17 Sep Victims Groups Unhappy With Prospect of a (Reasonably) Manageable Karadzic Trial
The Trial Chamber in Karadzic has instructed the prosecution to reduce the scope of its indictment from monstrous and completely unworkable to somewhat less monstrous and somewhat less completely unworkable. The result? Victims groups burning judges and prosecutors (and my client) in effigy and threatening not to cooperate with the prosecution:
Several hundred members of victims’ associations have protested in front of the Hague Tribunal and Prosecution building in Sarajevo, setting photos of judges, prosecutors and indictees on fire.
The protest was organised by the Association of Detainees of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Association of Mothers of Srebrenica and Zepa Enclaves, and the Women, Victims of War group.
Organisers said the protest was intended to express dissatisfaction with a proposal from the Trial Chamber, sitting in the case of Radovan Karadzic, that the Prosecution reduce the indictment against the former Bosnian Serb president and not present evidence pertaining to certain crimes.
Protestors burned photos of Patrick Robinson, the president of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, ICTY, Chief Prosecutor Serge Brammertz and O-Gon Kwon, the judge chairing the Trial Chamber that will hear the Karadzic case. They also set photos of Karadzic on fire.
Association representatives asked for an urgent meeting with senior Tribunal officials, saying that if the indictment is reduced they will refuse to cooperate with the ICTY. BIRN-Justice Report has learned that a group representing victims will travel to The Hague today.
“The victims will no longer appear as witnesses at trials. We will ignore them. We will not take part in the work of the Tribunal. They know they cannot go on without our help. So, they should then release Karadzic,” Munira Subasic from the Mothers of Srebrenica and Zepa Enclaves association told reporters.
I guess the victims groups would prefer a four-year circus in which the defendant drops dead before the verdict…
I suppose the Tribunal is serving its purpose, which is to remove irritants such as responsibility for war criminals and war crimes from the governments in the region, allowing them to get on with the business of actually improving their citizens’ lives.
Whether anything actually gets done about the war criminals seems to be secondary.
Ray,
You’re kidding, right? Removing localities from the indictment and perhaps reducing the number of counts — in a massive indictment with 11 counts and four separate JCEs — is “remov[ing]… responsibility for war criminals”?
It is worrying when groups feel they can exert political pressure on a judicial process. Worse when witnesses take part in demonstrations or other pressure; it casts doubt on the purpose and veracity of any testimony they may give.
Let’s not forget that these people have been waiting nearly 15 years for justice. Add on top of that the time it took the international community to actually track down and arrest Karadzic and the fact that Mladic is still at large. One can understand why they would get upset if the prosecution is going to pare down the charges just because it will be easier and save time.
Do not these victims and their families deserve to see justice done, and to its full extent? If the reason to drop charges is because they do no have the evidence, then that is one thing. But if the reason is because of time and money, I ask, what about the time and suffering that the victims and their families have gone and are still going through.
If we are going to hold the international community to a standard and uphold international human rights and humanitarian law – then we need to be prepared to do it right.
Dan,
What counts as doing it right? Given the scale and number of atrocities that can be placed at Karadzic’s feet, a trial could go on for decades. How does that assist international justice or the victims? Decisions need to be made to keep the trial manageable and to make sure that a verdict is actually reached (unlike the trial of Milosevic alluded to above). Concluding the trial in less than a decade also helps the victims and the general region achieve some closure and move on. As was also mentioned, the victims have waited a long time already. I’m sure they would like to see a verdict in their and Karadzic’s lifetime.
Kevin, just so long as they don’t start burning pictures of … you! 🙂
He still faces life in prison, does he not? It isn’t necessary that he be tried and convicted of every wrong he’s believed to have committed or contributed to committing during his tenure.
I understand lots of charges to maximize the chance of getting a conviction, but at what point does it detract from the proceeding as a whole?
Actually if you truly understood the Balkan mentality – you would understand that from THEIR perspective – Milosevic dying in prison was not a bad thing. Additionally, they would probably prefer Karadzic die in prison awaiting a long trial for all the atrocities that are attributed to him than to die in prison convicted for a portion of them. There is a saying in Bosnia – We may forgive, but we will never forget. Whether a long trial with every possible crime is the best solution – or an abbreviated trial with a solid conviction is – I do not have the answer. What I do know – is that we cannot sit here and judge these women and their desire to see justice for their loved ones when it was their husbands and sons who were slaughtered. As an outsider we may be able to say – he was convicted and spent the rest of his life in prison for those crimes – we as the international community did our job. But the mother/wife who has been looking for closure – whose are is not a part of that conviction – may not and has every right to not… Read more »
Regrettably, since lately, ICTY has lost legitimacy almost completely in the eyes of Bosniak victims (ICTY never had it with Serbs, and with Croats only meagerly), and everything that ICTY had done thus far might be lost (in terms of any lasting impact). O-Gon Kwon has been especially targeted in the press.
It’s just beyond comprehension how the prosecutors in Nuremberg didn’t clue in that nailing Eichmann with identity theft would’ve been much easier than, say, that monstrous and completely unworkable Holocaust thingy. It would’ve provided closure quicker and the world would’ve moved on to a better tomorrow, or at least until the 90s.
Ah, those pesky little victims. How dare they burn paper. They should just set themselves on fire like they did during the war.
Adolf Eichmann was not tried at Nuremberg, ameL.
Pardon my ignorance M. Gross.
Reboot:
It’s just beyond comprehension how the prosecutors in Jerusalem didn’t clue in that nailing Eichmann with identity theft would’ve been much easier than, say, that monstrous and completely unworkable Holocaust thingy.