednesday.

"That means that the burden is on the prosecution to show that an accused person, who is presumed innocent, should be kept in detention pending trial."

The co-investigating judges claimed that Nuon Chea's extended sentence was necessary as there were "well founded" reasons to believe that he had committed crimes against humanity. His defence team will refute this, arguing that a factual basis for his detention has not been laid out.

Meet the conditions

According to the internal rules of the court, the provisional detention laws must set out the legal grounds and factual basis for a charged person's detention. They must also prove that detention is necessary to stop the accused interfering with witnesses or evidence or escaping persecution.

"Pretrial detention may be ordered only where [these] two conditions are met.... If the prosecution fails to satisfy these two conditions, the accused must be released pending trial," said Richard Rogers.

"Human rights bodies generally require that the factors justifying detention be discussed in a 'clear and specific' and not ‘stereotyped' manner. International and hybrid criminal courts have tended to accept more generalised justifications for detention,"Anne Heindel, a legal adviser for the Documentation Centre of Cambodia (DC-Cam) wrote in a recent article on Nuon Chea for the Cambodia Tribunal Monitor website.

Observers are concerned that the ECCC is following a worrying trend by international criminal courts to stray from human rights law.

"Human rights bodies ... disfavour[s] pretrial detention and place[s] the burden on states to justified continued detention," Heindel wrote.

"In contrast, international and hybrid criminal courts have treated pretrial release as the exception and in practice have placed the burden on the defence to show that release is warranted."

Ou Virak, president of the Cambodian Centre of Human Rights, told the Post Tuesday that he was concerned the extension defied a fair trial.

"The court needs to stick to the principles of fair trial for anyone, regardless of the crimes they commit," he said.

"The issue of burden of proof [at the ECCC] is a big issue for us," he added. "We believe the court is responsible to uphold the presumption of innocence, and if you put the burden of proof on the defendants, there is no longer this presumption."

Lawyers for Duch, whose real name is Kaing Guek Eav, have argued continuously that their client has been held illegally since 1999 and that this was a human rights abuse.

Co-counsel Francois Roux claimed after Duch's hearing in November last year that his pretrial detention contradicted Cambodian law as well as international standards for civil and political rights.

"There were never any reasons given [for Duch's detention renewals], they just kept extending it," Heindell said.

But the greatest concern for observers was the precedent it was setting for the already troubled Cambodian legal system. "What role model does it set for future governments? Will they do the same to activists? They will be able to make anyone a suspect," Ou Virak said.

Anne Heindell was also concerned about the legacy it left. "There is a long history in Cambodia of pretrial detention. If [the ECCC] wants to be transparent it needs to explain why [it makes its decisions]," she said.

"It's an important right, the presumption of innocence, and it's important for the court to take it seriously."

Cambodia's genocide trial delayed until next year
AP via Google News
By Ker Munthit
October 2, 2008

The start of the first trial at Cambodia's genocide tribunal is likely to be delayed until early next year because more time is needed to deal with an appeal for more charges against a Khmer Rouge defendant, officials said Thursday.

The news is likely to fuel further frustration among many Cambodians, who have been waiting for justice for nearly three decades after the Khmer Rouge held power in the late 1970s.

The communist group implemented radical policies considered responsible for the deaths of an estimated 1.7 million people from starvation, disease, overwork and execution.

The U.N.-assisted tribunal is attempting to establish accountability for the atrocities committed in 1975-1979, and the first trial had been expected to start last month.

The latest delay was caused by an appeal by prosecutors to have additional charges lodged against Kaing Guek Eav, also known as Duch, who headed the former S-21 prison, the Khmer Rouge's largest torture facility.

"The chance to have a trial for Duch could be in 2009, early next year," said Reach Sambath, a tribunal spokesman, but he was also unable to give a specific date.

The tribunal's pretrial chamber set Dec. 5 for a ruling on the prosecutors' appeal, said Helen Jarvis, the tribunal's public affairs chief.

"So there won't be anything before that," she said, also declining to be specific when asked about a possible starting date for a trial. She had previously said the trial for Duch was to open in September.

Youk Chhang — director of the Documentation Center of Cambodia, an independent group researching Khmer Rouge crimes — was not happy with the delay.

"What a shame. They surely can prolong the trials but not the lives of the defendants, including Duch," he said. "The hopes of the victims remain scattered at this moment."

The 65-year-old Duch is the youngest of the five Khmer Rouge who have been indicted, and all have health problems.

In August, the investigating judges concluded their yearlong investigation into Duch's case, ordering the defendant to stand trial for crimes against humanity and war crimes.

But afterward the prosecutors objected, saying the charges were insufficient as they might prevent a full accounting for Duch's criminal responsibility during his tenure at the prison.

They said they wanted Duch additionally charged with homicide and torture — crimes under Cambodian national law — and also with joint criminal enterprise for actions that occurred inside S-21 prison

Germany gives 4.3 million dollars to Cambodian Khmer Rouge trial
KI-Media
October 7, 2008

The German government announced it is increasing its support for the trial of former Khmer Rouge leaders in a press release on the embassy website received Tuesday. Germany said it had pledged an additional 4.3 million dollars for the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) 2009 and 2010.

"This significant contribution from the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) has already been announced to United Nations General Secretary Ban Ki-Moon," the press release stated.

"The German Government regards the Khmer Rouge Tribunal as an important step towards trying the atrocities committed by the Khmer Rouge during their reign from 1975 to 1979 and bringing to justice those responsible.

Furthermore the German commitment is linked with the expectation that the tribunal ... will become a model for the development of the legal system and legal culture in Cambodia."

It said the new donation brings direct German government support of the joint UN-Cambodian sponsored tribunal to about 10 million dollars in total, and Germany is also sponsoring a number of indirect support programmes.

It is the second-largest sponsor of the trials behind Japan.

Five former Khmer Rouge leaders are currently in custody for crimes they allegedly committed during their 1975-79 regime, during which up to 2 million Cambodians perished.

The first trial hearings are expected within months, according to court officials.

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Canadian Truth and Reconciliation Commission

Truth commission tied too closely to government: aboriginal groups
CBC News
October 8, 2008

Leaders raise questions about new executive director

Aboriginal groups are concerned that a federal government bureaucrat who is not aboriginal has been chosen to be the new executive director of the Indian Residential Schools Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

Aideen Nabigon, who has worked for the federal government on issues arising from the legacy of Indian residential schools, has replaced Bob Watts, former chief of staff to the national chief of the Assembly of First Nations.

Watts, who was seconded from the assembly to work as interim executive director, said this week that he was surprised that he received a letter last month saying the commission was activating the termination clause in his contract.

"I'm really at a loss to figure out what's going on except it's quite likely they're not honouring the job offer they made me," he said.

"I've put my heart and soul into this process and made commitments to survivors across the country that I was going to work hard for their benefit and not having that opportunity is tough."

While Nabigon has treaty status, Watts is from the Mohawk and Ojibway Nations in Ontario. He was directly involved in negotiating the residential schools settlement for the assembly.

Phil Fontaine, national chief of the Assembly of First Nations, said this week that he is worried that the federal government is behind the change in staff and that the appointment is another example of the federal interference in the commission.

"The issue here is not colour. The issue is competence and understanding and experience. That's OK as long as the independence of the TRC is not compromised in any way," he said.

Edward John, a lawyer and member of the Union of B.C. Chiefs, said the appointment is raising questions because aboriginal leaders believe that the executive director of the commission should not simply be a federal appointee.

The commission is charged with examining the legacy of abuse in Indian residential schools.

"We certainly want to make sure there is someone there who understands residential schools, who understands survivors, and not just another mandarin from Ottawa," John said.

Chief commissioner Harry LaForme defended his decision to hire Nabigon, saying he should have the independence to hire the person he thinks is best for the job.

"When it's interference and influence that's being attempted through aboriginal organizations like the AFN, then it's just me being accused of getting into bed with the federal government," he said.

"And I will defend the independence of the commission from that kind of influence as much as I will from the influence of government."

LaForme said the commission needs to strike a balance between the federal government and aboriginal interest groups and be independent from both.

He said Nabigon is an excellent choice for executive director. "She's worked on many aspects of the settlement agreement. I'm satisfied," he said.

"She's working out marvelously. I'm quite delighted with her work."

Last summer, the assembly protested another hiring. It urged LaForme to reconsider a decision to hire lawyer Owen Young, who had last worked for the Ontario government in a court case against aboriginal leaders.

The federal government formed the commission as part of the court-approved Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement that was negotiated between legal counsel for former students, legal counsel for the churches, the federal government, the assembly and other aboriginal organizations.

The commission has been asked to provide former students with an opportunity to share their experiences in a safe and culturally appropriate manner.

Its purpose is to create a historical account of the residential schools, help people to heal, and encourage reconciliation between aboriginals and non-aboriginal Canadians.

The TRC has a budget of $60 million. It was formally established on June 1, 2008, and is expected to complete its work within five years.

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Democratic Republic of the Congo (ICC)

Official Website of the International Criminal Court
ICC Public Documents - Situation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

Alleged warlord may stand trial after all
The Telegraph
By Joshua Rozenberg
October 8, 2008

The International Criminal Court has been asked to let Thomas Lubanga stand trial on charges of using children as weapons of war, now that the prosecutor has finally agreed to let him see evidence that could help his defence. But will this be enough?

A defendant can have a fair trial without being shown all the evidence that might help his defence, the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court argued this week. Luis Moreno-Ocampo is appealing against a decision by a trial chamber in The Hague to “stay” the trial of Thomas Lubanga, an alleged warlord from the Democratic Republic of Congo. For the background to the case you can follow this link to my most recent commentary while this link will take you to my first report on the case.

In his grounds of appeal filed on October 6, the prosecutor “submits that a fair trial does not necessarily require that all information collected has to be provided to the defence.” Instead, he maintains, “the trial will be fair if the accused has access to exculpatory information that he may offer into evidence at trial — or an equivalent that will protect his rights”.

And what might that equivalent be? It “may be analogous evidence, it may be a summary of the exculpatory information, it may be a stipulation, it may be the trial court's presumption or inference”.

There is good authority for saying that a defendant need not be shown everything — but Mr Moreno-Ocampo seems to be trying it on a bit, as the lawyers would say. The European Court of Human Rights acknowledged in 2000 that “there may be competing interests, such as national security or the need to protect witnesses at risk of reprisals or keep secret police methods of investigation of crime”. But the Strasbourg court ruled, in the same case, that “the prosecution's failure to lay the evidence in question before the trial judge and to permit him to rule on the question of disclosure deprived the applicants of a fair trial”.

And that, of course, is the point. In the Lubanga case, Mr Moreno-Ocampo had refused to let the court and any appeal chamber make a proper assessment of all potentially exculpatory evidence.

His response to the trial chamber’s insistence that potential appeal judges should be allowed to see the evidence was to complain that the trial judges were “affecting the rights of the prosecutor and the victims to an actual trial in order to preserve the fairness of a hypothetical appeal process”.

The prosecutor maintained that the decision to maintain a stay on the prosecution was based on a hypothetical argument — that it might not be possible for the appeal chamber to review the trial court’s decision — and that this question should be left for the appeal chamber to sort out if it ever became necessary.

On a visit to London this week, Mr Moreno-Ocampo gave a public lecture organised by the Centre for the Study of Human Rights at the London School of Economics. Every seat in the lecture hall was taken and stewards had to hold back crowds trying to get in, which I suspect was not the case across the road where the president of the European Court of Human Rights was giving a lecture sponsored by Kings College London on the relationship between his court and the European Court of Justice.

Despite the enthusiasm with which Mr Moreno-Ocampo was greeted at LSE, there was nothing new in the lecture itself, I thought — though you can judge for yourself from a recording for yourself on the LSE website.

During questions, I reminded the prosecutor (at 46 minutes into the recording) that he had pronounced himself “highly confident” in June that Lubanga’s trial would start in September. So would the trial go ahead, I wondered, and if so when?

Mr Moreno-Ocampo gave me a detailed reply setting out the background to the appeal he had just filed. His answer may be difficult to follow because he spoke very quickly in heavily-accented English.

But displaying a rather better understanding of the need for disclosure than he had shown in the summer, he announced that 90 per cent of the 156 documents previously withheld at the request of the UN could be could now be disclosed to the defence. “So the problem is finished, ”he promised. “And we are still reviewing this number, so it will go down from 15 to two — probably.”

Mr Moreno-Ocampo was “pretty sure that, once the judges reviewed the documents, the problem will be solved” and the trial would go ahead — though he now knew better than to predict when.

In his view, it was good that the court had demonstrated the importance of a fair trial — glossing over the fact that the case would never have been stopped if he himself had understood what this meant in the first place.

The prosecutor’s appeal will be decided by a court of five judges, headed by the court’s president, the Candaian Philippe Kirsch. If Mr Moreno-Ocampo really is willing to let Lubanga’s lawyers see most of the evidence and to allow the appeal chamber to see any documents that he still wants withheld, I suspect the judges will find a way of letting the trial go ahead.

But that does not mean the trial chamber was wrong to make a stand in the summer, when Mr Moreno-Ocampo was telling the judges they could not even bring the documents into their own courtroom. On that occasion, the court was right and the prosecutor was wrong.

Meanwhile, Lubanga’s continued detention remains on the very cusp of legality — though I suppose it may not matter very much if he is eventually convicted.

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The Trial of Alberto Fujimori

Fujimori on Trial

A Sentence Could Be Handed Down Early Next Year
Fujimori On Trial
September 29, 2008

One hundredth first session. The presentation of the evidence phase was initiated. The court started with the documentary evidence offered by the prosecution, after which the attorneys for the civil party (the victims' attorneys) will present, and Alberto Fujimori's defense attorney will finish. According to how long this session has lasted, we can calculate that this phase will last two months, so the sentence from this criminal process could be issued early next year. The Court stressed that all parties be accurate and brief.

1. Incidents of the criminal process still have not brought evidence to the court.

To begin the session, the secretary informed the Court that she still needed to add sixteen certified copies of evidence offered by Fujimori's defense counsel because currently none of the documents submitted by defense counsel have been certified.

Faced with this situation, the Court reiterated to the appropriate authorities (the Ministry of Defense and the National Police of Perú), under a subpoena for disobedience, that this evidence must be delivered.

Likewise, the Court also reiterated for the third time to María Elena Castillo, the reporter from the daily paper "La República", that she must deliver the audio of the interview she gave with Jesús Sosa Saavedra, when he was a fugitive as the former agent of the Special Intelligence Detachment of the Colina Army.

The Public Ministry´s evidence

The documents presented by the Public Prosecutor served to show three themes: 1) the existence of a double strategy (one legal, the other illegal) against subversion; 2) Fujimori´s knowledge of the Special Detachment of Intelligence of Colina and its actions; and 3) Vladimiro Montesinos and his role as Alberto Fujimori's representative before the Armed Forces and the anti-subversive fight.

The head prosecutor, Avelino Guillén, presented, along with others, the following documents:

Alberto Fujimori's message to the nation on February 7, 1991. According to the Public Ministry, this message indicates that a small group of agents had already begun covert work to eliminate the Shining Path. It also proves that Alberto Fujimori "was aware of the NIS's actions down to the smallest detail" and "it shows the parallel strategy perpetrated the National Intelligence Service.
The book "Lecciones de este siglo" ("Lessons From this Century"), by Nicolas Hermoza Rios, a retired Peruvian Army general who was the General Commander of the Army for eight years in Fujimori's government. This book's prologue was written by Vladimiro Montesinos Torres.
The declaration of Jorge Nadal Paiva, a retired general, before the special prosecutor for human rights in December of 2004.

Also, the Public Prosecutor presented partial declarations offered in different criminal processes from: 1) Francisco Loayza Galván, ex asesor del NIS; 2) Edwin Díaz Zevallos, former head of the NIS; 3) Matilde Pinchi Pinchi, ex figurehead of Vladimiro Montesinos; 4) Santiago Fujimori, Alberto Fujimori's brother, and a current Congressman for the Republic; Federico Salas Guevara-Shultz and Alberto Pandolfi Arbulú, former prime ministers of the Fujimori regime.

"Vadivideos"

The Public Prosecutor offered the Court the written transcripts of three videos taped by Vladimiro Montesinos, in which he is filmed along with: 1) former heads of the armed forces, José Villanueva Ruesta, Antonio Ibárcena Amico, and Elesbán Bello; 2) Antonio Ketín Vidal Herrera, retired general of the PNP; and 3) Alberto Fujimori, in which the former President of the Republic gives a birthday speech to Vladimiro Montesinos.

These videos, which show various figures with power in the political arena, media, and religion, who did not know they were being filmed, are commonly known in Perú as "vladivideos", given that all were clandestinely made and made under the order of Vladimiro Montesinos.

The Civil Attorneys

The civil attorneys (attorneys for the victims) stated that the evidence they will offer will be limited to completing the work of the Public Prosecutor.

Disagreement of Fujimori's Attorney

Faced with the evidence at work in other criminal trials and presented by the Public Prosecutor, Fujimori's attorney presented several challenges, arguing that it would be "transferred evidence" and that Alberto Fujimori was not a part of the trials in which these statements were made. Also, the attorney asserted that the videos cannot be admitted in the criminal proceedings because they had not been displayed previously; therefore they should be declared inadmissible. Finally, the attorney stated that the evidence is faulty due to the likelihood that some documents lack signatures and official stamps, such as the "Plan Cipango."

However, they still do not know which documents the Court will ask them to present.

The Court said it will decide on this issue in due course.

2. Next session.

The next session will start on Wednesday, the first of October, and the schedule of upcoming meetings will be from 9 am to two in the afternoon.

Prosecution Continues its Oral Arguments against Fujimori
Fujimori On Trial
October 1, 2008

One hundred-second session. The prosecution continued producing documents seeking to show that Alberto Fujimori was the person behind the crimes committed by the Military Squadron Colina.

1. The criminal process against Alberto Fujimori for human rights violations.

The head prosecutor, Avelino Guillén Jáuregui, continued with his presentation of documents, which served to demonstrate Fujimori's criminal responsibility as a perpetrator of the crimes committed by the Military Squadron Colina. During this session, the documents presented as evidence (witness statements, instructive statements, supreme resolutions, official documents, newspaper reports) were used to prove two themes:

The forming of two different strategies to combat subversion (one legal the other illegal).

Fujimori and Vladimiro Montesinos contributions in the shaping of the Analysis Group (the team that, according to the prosecution, later became the Special Intelligence Squadron Colina.

1. The parallel strategy to combat subversion.

The prosecution presented evidence seeking to credit the shaping of the National Intelligence Service (NIS) as an operational strategy to combat terrorism. This evidence was also used to show that the management of the NIS budget and the expenditures reserved for Vladimiro Montesinos were both a result of express orders from Alberto Fujimori.

To prove this the prosecution presented two declassified documents from the United States Embassy that were from the beginning of the 1990s. These documents purposed to show the path that was followed to implement the dirty war strategy against subversion:

1.1 The first document, from August of 1990, shows the United States Embassy's assessment, on the account of an unidentified retired Navy official, about the existence of a dual strategy to combat subversion: a public strategy of respecting human rights and a confidential strategy of dirty war.

1.2 The second document expressed the concerns that the North American Embassy had because of Fujimori's government's lack of political will to investigate the Barrios Altos crime.

However, Fujimori's lawyer, César Nakazaki, argued that the documents had no probative value. With respect to the first document, he argued that even if the authenticity of the document is recognized, it will have no probative value because it is a declassified document from the United States Embassy that did not identify the Navy official. With respect to the second document, according to Nakazaki, it would actually provide evidence in favor of Fujimori because it shows that the Embassy recognized his commitment to human rights.

1.3 Supreme Resolutions of appointment: as ad honorem advisor of Cabinet of Advisers of the NIS, Vladimiro Montesinos; as head of the NIS, Julio Salazar Monroe, and as director of the Directorate of Military Intelligence, Juan Rivero Lazo, among others.

In this regard, counsel Nakazaki said that the documents have no probative because they are constituent documents (only show the designations, but do not prove that Fujimori directed a strategy of dirty war).

2. Fujimori and Vladimiro Montesinos' contributions in shaping the Analysis Group

The prosecution offered evidence seeking to show the dependence of the NIS Analysis Group on Fujimori, Fujimori's knowledge of the activities of this group, for which the presented the following documents (among others):

2.1 Efficiency Report of the greatest EP in retirement, Santiago Martin Rivas (chief operator of the Military Squadron Colina). This report highlights the virtues of Martin Rivas for having commanded, as a member of the Army, special operations of anti-subversion intelligence.

2.2 The migratory movement of the great EP, Santiago Martin Rivas

2.3 Two memoranda of Alberto Fujimori to the Minister of Defense, from June and July of 1991, which ask for presidential commendation and rewards for members of the Analysis Group. Fujimori's attorney, Nakazaki, expressed his opinion that these two documents do not show that Fujimori has provided such recognition to a group of annihilation.

2. Incidents outside of this criminal process

La Cantuta

The same day as this session, Judge Antonia Saquicuray annulled the Cantuta sentence given by the Military Tribunal on September 21, 1994, which sentenced Santiago Martin Rivas, Juan Rivero Lazo, Federico Navarro Pichilingue Perez and Carlos Guevara, among others. Therefore, she proceeded to open a criminal investigation against these retired Peruvian army officers.

Earlier, relatives of the Cantuta victims, seeking protection from the ruling of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (which ordered sanctions for all those responsible for this crime), asked the Supreme Council of Military Justice to annul the ruling of 1994.

Vladimiro Montesinos

The Peruvian Judiciary ratified the prison sentence given to Vladimiro Montesinos -imprisonment for nine years - for planning a coup in 2000, which would have been given if Fujimori had not been re-elected as President of the Republic that year. In this case, the Peruvian judiciary confirmed the conviction of then-Peruvian Army commander General Jose Villanueva Ruesta, for supporting this attempted coup.

3. The next session.

The next session will take place on Friday, October 3, from 9:00 am to 2:00 pm.

Prosecution presents documents seeking to show that Fujimori ordered the Military Squadron Colina to carry out the dirty war
Fujimori On Trial
October 3, 2008

One hundred and third sesion - The prosecution continued presenting documents with the purpose of demonstrating that Fujimori was the perpetrator behind of the crimes perpetrated by the Colina Military Squadron. In this session, the prosecutor sought to show the existence of a parallel strategy in the anti-terrorist fight, which was in charge of the Colina Military Squadron.

1. Incidents of the criminal trial

The probative evidence introduced by the Public Ministry-

The prosecution presented the court with the manuals of the Army regarding special operations of intelligence and army squadrons, as well as the Plan Cipango, through which the prosecutor seeks to show the implementation of a strategy of dirty war by the government of Fujimori:

1. Manual of Special Operations of Intelligence, ME-2830, of April of 1991. The prosecution explained that this document demonstrated that, by orders of Fujimori, the National intelligence Service (NIS), assumed an executive role in the planning and development of the parallel strategy of the anit-terrorist fight, which was executed by the Colina Group, as reflected in the Cipango Plan. That is to say, this is a normative document that allowed for the development of the document known as Cipango Plan.

2. Manual of Army Squadrons, ME-38-23, defined as "secret" and issued by the Army in April of 1991. This document reveals the existence of a doctrine of dirty war (parallel strategy), which allowed for the implementation and development of the activities of the Colina Group

3. Plan of Operations Cipango, of August of 1991, delivered by the secretary of the Cipango plan Marco Flores Albán this document was produced by the director of operations of the Colina Group, Santiago Martin Rivas, with the support of former agent Marcos Flores Albán, who testified that everything stated the Plan was executed and became a reality.

4. Other documents (receipts and plans of payment to collaborators) related to Plan Cipango.

Arguments the defense team of Fujimori.-

As predicted, the lawyer of Fujimori, Caesar Nakazaki, challenged the authenticity and lack of probative value of the documents presented.

1. With relation to the ME-2830, Nakazaki argued that no original manual existed and declared that the versions produced from the years 1999 and 2000 contained different text than that which was offered to the court in this criminal trial.

2. Nakazaki continued making arguments about the lack certification and authentication of documents, arguing that the lack of signature and seals on Plan Cipango indicated that at best it could only be treated as a transcription made after the crimes were perpetrated.

3. With respect to the document ME-38-23, the defense lawyer declared that this Manual is not an indication of dirty war, noting that the document does not explicitly mention that people should be killed and arguing that its use was limited to situations of conventional war (in an external conflict) instead of internal struggles against subversive movement. Additionally, the defense questioned the probative value of the Manual, even while recognizing it as an official document of the Army, arguing that the document did not indicate its application, since every manual of the Army is only doctrine, but is not an obligatory norm that has binding effect.

Incineration of documents.-

The Public Ministry maintained that the incineration of documents was a routine practice in the NIS, resulting in the incineration of the documents at issue including those in which Fujimori gave orders to the Colina Group. There remains an understanding of interrelationship between those documents, but the complete registration of the documents and the precise content of each individual document has been destroyed.

This practice (incineration of documents) already has been described in the court by one of the former advisors of the NIS, Rafael Merino Bartet. The Public Department maintains that the documents with the plans that would support the facts related to Barrios Altos and Cantuta, would have been burned.

2 . Next session

The next session will begin on Monday, the 6th of October, in which the Public Ministry (Prosecution) will present documents seized in 2002 by the judge Victory Sánchez. With these documents the prosecution seeks to show the existence of the Colina Group (the existence of this Group and the ones that perpetrated the crimes has been recognized by the lawyer of Fujimori), the use of the fictitious names by the military who constituted the Colina Group, the role of agents of intelligence, the delivery of weapons and money to the Colina Group, as well as the existence of a business of facade to conceal the existence of this Group: COMPRANSA

Prosecution Continues Presenting Evidence that shows Military Squadron Colina´s affiliation with Peru's Armed Forces.
Fujimori On Trial
October 6, 2008

One hundred forth session.

1. The Criminal Trial against Alberto Fujimori for Human Rights Violations

The documents presented in this session sought to show:

1) The conformation of the Military Squadron Colina within the structure of the Peruvian Army.

2) The Military Squadron Colina's activities, as a criminal organization charged with executing the dirty war; designed, planned, and executed within the National Intelligence Service (NIS) under Fujimori's orders.

3) Allocation of weaponry and logistic resources to the Military Squadron Colina.

4) Constitution of the company COMPRANSA (company that served as the facade of the Military Squadron Colina).

The evidence pertaining to the Military Squadron Colina:

1) Decisions of proceedings in which documents were presented as exhibits; these proceedings were conducted in 2002 by Judge Victoria Sanchez Espinoza and records were made in the files of:

a. The Army's General Command Headquarters.

b. The Office of Army Intelligence, which is found within the installations of the Army's General Command Headquarters.

c. The Army's Intelligence Service, which is also located in the back part of the Army's General Command Headquarters.

2) Minutes from October 31, 2002, which contain information that Marcos Flores Albán, former agent of the Military Squadron Colina, delivered documents confirming the existence of the Squadron Colina to the Public Ministry.

3) Various official documents, reports, memorandum, requests for withdrawals or fictitious casualty lists submitted by squadron members, sanctions, destination changes, exchanges.

All of the documents that were presented sought to prove the accusation of the Public Ministry: the Military Squadron Colina was formed within the organizational structure of the Armed Forces, which was comprised of active members of the Peruvian Army (that it was not a paramilitary group, but a squadron within the Armed Forces) and which depended on the National Intelligence Service (whose real leader was Vladimiro Montesinos).This squadron, according to the Public Ministry, executed actions planned during the Plan Cipango.

2. The Issue of Fujimori's Defense:

As might be expected, Fujimori's lawyer questioned the documents and said that none of them showed that Alberto Fujimori gave any order that the crimes of Barrios Altos and La Cantuta be carried out.

1) In the same manner, Fujimori's lawyer objected to the documents from the legal proceedings conducted by Judge Victoria Sánchez Espinoza, arguing that during these proceedings the only participants were the Judiciary and the Public Ministry; there was no participation on part of the defense of Alberto Fujimori, and Fujimori was not party to these proceedings.

2) Regarding the Act of Reception of documents of Marcos Flores Albán, Fujimori's lawyer asserted that the documents had no probative value because the information was given within a procedure of effective cooperation.

3) Finally, Fujimori's lawyer stated that none of the documents that were presented during this session's arguments made reference to the Plan Cipango.

3. Next Session.

There will not be a session Wednesday, October 8 because it is a non-working holiday in Peru. The next session will take place Friday, October 10.

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International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY)

Official Website of the ICTY

Sarajevo in the Palm of Mladic's Hand
SENSE Tribunal: ICTY
October 3, 2008

Aernout Van Lynden, former Sky News TV war correspondent, described what he saw and recorded in Sarajevo in 1992. He filmed the destroyed and burned buildings and the Sarajevans injured and killed in attacks. He also taped an interview with Ratko Mladic, who told him that he had ' Sarajevo in the palm of his hand'

The first prosecution witness called at the trial of Momcilo Perisic, Aernout Van Lynden from Holland, described today what he saw and experienced in Sarajevo in 1992 where he worked as a war correspondent for the Sky News TV. Perisic, former chief of the VJ General Staff, is charged with providing personnel, material and logistic support to the Bosnian Serb troops for the shelling and sniper campaign in Sarajevo from August 1993 when he was appointed as the chief of the VJ to the end of the war in November 1995.

Through Van Lynden's evidence, the prosecution wants to show the widespread and systematic nature of attacks launched against the civilian population of Sarajevo, highlighting the fact that Perisic knew the support he had provided to the VRS contributed to the commission of the crimes in Sarajevo. As the prosecution alleges, Perisic had information that his subordinates had either already committed crimes or were about to commit them; despite that he failed to do anything to prevent or punish them. The defense objected to the relevance of Van Lynden's evidence noting that the events he referred to in his testimony remained outside of the timeframe covered by the indictment. The judges decided to hear the former journalist adding that the defense, if it considers his evidence irrelevant, might later ask that it be stricken from the record.

Van Lynden came to Sarajevo in March 1992; he and his crew were housed in the former military hospital. From there he could see almost entire city. Over the next few months he and his cameraman recorded dozens of stories covering the shelling and sniper attacks against Sarajevo and its citizens. Some of them were shown today in court; they were played already at the trials of Slobodan Milosevic and Stanislav Galic.

Van Lynden met Radovan Karadzic, political leader of Bosnian Serbs, several times and in the fall of 1992 he was granted permission to come to Pale with his TV crew. He filmed the artillery positions from which Sarajevo was shelled and recorded an interview with the first man of the VRS, Ratko Mladic. Mladic told Van Lynden that he had 'Sarajevo in the palm of his hand'. In the footage showed today in court, Van Lynden described Mladic as 'man who feels no remorse, no doubt; a man sure that he is right and the world around him wrong and that his people are wrongly accused'. 'I hope that the UN Security Council will take measures to make it clear that we, Serbs, exist in this world for real, that we are not some aliens; that we have the right to defend ourselves', Mladic told the Sky News.

Aernout Van Lynden continues his evidence on Monday afternoon.

Serb ex-general says he is innocent of war crimes
International Herald Tribune
October 3, 2008

THE HAGUE, Netherlands: The former chief of the Yugoslav army told a U.N. war crimes court Friday he regretted the horrors of the Balkan wars, but insisted he was wrongly indicted for the atrocities.

In an opening defense statement, Momcilo Perisic said he bore no responsibility for Srebrenica, the 1995 massacre of thousands of Muslim men and boys, nor for the deadly siege of Sarajevo or other crimes carried out by Bosnian or Croatian Serbs.

"Never before have a commander and chief of the general staff of one army been held criminally responsible for crimes committed by members of the forces of another state or entity," Perisic said.

His trial began Thursday on 13 charges of aiding and abetting crimes carried out by allied Serb forces in Bosnia. He faces a maximum life sentence if convicted.

Prosecutors allege he provided crucial military aid to the rebels, including weapons, ammunition and communications equipment as well as troops and officers that enabled them to conduct lethal operations against the Muslims of Srebrenica and Sarajevo and to launch deadly rocket attacks on Zagreb.

The prosecution says its case highlights close links between the Belgrade-based Yugoslav army and Bosnian Serb forces commanded by fugitive Gen. Ratko Mladic during the 1992-95 Bosnian war.

The last time the court dealt with a similar case was the trial of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, which was aborted without reaching a verdict when he died of a heart attack in his cell early in 2006.

Perisic is a former Milosevic ally who turned against the dictator after the Bosnian war and warned Milosevic's regime against fomenting conflict in Kosovo.

He said he was proud of the role he played in what he called the "multiethnic" Yugoslav army and appalled by the horrors of the Balkan wars.

"I regret deeply that there were victims of crimes in the territory of the former Yugoslavia. I sympathize deeply with the families of the victims," he said. "Every life lost in war is an irreplaceable loss for society. But lives lost to crime are an even greater loss. I believe all those who committed crimes will face trial and will receive proper punishment and I hope war crimes will never happen again."

However, he insisted the evidence and his defense team "will prove my innocence."

Bosnian wartime commander arrested for extortion
Reuters
By Daria Sito-Sucic
October 4, 2008

Bosnian police arrested Muslim wartime commander Naser Oric on extortion charges, three months after a U.N. war crimes tribunal overturned his conviction for failing to stop the murder of Bosnian Serbs.

The police said Saturday they detained three people after finding a significant quantity of weapons and ammunition during raids on apartments in Sarajevo and the northern town of Tuzla.

"They are suspected of having extorted money over the last few years after lending it at excessively high monthly interest," a police statement said.

Oric, who organised the defence of the eastern enclave of Srebrenica during the 1992-95 war, was indicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) for war crimes against Bosnian Serbs.

The Hague-based court acquitted him of all charges last July, a move that angered the Bosnian Serbs who see the tribunal as biased against them.

The police said they placed Oric and two others in the custody of the Sarajevo judiciary.

(Reporting by Daria Sito-Sucic; Editing by Louise Ireland)

Karadzic wants access to evidence on alleged deal
International Herald Tribune
October 6, 2008

THE HAGUE, Netherlands: Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic wants U.N. war crimes prosecutors to turn over any evidence they have about an alleged deal he cut to avoid prosecution, saying he wants to use it in a motion to have his indictment dismissed.

In a motion released Monday, Karadzic asks the Yugoslav war crimes tribunal to order prosecutors to turn over any material they have about a deal he claims he made with U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke in July 1996.

Karadzic said in the motion that the deal promised he would not face prosecution if he "agreed to withdraw completely from public life."

He claims the deal is relevant to his case because Holbrooke made it on behalf of the U.N. Security Council — the body that established the tribunal. Holbrooke has repeatedly denied making such a deal with Karadzic.

Prosecutors did not immediately file a response to the motion.

Karadzic faces charges including two counts of genocide for allegedly masterminding atrocities by Bosnian Serb forces during the 1992-95 Bosnian war including the 1995 massacre of 8,000 Muslims in Srebrenica and the deadly siege of Sarajevo.

If he is convicted, he faces a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.

Karadzic was arrested in Belgrade in July after 13 years on the run from international justice. His former military chief, Gen. Ratko Mladic, is still on the run.

Hague upholds RSK leader's sentence
B92
October 8, 2008

THE HAGUE -- The Hague Appeal Chamber has upheld the sentence of 35 years for former Croatian Serb leader Milan Martic.

The verdict in Martic's case was delivered on June 12 last year and found him guilty of persecution, murder, deportation and other crimes against humanity, and violations of the laws and customs of war.

The former president of the Republic of Serb Krajina (RSK) was also accused of the bombing of Zagreb on May 2 and 3, 1995, when he attempted to halt the persecution of Serbs from western Slavonia during Operation Blaze by launching an attack on the Croatian capital.

According to the verdict, seven people died in the attack and 200 were injured.

Martic's defense team will call for an acquittal or a retrial, as the initial trial, they claim, was unfair. During the appeal, Martic said that he had come before the "Inquisition" at the Hague and that the verdict was delivered "according to the Western stereotypes that the Serbs are the baddies."

A key argument cited in this regard is a sentence uttered by Judge Justice Bakone Moloto (presiding), who asked one witness: "When you saw that they didn't want you in Croatia any more, why didn't you pick up your things and go to Serbia? Instead, you made problems for yourself and the Croats."

The Hague prosecution was also unhappy with the verdict, considering it to be too lenient, and they too filed an appeal calling for a sterner sentence.

Martic, a former police officer from Knin, was elected president of the RSK with, it is believed, significant help from Slobodan Miloševic.

At the initial trial, the judges took the view that as Miloševic's man in Croatia, Martic was complicit in the so-called "joint criminal undertaking", whose aim was the "creation of a single Serb state through the removal of non-Serbs from territory the Serbs considered as their own. "

Serbia Police Raids Target Mladic Supporters
Gulf Times
October 8, 2008

Serbian authorities are dismantling a network that helped hide former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic to tighten the noose around his wartime military chief Ratko Mladic, officials said yesterday.

"We have detained and began questioning several people suspected of being members of the network helping indictees Karadzic and (Stojan) Zupljanin," arrested earlier this year, said Bruno Vekaric, a spokesman for Serbia's war crimes prosecutor.

He said at least seven people were being questioned and 30 people were under investigation.

"We hope that will lead us to the system of hiding of Ratko Mladic," he added, referring to the former Bosnian Serb military chief is wanted for genocide and is one of last two remaining top fugitives.

Another is a Croatian Serb wartime leader Goran Hadzic.

Rasim Ljajic, Serbia's minister in charge of cooperation with the UN court based in The Hague, said Belgrade was "fully focused on locating Mladic, arresting him and transferring him to the tribunal" Beta news agency reported.

Ljajic said the UN court's chief prosecutor Serge Brammertz will pay a two-day visit to Belgrade on November 11 to assess Serbia's cooperation with the tribunal, a key condition for its integration into the European Union.

Karadzic and Mladic have been indicted by the UN International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY) for genocide and war crimes for the 1995 massacre of some 8,000 Muslim men and boys in the eastern Bosnian enclave of Srebrenica, as well as for the siege of Sarajevo during the 1992-1995 war.

According to Serbia's war crimes prosecution, the network includes several former top officials in several Serbian towns, who were in power until local elections in May, as well as police officials and one university professor.

Karadzic, arrested in July, and former police chief Zupljanin, his wartime adviser who was arrested a month earlier, are detained in The Hague, pending trials before the UN war crimes court.

"We have cracked a code register belonging to Zupljanin which has helped reconstructing the ways, helpers and places, as well as his movements and whereabouts since 1999," spokesman Vekaric said.

The probe showed that Zupljanin had stayed in Russia, France, Nigeria and Montenegro.

"We found out that he was in Moscow, Paris and Lagos, using the identity of a dead man," Vekaric added.

Karadzic and Zupljanin were both using false identities and had original documents issued in these names when detained.

Vukaric said the prosecutor's office would inform ICTY officials that Zupljanin has been extorting pressure on suspects being questioned in Belgrade, calling them from the detention in The Hague.

"He called one witness twice during the interrogation in the police and tried to instruct that person what to say to the investigators," Vekaric said.

Serbia's war crime prosecutor Vladimir Vukcevic said last month that the hunt for Mladic has intensified under Serbia's new West-leaning government, which took the office in July.

Mladic has been on the run since 1995 and has so far evaded arrest despite repeated pleas from the UN tribunal and amid mounting international pressure on Belgrade to hand him over.

He is believed to be hiding in Serbia as the authorities have admitted that he had lived in at least five apartments in Belgrade, where many Serbs still consider him a war hero.

Nine people have already been on trial since September 2006 before a Belgrade court charged with aiding and sheltering Mladic and helping him evade capture.

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International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR)

Official Website of the ICTR

Key Genocide Trials Depend on Judicial Reforms
Inter Press Service News Agency
By Aimable Twahirwa
October 4, 2008

KIGALI, Oct 4 (IPS) - Rwanda is hoping to convince the International Criminal Tribunal to change its mind over refusing to transfer three genocide suspects to face trial at home, paving the way for extradition procedures to start against dozens of others living abroad in freedom.

In rulings in May and June, the Tanzania-based ICTR blocked applications to hand over the three suspects on the grounds that they might not receive fair trials in Rwanda.

The three are alleged to have committed crimes against humanity in the 1994 genocide where 800,000 people, mainly ethnic Tutsis, were massacred.

In three separate but largely similar rulings, ICTR judges raised doubts about the independence of the Rwandan judiciary. Guarantees against outside government pressure on the courts were missing.

Judges also expressed concern that defence witnesses could face intimidation. The Rwandan witness protection programme was not robust enough to guarantee them protection.

Some judges were unwilling to hand over the accused because they might face inhumane prison conditions, including isolation and solitary confinement, if convicted.

The ICTR rulings were issued as its U.N. mandate for prosecuting the principle people allegedly responsible for the 1994 genocide draws to a close. All trials should be completed by the end of 2008, a goal which is unlikely to be met.

So far, ICTR judges have sentenced 30 people and acquitted five. Eight suspects are still awaiting trial.

The decisions to refuse to hand over the three are a blow to Rwanda's aim of securing the extradition of others who fled the country at the end of the genocide. In any extradition proceedings, suspects could cite the ICTR view that fair trial conditions do not yet exist in Rwanda, despite massive help from the international community.

In 2007, Rwanda rushed though a bill to abolish the death penalty, removing a major barrier to extradition posted by the ICTR and many abolitionist countries where the accused had fled.

Rwanda had a list of 97 people it wanted to extradite for allegedly masterminding or participating in the genocide, Tharcisse Karugarama, minister of justice, told IPS.

"Most of those wanted are still free … in many European countries and in North America."

Their return to face justice in Rwanda was essential for national reconciliation, Theodore Simburudali, president of Ibuka, one of the main genocide survivors' organisations, told IPS.

Rwanda has been allowed to submit written appeals against the blocking of the transfer of the three. Its lawyers will also be allowed to back-up their arguments by appearing before ICTR judges.

The ICTR recognised the progress that had made in reforming Rwanda's judiciary system, but "some more requirements" were necessary, Hassan Bubacar Jallow, the chief ICTR prosecutor, told IPS.

His comment suggests that ICTR judges could reverse their decisions if Rwanda could show it was introducing more judicial and penal reforms.

In reaching their decisions, ICTR judges listened to the views of four NGOs, including Human Rights Watch. HRW questioned the independence of the Rwandan judiciary.

ICTR judges ruling in the case of Yusuf Manyakazi, a former businessman and farmer, suggested that this concern could be met by having a panel of trial judges. Three or more judges were less likely to bend to pressure from outside than a single judge.

But Martin Ngoga, a senior Rwandan prosecutor, rejected any need for changes to the present trial system. "Rwanda has already put in place all the necessary mechanisms to guarantee the international legal rights of the accused to a fair trail," he told IPS. "Many of those who committed genocide have already been convicted in Rwanda and all trials have been carried out with fairness and impartiality."

NGOs also gave evidence to the ICTR about the poor prison conditions in Rwanda. Death row was abolished when life imprisonment replaced capital punishment in 2007, but inmates now serving life terms were said to be held in inhumane conditions, including solitary confinement. But Karugarama denied this. "Rwanda has already responded to these allegations", he said. Carina Tertsakian, a human rights activist and researcher, in her book, Le Château: the lives of prisoners in Rwanda, tells the story of life in Rwanda's prisons in the ten years which followed the 1994 genocide. "Forty centimetres is the standard width of a prisoner's individual space, where he sleeps, where he eats, where he sits, where he lives," she writes.

"Every aspect of prison life in Rwanda is defined by overcrowding."

Despite this, in March Rwanda qualified as the seventh country to receive prisoners sentenced by the ICTR to serve out their sentences. Adama Dieng, assistant secretary-general of the U.N., said at the time that he expected that Rwanda would take the necessary steps to implement this agreement. His comments suggest that Rwanda will be given time and help to improve its prison conditions before the actual transfer of convicted prisoners takes place.

(*The story moved Sep. 23, 2008 erroneously identified Carina Tertsakian as a researcher for Penal Reform International. Ms Tertsakian independently researched and produced her book on Rwanda's prisons which is published by Arves Books, London)

Negotiations For Guilty Plea Agreement Between OTP and Accused Fails
Hirondelle News Agency
October 8, 2008

Arusha, 8 October 2008 (FH) - The negotiations of a guilty plea agreement between the Office of Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) and defendant and key witness, Michel Bagaragaza, has failed, reports Hirondelle Agency.

The prosecutor had recognized in June the existence of a draft guilty plea agreement with the accused, a close associate of the family of the former President Juvenal Habyarimana, but had refused to reveal it while waiting for it to be validated by a Chamber.

The judges had followed this reasoning by refusing two requests of disclosure of the agreement, including one from Joseph Nzirorera, former secretary general of the National Republican Movement for Democracy and Development (MRND), the former presidential party.

"Because those negotiations were ultimately unsuccessful", this heavy hitter of the Habyarimana regime requested the reconsideration of the decision, notes the Chamber, in the introduction of its new order.

The three judges before whom Nzirorera and his two co-defendants appear, consider, in the text posted on the website of the Tribunal, that the collapse of the negotiations between the prosecutor and Bagaragaza, "constitutes a new fact". Also, they ordered the prosecutor to communicate the text "inter partes (between the parties) and confidentially".

Prosecuted himself for his alleged role in the genocide, Bagaragaza, 54, head of the tea company in Rwanda in 1994, is, in particular, accused of having contributed to create, finance, train and arm the Interahamwe militia, the main armed wing of the massacres which resulted, according to the UN, in nearly 800 000 killed, primarily Tutsis.

The former economic official, who feared for his safety after having testified against other ICTR defendants, had been detained in The Hague, Netherlands, since his arrest in 2005 until his transfer to the ICTR in May, after the cancellation of the transfer of his case to Dutch courts.

A first motion aiming at transferring him to Norway was rejected by the ICTR judges. The prosecutor had then turned to The Netherlands which had agreed to try the case.

But the transfer to the Scandinavian kingdom was cancelled in August 2007 by the ICTR judges, on request of the prosecutor himself who feared that Dutch courts who declared that they did not have jurisdiction.

Bagaragaza undoubtedly hoped, in his attempts to be tried in Europe, to see himself inflicted a sentence less severe than at the ICTR.

Ngirabatware transferred to ICTR
The New Times
By Gasheegu Muramila
October 9, 2008

A former Rwandan Minister of Planning accused of war crimes has been transferred to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR).

According to an ICTR communique, a copy of which The New Times obtained, Augustin Ngirabatware was transferred yesterday from Frankfurt, Germany, to the UN Detention Facility in Arusha, Tanzania.

The accused will soon make his initial appearance before Trial Chamber II composed of Judges William Sekule, presiding, Arlette Ramaroson and Solomy Bossa.

Ngirabatware is accused of funneling weapons to Interahamwe militiamen during the 1994 Genocide of Tutsis, which claimed over a million people.

Meanwhile, Rwanda has welcomed the move, saying that if other countries acted like Germany, there would be an end to impunity.

Aloys Mutabingwa, Rwanda's Special Representative to the ICTR called upon countries in the Great Lakes Region and Europe to emulate Germany and transfer the remaining 13 Genocide fugitives to the seat of ICTR.

"We are still concerned with the time it is taking to apprehend fugitives like Felicien Kabuga. We hope this transfer becomes a wakeup call to emphasize the need to intensify efforts in rendering justice," Mutabingwa said.

He also added that Rwanda doesn't expect such cases to add up to cause another request for the extension of the ICTR mandate 'unless it is justifiable'.

The accused is facing nine counts of Genocide, conspiracy to commit genocide; complicity in genocide; direct and public incitement to commit genocide; crimes against humanity for murder, extermination, rape, inhumane acts; and serious violations of the Geneva Conventions and of Additional Protocol II.

Initially, Ngirabatware was jointly charged with Jean de Dieu Kamuhanda, the former Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research who, in January 2004, was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment following a dismissal of his appeal in September 2005.

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Iraqi High Tribunal

Official Website of the Iraqi High Tribunal
Grotian Moment: The Saddam Hussein Trial Blog

U.S. denies transfer of Baath officials
Middle East Times
September 26, 2008

BAGHDAD, Sept. 26 (UPI) -- U.S. officials denied a request from the Iraqi government to hand over custody of former officials of the Baath regime facing war crimes charges, sources say.

In an apparent reference to negotiations centered on the long-term security agreement between Baghdad and Washington, the media arm of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, PUKmedia, said Friday Iraqi officials had asked Washington to turn over the officials as part of the deal.

Officials with the former regime, including former Deputy Premier Tariq Aziz and Ali Hassan al-Majid, or "Chemical Ali," are in U.S. custody at detention facilities in Iraq.

An Iraqi war crimes court in Baghdad sentenced Majid and several others to death for an ethnic cleansing campaign against the Kurdish population in northern Iraq in the 1980s. Aziz faces charges in the court for his alleged involvement in the deaths of several businessmen who were protesting rising food prices in the wake of the U.N. sanctions regime.

A source from the Iraqi government has told al-Hayat newspaper the suspects should be handed to Iraqi custody since it was an Iraqi court that is handling the court procedures.

The Iraqi court in 2006 sentenced former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to death for crimes against humanity. He was executed that December.

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Special Court for Sierra Leone (SCSL)

Offical Website of the Special Court for Sierra Leone
The Sierra Leone Court Monitoring Programme

The Netherlands pledges extra support for the prosecution of Sierra Leonean war criminals
Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs
By Staff
September 24, 2008

The Netherlands will be making an extra 4.5 million euros available to the Special Court for Sierra Leone. This was announced yesterday by Minister of Foreign Affairs Maxime Verhagen, who is attending the General Assembly of the United Nations in New York

The Court is mandated to try those responsible for war crimes committed during the civil war that ravaged Sierra Leone between 1991 and 2002. Its trial of former Liberian president Charles Taylor marks an important step forward in the international fight against impunity.

At a meeting with President Ernest Bai Koroma of Sierra Leone, Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende and Mr Verhagen pledged their continued support for the Special Court. 'The Netherlands is a leading donor,' said Mr Verhagen. 'This reflects our commitment to eradicating impunity and upholding the international legal order.'

Punishing those responsible for war crimes is important in achieving the lasting resolution of conflicts such as the war in Sierra Leone. The Court's legal expertise will also benefit the administration of justice by the national courts.

Ex-Liberia president, son face UN, US charges
The Associated Press
By Mike Corder
October 2, 2008

In separate courts on different continents, former Liberian President Charles Taylor and his American son are standing trial on charges of committing atrocities in neighboring West African nations.

The unprecedented father and son trials — one by a U.N.-backed war crimes tribunal in The Hague and the other by a U.S. federal court in Miami — are revealing the savagery of the conflicts in Liberia and Sierra Leone.

In Miami, a witness displays the scars he says came from burning plastic poured onto his skin in Liberia. In The Hague, a mother recounts how rebels in Sierra Leone ordered her to carry a sack containing the heads of her two children who had just been hacked to death.

The cases demonstrate that the days when war crimes suspects could flee and slip into obscurity to avoid prosecution may be drawing to a close.

Stephen Rapp, the U.S. lawyer leading the prosecution of Taylor at the Special Court for Sierra Leone, on Wednesday welcomed the trial of Taylor's son, Charles McArthur Emmanuel, as another step along the road to ending impunity for alleged war criminals.

Emmanuel is the first person ever tried under a 1994 U.S law that makes it a crime for an American citizen to commit torture overseas.

Emmanuel — also known as Chuckie Jr. — was born in Boston and spent most of his life in Orlando, Fla. before moving to Liberia when he was a teenager to be with his father. There, prosecutors say, he led a notorious unit blamed for silencing Taylor's critics.

Taylor meanwhile is charged with orchestrating atrocities by rebels in Sierra Leone from 1996-2002 while he was ruling Liberia.

Father and son have both pleaded not guilty.

National trials such as Emmanuel's send a clear signal that the countries staging them "are not going to be safe havens for war criminals," Rapp told The Associated Press in an interview.

They can also act as a deterrent.

"Many of the people who commit these crimes perceive that if they win they're in the presidential palace for life, if they lose they'll find exile somewhere and live comfortably," Rapp said. "We really want to eliminate that perception that you can get away with these things."

Temporary war crimes tribunals are currently prosecuting cases from the former Yugoslavia, Rwanda, Sierra Leone and Cambodia. The world's first permanent tribunal — the International Criminal Court — has launched cases in Sudan, Uganda, Congo and Central African Republic.

But Rapp said prosecutions by individual countries are just as important.

"These international courts will only handle in the future a relative handful of cases," he said. "One of the most important things countries can do is develop their own ability to prosecute war crimes, particularly of individuals they find in their midst."

Early witness testimony in Emmanuel's trial, which started Monday, has already exposed U.S. jurors to the kind of horrific claims regularly dealt with in the international tribunals.

Prosecutors say Emmanuel headed the "Demon Forces," an elite paramilitary anti-terrorist unit in his father's Liberian government from 1999-2002. The unit trained soldiers and tortured prisoners, prosecutors said.

Former prisoner Rufus Kpadeh testified Tuesday that detainees were forced to sodomize each other as Emmanuel laughed.

"I want the world to know what happened to me so it will not happen again in the future," said Kpadeh, who rolled up his tunic sleeves to show jurors scars from where he was burned with flaming-hot plastic.

Defense attorneys argue Emmanuel's accusers are fabricating the stories for financial gain and political asylum.

Only two witnesses were expected to testify at both trials, Rapp said. One has already testified under a pseudonym at the Taylor trial and the other, Liberian journalist Hassan Bility, is expected to testify at both trials about being tortured in Liberian prisons.

At the Taylor trial, prosecutors are trying to establish a pattern of brutality by rebels who they say were led by Taylor. They are calling victims and former officers under his command to tell tales of executions, cannibalism, torture and disfigurement.

On Wednesday, Osman Jalloh told judges that rebels hacked off his right hand — such amputations were a hallmark in the Sierra Leone conflict.

And in some of the most harrowing testimony since Taylor's trial started in January, a woman identified as witness TF1-064 said Tuesday she was forced into a house and had to listen as her two children and other members of her family were hacked to death outside.

Rebels then ordered her and another man to carry a bag containing the victims' heads to another village where they were dumped in a pit of water.

Liberia's Taylor case moving swiftly: prosecutor
Reuters Africa
By Aaron Gray-Block
October 3, 2008

THE HAGUE (Reuters) - The prosecution's case against war crimes suspect and former Liberian President Charles Taylor will be completed by January, the prosecutor for the U.N.-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone said on Thursday.

Taylor -- on trial in The Hague instead of Freetown to avoid possible unrest in Liberia -- has pleaded not guilty to charges involving murder, rape, conscripting child soldiers and sexual slavery during the intertwined wars in Liberia and Sierra Leone, in which more than 250,000 people were killed.

"We're presenting a lot of crime victim testimony, it's very dramatic testimony. Defence cross examination is actually fairly limited so the trial is moving forward very quickly," prosecutor Stephen Rapp told Reuters in The Hague.

"We have some hope before the end of the year, but certainly by the end of January we'll have concluded prosecution evidence."

Rapp said the strength of the evidence has exceeded his expectations. Taylor's defence lawyer was not immediately available to comment on Rapp's comments.

The U.N.-backed special court was set up to try those with the greatest responsibility for war crimes in Sierra Leone and is seen as an example to other tribunals that might try former rulers such as the Hague-based International Criminal Court.

Taylor, whose trial started in June 2007, is the first former African head of state to stand trial in front of any court.

TAYLOR'S SON

Meanwhile, proceedings started last week against Taylor's son, Charles "Chuckie" Taylor Jr., who is on trial in the United States under a 14-year-old U.S law allowing the prosecution of its citizens for acts of torture committed abroad.

Taylor Jr. is accused of taking part in summary executions and torture and Rapp said there are likely to be common witnesses to both Taylor's trial and that of his son.

He said one witness who told the Hague court three months ago he was a Sierra Leone citizen tortured by Taylor's forces in Liberia will give testimony to the U.S. court, while a Liberian journalist is also expected to give testimony after statements given to the Hague court.

Rapp said, however, the cases are not joint prosecutions, especially due to the fact the case against Taylor Jr. mainly involves crimes in Liberia, not Sierra Leone.

"But there is a relationship that we've submitted ... that Charles Taylor basically had a method of operation for being in power and of keeping power," Rapp said, adding that Taylor had used intimidation against the entire population.

A ruling is expected in the Taylor Jr. case in two months.

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Special Tribunal for Lebanon

In Focus: Special Tribunal for Lebanon (UN)

Names of Hariri Killers to Remain Classified Until Indictment
The Daily Star
By Andrew Wander
October 3, 2008

BEIRUT: The names of those implicated in the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri will not be made public by the United Nations commission tasked with investigating the killing, but will instead be passed to prosecutors at an international tribunal who will consider the evidence against them, a spokesperson for the panel says.

The names of people the UN believes were involved in the assassination - rumored to number around 120 - will only be released when the Special Tribunal for Lebanon issues indictments for the crime. There had been speculation that the names could be released before being passed to the tribunal, when the head of the UN investigation into Hariri's death, Daniel Bellemare, makes his final report on December 2. However, this notion was rejected by the commission's spokesperson.

"As Commissioner Daniel Bellemare stated in April 2008 when he presented his first report to the UN Security Council, no names will be disclosed by the commission throughout the duration of its mandate," Radhya Achouri said.
"Names will only be [made public] once indictments are issued by the Special Tribunal for Lebanon when and if sufficient evidence is established for issuing indictments," she added.

Her statement came after newspaper reports speculated that the names would be released along with a mass of information about how the killing was carried out.

Al-Anwar daily said that investigators had divided the suspects into four categories - planner, executor, interferer and information withholder - depending on their role in the plot.

The newspaper claimed that the final UN report would cause a "political earthquake" in Beirut by confirming that high-ranking officials were involved in the death of the former prime minister, who died along with 22 others in a massive car bomb explosion in Beirut in February 2005.

The newspaper said that the killers made at least three practice "dry runs" before putting their plan, which involved a suicide bomber detonating an enormous bomb, into action. The killing took about eight months to plan, the paper said, and senior members of the security services were aware of the plot. It cites wiretap telephone evidence in which a suspect said: "It's over. We got rid of him."

The UN investigation into the killing began at the request of the government in the months after Hariri's death. When the commission finishes its reporting process, a special tribunal will swing into action, initially considering the evidence gathered by the commission, before indicting and eventually trying suspects under Lebanese law.

Over the past three years, the commission has released periodical reports on its progress. Earlier this year it said it believed a criminal group - dubbed the "Hariri network" - had planned and executed the assassination after conducting surveillance on the former prime minister. But the report did not say whether the evidence suggested the motive was political.

Previous UN reports have said that they believed Syrian intelligence services had played a role in the assassination, an allegation that Damascus has always strongly denied.

Four high-ranking Lebanese security officials were arrested in 2005 in connection to the assassination and are still being held over their suspected involvement. The United Nations has refused to comment on their detention, saying that it is a matter for the Lebanese government to resolve.

Bellemare Pins Down Suspects with Direct Involvement in Hariri’s Killing
Naharnet Newsdesk
October 8, 2008

Chief U.N. investigator Daniel Bellemare has reportedly pinned down suspects with direct involvement in the 2005 assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

The daily As Safir, citing a U.N. source, said Wednesday that Bellemare would not disclose the names of the suspects.

The source said Bellemare is likely to announce in early December the completion of a major part of the probe and his readiness to take over as prosecutor general for the international tribunal to try suspects in the Hariri killing.
As Safir said Bellemare is also likely to announce before the U.N. Security Council in December the names of 120 suspects.

"But those 120 suspects are not accused of involvement in Hariri's assassination," the source said, adding that the international tribunal would interrogate them under oath.

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Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Liberia

Official Website of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Liberia

Charles Taylor Ordered Me To Execute People...Namayan At TRC Hearing
The Liberian Journal
By James Kpargoi, Jr.
September 30, 2008

MONROVIA- A top commander of the defunct National Patriotic Front of Liberia admitted that on two occasions then rebel leader Charles Taylor personally ordered him to execute people.

John P. Namayan, former special bodyguard to Mr. Taylor, told commissioners of Liberia’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) that Mr. Taylor ordered him to first execute a man accused of killing his wife and then another NPFL commander in Ganta, Nimba County, who violated the front’s leaders orders to close Liberia’s frontier with Guinea during the heydays of the civil conflict.

Namayan conceded that NPFL forces did not treat civilians with dignity, saying that they committed wide spread human rights violations including rapes and forced labor.

Mr. Namayan, former Deputy Director of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) and Deputy Commissioner of the Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization (BIN) was testifying Tuesday at the TRC’s ongoing “Contemporary History of the Conflict” Institutional and Thematic Inquiry Public Hearing at the Centennial Memorial Pavilion.

“Civilians were not actually treated with dignity. We did not have time to treat civilians with dignity,” the former chief of staff of the NPFL “Executive Mansion” guards said.

Alluding to widespread rapes by NPFL forces, Gen. Namayan confessed that women including underage girls were forced into sexual relationships.

“If we captured a place and…the commander told the people to come out and…he say he want to choose his own of women first and then he choose the women he wanted and left and then we choose ours and forced them to sleep with us, that’s human rights abuse,” he said.

He admitted that women having sexual relationships with fighters “did not do them” out of their own willingness, saying, “I don’t know how to classify it, whether it was rape or coercion.”

Mr. Namayan acknowledged that NPFL combatants extorted food and money from civilians and forced them to carry arms and ammunition on their heads.

‘We were not properly guided by the conduct of our commanders, the older people. Whatever we saw our commanders doing, we thought they were right and we followed their examples. We committed lots of human rights violations.”

He expressed penitence for acts directly or indirectly committed during his participation in the civil crisis but denied knowledge of massacres allegedly perpetrated by the NPFL.

“War is not good. During war so many things can happen and that’s what we continue to say that we were sorry for what we did and what we did not do that led to the suffering of our people.”

“Doe Never Had Knowledge Of Lutheran Massacre” --Armah Youlo Tells TRC
The News Online
By Alloycious David
October 4, 2008

A former agent of the National Security Agency (NSA) and aide of late former President Samuel K. Doe, Armah Youlo says the 1990 Lutheran Church massacre was never sanctioned by the former president.

Mr. Youlo, former executive of the defunct ULIMO said former President Doe never had knowledge of the massacre.

Appearing before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) Thursday, Mr. Youlo said former President Doe was upset when he received news of the massacre of people who had gone to seek refuge at the Lutheran Church compound in Sinkor.

He said the former President in the presence of several persons, including Mr. Wesseh McClain, former Minister of State, threatened to execute those who carried out the massacre.

Mr. Youlo said judging from Doe’s feature at the time, “I can put my neck on the line; he never had knowledge of the massacre.”

He said former President Doe grieved over the mass killings and said “they have done it to me again.”

His testimony at the on-going Thematic and Institutional Hearings of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) contradicted earlier testimonies from survivals that former President Doe was among AFL soldiers who carried out the massacre.

Hundreds, perhaps more than a thousand persons, were massacred at the St. Peter Lutheran Church in Sinkor allegedly by soldiers of the Armed Force of Liberia.

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United States

Guantanamo Prosecutor Quits, Says Evidence Was Withheld
Washington Post
By Peter Finn
September 25, 2008

A military prosecutor involved in war crimes cases here has quit his position, citing ethical concerns about his office's failure to turn over exculpatory material to attorneys for an Afghan detainee scheduled to go to trial in December.

Army Lt. Col. Darrel Vandeveld, a reservist, who declined to be interviewed, filed a declaration with a military court here Wednesday, laying out his concerns about the case and procedures in the military prosecutor's office, according to defense attorneys.

"My ethical qualms about continuing to serve as a prosecutor relate primarily to the procedures for affording defense counsel discovery," wrote Vandeveld in his filing. "I am highly concerned, to the point that I believe I can no longer serve as a prosecutor at the Commissions, about the slipshod, uncertain 'procedure' for affording defense counsel discovery."

Vandeveld's departure is the latest blow to the military trials process and a prosecutor's office that has been buffeted by resignations over issues of fairness. Other officials have alleged that the leadership of the military commissions is sacrificing principles of justice in a rush to secure convictions.

Vandeveld was prosecuting Mohammed Jawad, 24, who is accused of tossing a grenade into a military jeep at a bazaar in Kabul in 2002, injuring two U.S. troops and their Afghan interpreter.

"I believe [Vandeveld's] view is that there is a systematic problem with the discovery process," said Air Force Maj. David Frakt, Jawad's military attorney, referring to the prosecution's obligation under the law to turn over material to the defense even if it damages the prosecution's case. "He decided he could no longer ethically serve on this case, or generally."

Frakt said that Vandeveld wanted to reach a plea agreement that would allow Jawad, who was 16 or 17 at the time of the attack, to be released in the very near future. Frakt said there were serious questions about Jawad's guilt and that the government failed to investigate two other Afghans who he said admitted to Afghan police to having roles in the attack.

Frakt, speaking to reporters here, said he would seek to have the case dismissed because of "gross government misconduct."

The chief prosecutor, Army Col. Lawrence Morris, declined to discuss any potential plea agreement. He said Vandeveld resigned because he is "disappointed" his superiors "didn't see the wisdom of his recommendations."

"There are no grounds for ethical qualms," Morris said in a conference call with reporters here. "We are the most scrupulous organization you can imagine in terms of disclosure to the defense."

A Pentagon official, Brig. Gen Thomas W. Hartmann, was ordered by a military court to have no further involvement in the Jawad case last month. Hartmann was the legal adviser to the Convening Authority, a Pentagon office that is required to exercise a neutral role in the running of the military commissions.

The defense alleged that Hartmann wanted Jawad prosecuted for political and public relations purposes. And the judge found that Hartmann had compromised his objectivity.

Hartmann did not respond to requests for comment Wednesday.

Word of Vandeveld's resignation came on the same day that a military judge rejected a formal motion by Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the self-described operational mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, to disqualify himself because of bias and the possibility that his upcoming retirement could disrupt the process.

"It is clear you are retiring before [the trial] is completed," Mohammed told Marine Col. Ralph H. Kohlmann, the presiding judge, at a hearing earlier Wednesday, arguing that Kohlmann might inappropriately rush the proceedings. Three of the five defendants in the case, including Mohammed, are representing themselves with the assistance of military and civilian attorneys.

Kohlmann said Mohammed's claims were "completely wrong" and briskly rejected each argument offered as a basis for disqualification.

Kohlmann told the court during a hearing this week on his impartiality that he is scheduled to retire April 1 and has lined up a new job. Defense attorneys said that factoring in unused leave time, Kohlmann could be gone as early as mid-January.

Kohlmann, who is responsible for appointing judges to cases here, selected himself for the trial, the most-watched proceeding at Guantanamo Bay.

Navy Lt. Cmdr. James E. Hatcher, the lead military attorney for defendant Tawfiq bin Attash, said that if a new judge is appointed, a new round of pretrial hearings would be required and the new judge would be forced to reexamine earlier rulings.

That could set back a process that still lacks a trial date and promises to be protracted.

The loquacious Mohammed, as he does on most days, took the lead in speaking for the other four defendants, all of whom face the death penalty if convicted on various murder and war crimes charges.

CIA Director Michael V. Hayden has confirmed that Mohammed was subject to waterboarding, a technique that simulates drowning, among other tactics when he was held by the intelligence agency. But the Bush administration has argued that the coercive interrogation techniques it sanctioned did not amount to torture.

Defense attorneys said they will seek to exclude from trial all evidence extracted under duress. "Torture is at issue in this case," said Navy Lt. Cmdr. Brian Mizer, who is representing Ammar al-Baluchi. "It is going to be at the very center of this case."

Former Gitmo Prosecutor Blasts Tribunals
Associated Press
By Mike Melia
September 26, 2008

A former prosecutor testified Friday that breakdowns in the delivery of evidence to Guantanamo detainees could lead to wrongful convictions, saying his experience changed him from a "true believer" to feeling "truly deceived."

Testifying in the war crimes case he led before quitting this month, Army Lt. Col. Darrel Vandeveld said the government has not provided exculpatory evidence to lawyers for Mohammed Jawad, who is accused in a grenade attack that injured two American soldiers.

He said the embattled military tribunal system may not be capable of delivering justice for Jawad or the victims.

"They are not served by having someone who may be innocent be convicted of the crime," said Vandeveld, who testified by video link from Washington.

Vandeveld, the second former prosecutor to testify on behalf of a detainee this year, said the problem affects cases throughout the Pentagon's system for prosecuting alleged terrorists at this U.S. Navy base.

"This is a system that has existed for six years, and I think it is impossible for anyone in good conscience to stand up and say he or she is provided all the discovery in a case," said Vandeveld, who has blamed bureaucracy as well as ethical lapses.

The chief prosecutor for the Guantanamo tribunals, Army Col. Lawrence Morris, said there is no basis to Vandeveld's ethical qualms and his office complies "beyond what the rules require" in seeking out and turning over evidence.

"The idea of holding out the specter of a wrongful conviction is outrageous," he told The Associated Press, adding that defense complaints of unshared evidence typically involve mitigating material that would not have any bearing on a defendant's guilt.

He said the time involved in seeking out evidence from the military, the FBI, the CIA, and other agencies is a primary reason cases have not gone to trial faster at Guantanamo. The first trial was completed last month in the tribunals that have faced repeated legal setbacks, including a 2006 Supreme Court ruling that found an earlier system unconstitutional.

"It is because of the nature of this war and that there are so many elements fighting in it, information doesn't come in a tidy package," he said.

Jawad, an Afghan, faces a war crimes trial in January for allegedly throwing a grenade into a jeep carrying two soldiers and their interpreter in Kabul in December 2002.

As the lead prosecutor in that case, Vandeveld said he knew of exculpatory material including reports by Defense Department investigators that have not been turned over to defense lawyers. Some of the material concerns another suspect who allegedly confessed to the same crime.

The judge, Army Col. Steve Henley, ordered prosecutors to hand over those three documents by next Friday.

Jawad's attorney, Air Force Maj. David Frakt, is asking the judge to dismiss the case outright because of "gross government misconduct" including the issues raised by Vandeveld and alleged abuse in Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay.

"The world now knows that this is complete farce," he said.

Dressed in Army camouflage fatigues, Vandeveld told the court that he reached a turning point when by happenstance he discovered key evidence among material scattered throughout the prosecutors' office.

Flipping through another case file, he saw for the first time a statement Jawad made to a military investigator probing prisoner abuse in Afghanistan — an episode that helped convert him from a "true believer to someone who felt truly deceived."

Vandeveld said he become gradually disillusioned and even developed sympathy for the defendant, who was captured as a teenager and allegedly subjected to beatings and sleep-deprivation.

"My views changed," said the once hard-charging prosecutor. "I am a father, and it's not an exercise in self-pity to ask oneself how you would feel if your own son was treated in this fashion."

Vandeveld is at least the fourth prosecutor to quit in disillusionment with the tribunals. The former chief prosecutor, Air Force Col. Morris Davis, quit in October and later testified about alleged political interference.

On Thursday, Vandeveld refused to testify unless granted immunity. But he later changed his mind and indicated he was available, said Air Force Capt. Paula Bissonette, a tribunals spokeswoman.

Jawad faces a maximum life sentence if convicted of charges including attempted murder.

Despite Ruling, Detainee Cases Facing Delays
New York Times
By William Glaberson
October 5, 2008

When the Supreme Court ruled in June that detainees at Guantánamo had the right to challenge their detention in federal court, the justices said that after more than six years of legal wrangling the prisoners should have their cases heard quickly because “the costs of delay can no longer be borne by those who are held in custody.”

But nearly four months later, as the Bush administration has opened a new defense of its detention policies in federal court, none of the scores of cases brought by detainees have been resolved by any judge.

Since the Supreme Court issued its ruling, lawyers for most of the 255 detainees in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, have pressed ahead with habeas corpus lawsuits, yet most of those cases have been delayed by battles over issues like whether some court sessions will be held in secret, whether detainees can attend and what level of proof will justify detention.

Some of the arguments made by the Justice Department appear to challenge the Supreme Court’s conclusion that the federal courts have a role in deciding the fate of the detainees. One Bush administration argument asserts that only military officials — not federal judges — have the power to decide how to conclude wartime detentions.

Officials and lawyers inside and outside of the government say the new legal confrontation suggests that the Bush administration will most likely continue its defense of the detention camp until the end of President Bush’s term and is not likely to close the camp, as administration officials have said they would like to do.

“The legal issues that are being raised by the administration are going to take longer than the remaining time of the administration” to resolve, said Vijay Padmanabhan, an assistant professor at Cardozo Law School who was until July a State Department lawyer with responsibility for detainee issues.

“It is part of a broader strategy,” Mr. Padmanabhan added, “which is not to make difficult decisions about Guantánamo and leave it to the next president.”

Detainees’ advocates say that the administration is using the legal battle to delay judicial review of its evidence, while government lawyers argue that the cases are moving rapidly considering that they are unprecedented.

A Justice Department spokesman, Erik Ablin, said the government was working toward quick hearings for detainees, but was determined to take every precaution to avoid having dangerous people released. He added that “it is certainly the government’s goal to detain enemy combatants who are deemed a threat to the United States.”

Habeas corpus suits, which have their root in centuries-old English law, are generally streamlined proceedings for prisoners to force officials to explain why they are being held. The Guantánamo cases permitted by the Supreme Court’s ruling, Boumediene v. Bush, are to review the government’s reasons for holding the men as enemy combatants.

The military’s enemy combatant hearings, which the administration says permit indefinite detention, are separate from the Pentagon’s effort to prosecute some detainees in military commission trials.

A first test of a judge’s power in a federal habeas case may come on Tuesday during arguments in a case involving 17 detainees who claim a right to immediate release. The path to court has been slow for the habeas cases, and most seem unlikely to reach resolution until well into the next president’s administration, lawyers say. In some cases, government lawyers are adding new grounds for holding the men, supplementing or replacing the accusations made during Guantánamo hearings four years ago.

Lawyers say some of the government’s arguments could create grounds for years of new appeals by the Justice Department.

Many of the hurdles to moving the cases to court have been practical ones, including an initial shortage of Justice Department lawyers and the need to develop procedures for intelligence agencies to review classified evidence.

In August, Justice Department lawyers told the United States District Court in Washington that they could not meet their own deadline for providing initial responses to the cases. “The task has proven even more difficult than originally envisioned,” said a Justice Department filing.

The new schedule called for initial responses to 50 cases a month beginning in September. As a result, challenges by some detainees would not begin to move in the courts until January, the Bush administration’s last month in office.

Mr. Ablin, the Justice Department spokesman, said accusations against detainees might need to be updated because of the “changed legal landscape” and because intelligence collection might have changed what is known about detainees.

“It would be irresponsible,” he said, “not to update the courts with additional information gained over the past several years” that proved links to terrorism.

The government is relying extensively on classified information. That is quite likely to raise defense questions about how detainees can defend themselves since they are not permitted to see much of the evidence against them — long a contentious issue in the military’s hearings at Guantánamo Bay.

“Time is on their side,” Matthew J. MacLean, a Washington lawyer for four Kuwaiti detainees, said of the government. “Every day of delay is one more day our clients are in prison without a hearing.”

The habeas case scheduled for a federal court hearing on Tuesday involves 17 Guantánamo detainees who are ethnic Uighurs, a restive Muslim minority in western China.

In a separate case that was under way before the Supreme Court ruling in June, federal appeals judges issued a decision this summer that ridiculed as inadequate the Pentagon’s secret evidence for holding one of the Uighurs, Huzaifa Parhat, a former fruit peddler who said he had gone to Afghanistan to escape China.

Since then, the Pentagon has conceded that it would “serve no useful purpose” to continue to try to prove that any of the 17 Uighurs were ever enemy combatants.

The Uighurs say they have never been enemies of the United States, though they were in Afghanistan in 2002, where they were detained. They say they would be persecuted or killed if they were returned to China. The Bush administration says it has failed to find another country willing to accept them.

On Tuesday, a federal district judge, Ricardo M. Urbina, is to hear an urgent claim by lawyers for the Uighurs, that they should be released immediately into the United States since they are no longer considered enemy combatants.

The government argues that they should be held at Guantánamo until another country can be found to accept them. In filings, the Justice Department lawyers make expansive arguments that, while Judge Urbina can hear the Uighurs’ case, he cannot order their release. The judiciary “simply has no authority” to release the Uighurs into the United States, one filing said.

The Justice Department said the government’s executive branch, not the judicial branch, has the authority to conclude military detentions, as it has in prior wars. It noted that in World War II “no court ever questioned that it was solely for the political branches — not the courts” to decide how Italian prisoners of war were handled.

P. Sabin Willett, one of the Uighurs’ lawyers, said such claims appeared to be laying the groundwork for government appeals in the event that a judge orders a detainee freed.

The first full court hearing examining the evidence in a habeas case — this one involving six detainees at the center of the Supreme Court’s June decision — is scheduled for Oct. 27. Still, hearings for the vast majority of the detainees are unscheduled.

The Supreme Court justices said in their June decision that the detainees were “entitled to a prompt” hearing, but did not specify how prompt.

Mr. Willett said that while “prompt” might be open to interpretation, “I think they meant more quickly than this.”

Judge Orders 17 Detainees at Guantánamo Freed
New York Times
By William Glaberson
October 8, 2008

A federal judge on Tuesday ordered the Bush administration to release 17 detainees at Guantánamo Bay by the end of the week, the first such ruling in nearly seven years of legal disputes over the administration’s detention policies.

The judge, Ricardo M. Urbina of Federal District Court, ordered that the 17 men be brought to his courtroom on Friday from the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, where they have been held since 2002. He indicated that he would release the men, members of the restive Uighur Muslim minority in western China, into the care of supporters in the United States, initially in the Washington area.

“I think the moment has arrived for the court to shine the light of constitutionality on the reasons for detention,” Judge Urbina said.

Saying the men had never fought the United States and were not a security threat, he tersely rejected Bush administration claims that he lacked the power to order the men set free in the United States and government requests that he stay his order to permit an immediate appeal.

The ruling was a sharp setback for the administration, which has waged a long legal battle to defend its policies of detention at the naval base at Guantánamo Bay, arguing a broad executive power in waging war. Federal courts up to the Supreme Court have waded through detention questions and in several major cases the courts have rejected administration contentions.

The government recently conceded that it would no longer try to prove that the Uighurs were enemy combatants, the classification it uses to detain people at Guantánamo, where 255 men are now held. But it has fought efforts by lawyers for the men to have them released into the United States, saying the Uighurs admitted to receiving weapons training in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan at the time of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

The White House press secretary, Dana Perino, said the administration was “deeply concerned by, and strongly disagrees with” the decision. She added that the ruling, “if allowed to stand, could be used as precedent for other detainees held at Guantánamo Bay, including sworn enemies of the United States suspected of planning the attacks of 9/11, who may also seek release into our country.”

Justice Department lawyers said they were filing an emergency application on Tuesday night for a stay from the federal appeals court in Washington.

Judge Urbina’s decision came in a habeas corpus lawsuit authorized by a landmark Supreme Court ruling in June that gave detainees the right to have federal judges review the reason for their detention. Speaking from the bench in a courtroom crowded with Uighur supporters of the detainees, Judge Urbina suggested that the government was seeking a stay as a tactic to keep the men imprisoned.

“All of this means more delay,” he said with evident impatience, “and delay is the name of the game up until this point.” The centuries-old doctrine of habeas corpus permits a judge to demand production of a prisoner, a power Judge Urbina sought to exercise with his order that the men be brought to him.

“I want to see the individuals,” he said.

The Uighurs have long been at the center of contentious legal cases because they said they were swept into detention in Afghanistan in 2001 by mistake. They said they were in Afghanistan to seek refuge from China, where the Uighurs, Turkic Muslims, often bridle at Han Chinese rule.

The Bush administration has fought the Uighurs in court for years, contending that their encampment in Afghanistan had ties to a Uighur terror group. Last summer, a federal appeals court ridiculed as inadequate the government’s secret evidence for holding one of the men. In the months since, the government has said that it would “serve no useful purpose” to continue to try to prove that any of these 17 men were enemy combatants.

Lawyers for the Uighurs said the men would be persecuted or killed if they were returned to China. The administration said that since transferring five Uighur detainees to Albania in 2006, it had been unable to persuade governments to accept the other 17. Diplomats say many governments fear reprisal by China, which considers Uighur separatist groups terrorists.

The administration insisted during arguments on Tuesday that the courts did not have the power to release the men into the United States.

Judge Urbina, an appointee of President Bill Clinton, underscored the significance of his ruling with repeated references to the constitutional separation of powers and the judiciary’s role.

He rejected Justice Department arguments as assertions of executive power to detain people indefinitely without court review. He said that “is not in keeping with our system of government.”

More than 40 Uighurs, a few in native dress that included sequined velvet caps, watched in anxious silence. Only when the judge rose to leave the bench did they break into applause.

“Truth will win at the end,” said Elfidar Iltebir, one of the Uighurs, who is a computer systems manager in Virginia. Some of the men and women had come to court to describe the rooms, in the Washington suburbs, that they would offer the 17 men.

The ruling set the stage for a confrontation between the courts and the administration. John C. O’Quinn, a deputy assistant attorney general, suggested that immigration or Department of Homeland Security officials might detain the men when they were taken to the Washington area. Mr. O’Quinn argued that only the executive branch of the government, not the courts, could decide about immigration.

Mr. O’Quinn said such detainees would have no legal status in the United States. “Normally,” he added, “the law would potentially require them to be taken into some sort of protective custody.”

Judge Urbina said such arrests would not be appropriate. But he did not specify what he might do if the men were seized after being released by the Pentagon.

“I do not expect these Uighurs will be molested by any member of the United States government,” Judge Urbina said sharply. “I’m a federal judge, and I’ve issued an order.”

The Uighurs’ lawyers, Americans who have worked on the cases for years, had come to court prepared to outline a complex plan for support from community and church groups in the Washington area and in Tallahassee, Fla., where some of the men might eventually be resettled.

But Judge Urbina did not call for the testimony, saying he would hold a hearing on that matter on Oct. 16, after the men would already be free. He said he would impose conditions on their release, including appearances before him every six months. Lawyers for the Uighurs were pleased with the ruling.

P. Sabin Willett argued the case on Tuesday. In a crowd in the well of the courtroom after the judge had left the bench, Mr. Willett said there had been so many defeats over the years that he was not sure what to say at the prospect of the first federal case that might bring freedom to men in Guantánamo.

“We’ve had so many hearings where we didn’t even get half a loaf, we got a little crumb,” he said. “I’m emotionally unprepared for this.”

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UN Reports

Former Rwandan prosecutor found guilty of genocide by UN tribunal
UN News Service
September 24, 2008

A former prosecutor was sentenced to life in prison today after being found guilty of genocide, extermination and murder by the United Nations war crimes tribunal set up in the wake of the 1994 killing spree in Rwanda.

The trial chamber of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) found that Simeon Nchamihigo, former deputy prosecutor in Cyangugu Prefecture, instructed the Hutu-dominated rebel group known as the Interahamwe to seek out and kill Tutsis and moderate Hutus with the intent to destroy the Tutsi ethnic group and accomplices of the Tutsi-dominated Rwandan Patriotic Front.

The chamber also found that Mr. Nchamihigo took part in attacks on refugee places, with some of the massacres planned during meetings of the prefecture Security Council which he attended.

In sentencing him, the ICTR – based in Arusha, Tanzania – took into consideration that he had committed such crimes while serving as a Rwandan prosecutor.

The chamber noted that Mr. Nchamihigo, “as a deputy prosecutor of Cyangugu Prefecture, was in a position of public trust, yet he exhibited zeal in the perpetration of these serious crimes,” according to a press release issued by the Tribunal.

More than 800,000 people were massacred, mostly by machete, for being ethnic Tutsis or Hutu moderates during a period of less than 100 days starting in April 1994.

The defendant pleaded not guilty to all four counts against him when he first appeared before the ICTR in 2001.

Two Former Congolese Rebel Leaders to Stand Trial at International Criminal Court
UN News Service
September 26, 2008

The International Criminal Court has ruled that there is sufficient evidence to pursue criminal cases against two former Congolese rebel leaders for crimes allegedly committed by their militias in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) in 2003.

Germain Katanga, a senior commander from the group known as the Force de Résistance Patriotique en Ituri (FRPI), faces three counts of crimes against humanity and six counts of war crimes for a deadly assault on the village of Bogoro, in the province of Ituri. Hundreds of people were killed and many women forced into sexual slavery in that February 2003 attack.

Mathieu Ngudjolo Chui is a former commander of the rebel National Integrationalist Front (FNI). He faces three counts of crimes against humanity and six of war crimes, and is alleged to have played a key role in designing and carrying out the Bogoro attack.

Among the crimes the two men are accused of is using children under the age of 15 in active hostilities, including as bodyguards and combatants, during the deadly assault on Bogoro.

The ICC is an independent, permanent court that tries persons accused of the most serious crimes of international concern – namely genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.

Security Council extends terms of judges on UN’s Balkans war crimes tribunal
UN News Service
September 29, 2008

The Security Council today extended the terms of office of a number of judges serving on the United Nations tribunal set up to deal with the worst war crimes committed during the Balkan conflicts of the 1990s to help the court to finish its caseload at the earliest.

“The extension of the terms of office of the judges concerned will enhance the effectiveness of trial proceedings and contribute towards the implementation of the Completion Strategy,” the Council said in its unanimously adopted resolution.

Under the Completion Strategy for the Tribunal, which is based in The Hague, all trials at first instance are supposed to be completed by the end of this year and all appeals by 2010.

The terms of four members of the Appeals Chamber were extended until 31 December 2010, “or until the completion of the cases before the Appeals Chamber if sooner.”

In addition, 10 judges serving on the Trial Chamber and 14 ad litem, or temporary, judges currently serving at the Tribunal had their terms of office extended until 31 December 2009, or until the completion of the cases to which they are assigned if sooner.

Also extended until 31 December 2009, or until the completion of any cases to which they may be assigned if sooner, were 13 ad litem judges, who are not currently appointed to serve at the Tribunal.

Trial of former Yugoslav army chief begins at UN war crimes tribunal
UN News Service
October 2, 2008

The war crimes trial of a former chief of the Yugoslav army got under way today at the United Nations tribunal set up to try those accused of the worst war crimes committed during the Balkan conflicts of the 1990s.

Opening statements were heard at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), which is based in The Hague, in the case of Mom?ilo Periši?, a former chief of general staff of the Yugoslav army (VJ) and the most senior officer from the military forces to stand trial on charges relating to the conflicts in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in Croatia.

The 64-year-old is charged with crimes against humanity and war crimes, including murder, inhumane acts and attacks on civilians committed between 1993 and 1995 in the cities of Sarajevo, Srebrenica and Zagreb.

The indictment against Mr. Periši? accuses him, among other matters, of secretly providing significant personnel, material and logistical assistance to the Army of Republika Srpska (VRS) in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Army of Serbian Krajina (SVK) in Croatia.

He is charged with aiding and abetting the planning, preparation or execution of a military campaign of shelling and sniping in civilian areas of Sarajevo between 1993 and 1995, and of aiding and abetting the crimes of extermination, murder and persecutions in Srebrenica, where thousands of Muslim men and boys were killed in 1995.

UN mission in Kosovo reopens court at centre of dispute
UN News Service
October 3, 2008

The United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) today reopened the courthouse in north Mitrovica, which ceased operations after it was stormed and occupied on 14 March by a mob of opponents to Kosovo’s independence.

Nearly seven months since the attack, the courthouse will reopen to be staffed with UNMIK international personnel, including two judges, two prosecutors, legal officers and administrative assistance.

“The reopening of the court in north Mitrovica is a first step to ensure that rule of law is provided to everyone in Kosovo,” said Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General Lamberto Zannier. “I am pleased that Belgrade and Pristina are supporting this pragmatic development, which is in everyone’s interest.”

The UN envoy also acknowledged the need for regional participation in the court’s effective implementation.

“A court – like all rule of law institutions – does not stand in a vacuum. The Court’s success will require continued constructive actions by all sides and the support of the communities that it serves,” stated Mr. Zannier.

After it was occupied in March by some 40 people, including officers of the Serbian Ministry of the Interior, UN forces attempted to reestablish control of the courthouse on 17 March which triggered violent attacks on UN police officers – resulting in one death and 42 officers sustaining injuries – and the task force redeploying to outside of the city.

In the initial phase of reopening, the prosecutors and international judges will be dealing only with urgent criminal cases, and implementing UNMIK law and procedure. Local judicial workers and court staff will be introduced in the following phase, which will increase the court’s capacity to handle more cases.

UNMIK was established in 1999 following a Security Council resolution that authorized an international civil and military presence in the region as part of a settlement to the ethnic conflict in Kosovo, which has a predominantly ethnic Albanian population.

In February this year, the Assembly of Kosovo's Provisional Institutions of Self-Government declared independence from Serbia, sparking some protests from Kosovo’s ethnic Serbian population.

This week at the General Assembly’s annual high-level debate, many European officials – including Hungarian, Czech and Albanian representatives – reiterated the ongoing need for the presence of UN its international partners in Kosovo.

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