Prosecution expert witness against Mladic says mass grave indicate ethnic cleansing: Polish demographer Ewa Tabeau, an expert witness in the trial of former Bosnia Serb army chief Ratko Mladic, has maintained this week that individuals in a mass grave in Tomasica were killed as part of a campaign of ethnic cleansing. Tabeau has written at length about the war’s demographic effects and has testified in several trials at the Hague tribunal. In her report on the Tomasica graves, she identified a number of the bodies found in the grave as victims who had been killed in attacks on Bosnian Muslim villages. Defence lawyer Dragan Ivetic asked Tabeau how she had been able to differentiate between violent deaths occurring in combat and in ethnic cleansing, to which she replied, in part, “In my view, the deaths the killings of the Tomasica victims were part of the ethnic cleansing. And of course there are quite some results in my report that support ethnic cleansing considerably. I am speaking of ethnic cleansing, from my own experience. It is not the first time I have been working on the ’92 victims.” After Tabeau completed her evidence, the prosecution rested its case on the Tomasica mass grave and the defence case was allowed to resume. (Institute for War & Peace Reporting)
Srebrenica victims remembered at 20-year ceremony: Last week, more than 15,000 people attended the burial ceremony of 175 victims of the Srebrenica genocide, which took place on 11-13 July 1995. The ceremony took place at the Potocari memorial centre, marking the 20th anniversary of the genocide. Among others attending the ceremonies was Bill Clinton, the US president at the time. He apologized that it had taken so long to end the war. Clinton also made a specific point of praising the courage of Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic for turning up in the face of hostility from many ethnic-Bosnians. Vucic was chased away by protesters after he placed flowers at the memorial to the victims. The Srebrenica event began when about 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys died at the hands of Bosnian Serb forces amid the break-up of Yugoslavia in 1995. (Al Jazeera, BBC) (For additional information please click here)
US Federal Court rules that woman can be extradited to Bosnia for war crimes charges: A federal judge ruled that a Croatian woman, Azra Basic (BAH’-sich), can be extradited to Bosnia to face war crimes charges after living for years in Kentucky. In 2012, her attorney, Patrick Nash, filed court papers saying she was being held in violation of her rights as a U.S. citizen and asked for her release after Magistrate Judge Robert Wier ruled international treaties allowed her to be returned to Europe. On Thursday 9 July 2015, U.S. District Judge Karen K. Caldwell denied the petition, ruling the treaty cited for the extradition is valid and applies to the case. Basic is wanted in Bosnia on charges of committing war crimes against ethnic Serb civilians in 1992. She has been battling extradition in federal court since authorities arrested her in 2011 while she was living in Stanton, Kentucky. (ABC News)
Extradited Vasiljkovic pleads not guilty of war crimes before a Croatian court: At court on 10 July 2015, Serbian-born Dragan Vasiljkovic, with his temporary court-appointed lawyer Darko Stanic at his side, formally pleaded not guilty to charges related to genocide in 1991 during the Balkan Wars. Vasiljkovic also told the court he planned to hire his own legal team to represent him and fight the charges that could carry a 20-year jail sentence. Once the case was adjourned, Vasiljkovic was taken to Bilice prison by police where he will remain in protective custody and have limited contact with other prisoners. Vasiljkovic is accused of commanding troops involved in the torture and murder of Croatian prisoners of war and as yet unspecified war crimes at Bruska in Croatia in 1993. Captain Dragan currently has dual citizenship in Australia & Serbia. He is the first Australian citizen to be extradited from Australia for war crimes and was extradited to Croatia on 09 July 2015. (AU News)
STL defense questions Al Jazeera bureau chief: Defence lawyers at the Special Tribunal for Lebanon questioned former Al-Jazeera bureau chief Ghassan Ben Jeddo Friday about a possible role for Al-Jamaa al-Islamiya in the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. The testimony of the Jeddo, former director of the pan-Arab channel in Beirut at the time, is anticipated to be used to determine whether or not the alleged claim of the Islamist group was credible. The testimony surrounds the event which happened on 14 February 2005, where Prime Minister Rafik Hariri was killed in an explosion. (The Daily Star, L’Orient Le Jour) (For additional information please click here)
ICC delegation to conduct investigations in Palestine: Issam Younis, General Director of the Al Mezan Center for Human Rights located in Gaza, announced today, 13 July 2015, that a delegation of the ICC in The Hague is set to visit territories under the rule of the Palestinian Authority (PA) in the near future, in order to father information about the PA’s claims charging Israel with “war crimes.” The Gaza-based organization head called on the international community to side against Israel and punish it for its “crimes” in defending itself from Hamas’s terror war last summer. Late last week, Israel partially changed its policy and launched a limited process of cooperation with the ICC to prove that Israel is capable of investigating and drawing conclusions about its military actions on its own, and to show the ICC has no authority to discuss the PA complaints since PA is not a state. (Arutz Sheva)
Central American countries reaffirm commitment to ICC: During the High-level Regional Seminar held on 9 and 10 July in San Jose, Costa Rica, Government representatives from various Central American countries expressed their commitment to support and cooperate with the ICC. Senior officials from Costa Rica, Guatemala, Mexico, Panama, and El Salvador discussed with representatives of the Presidency, Office of the Prosecutor and Registry of the ICC, topics of mutual interest in the field of international cooperation. The Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Costa Rica, H.E. Mr. Manuel Gonzalez Sanz, expressed his support for the ICC. ICC President, Judge Silvia Fernandez de Gurmendi, expressed gratitude for the strong support the Court receives from the region. Of the current 123 State Parties to the Rome Statute, the founding treaty of the ICC, 27 are from Latin America and the Caribbean. (ICC Press Release)
Lesotho PM encourages support for African Court: Lesotho’s Prime Minister Dr. Pakalitha Bethuel Mosisili made remarks on 10 July 2015 when he met a delegation of the African Court at the Prime Minister’s Office in Maseru. Mosisili said the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights (AfCHpr) needs the support of all African Union member states and his government would give it full support for its success. The delegation included Justice Gerard Niyungeko, Judge and former President of the Court, Justice Duncan Tambala, Justice Angelo Matusse and a registry staff. Dr. Mosisili said his government would make the Declaration under Article 34(6) of the Protocol establishing the Court. So far, twenty-eight AU countries have ratified but only seven of them have made the Declaration. (IPP Media)
Post by: Halinka Zolcikova
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