OHR

HR/EUSR visits Brcko District

The High Representative and EU Special Representative, Miroslav Lajčák, is today in Brcko.

This is his first visit to Brcko District since taking office. In the course of the day, he will be meeting with Mayor, Mirsad Djapo, Assembly Speaker, Milan Tomic, and Deputy Assembly Speaker, Ivan Krndelj, as well as the Deputy Chief of Police and the Brcko District Judicial Commission.

The High Representative will use this visit, among other things, to highlight the importance of the passing of a BiH Law on Brcko District by the end of the year.

Such a law is necessary to provide Brcko District with a means to protect its interests in relevant State institutions and to create the conditions for ending the Supervisory regime.

EUFOR

Prime Minister of Greece visits EUFOR

As part of his visit to Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Greek Prime Minister, Mr Kostas Karamanlis, took the opportunity to visit Camp Butmir, where Greek soldiers are currently operating as part of the EUFOR mission.  Mr Karamanlis was greeted at the EUFOR Headquarters by Rear Admiral Hans-Jochen Witthauer before attending a reception hosted by the Senior National Representative of the Greek EUFOR contingent.

ICTY

Good morning on behalf of the ICTY.

Trial Chamber II rendered a decision on Friday on the Prosecution Motion for Joinder of Zdravko Tolimir’s case with the Popović et al. case in which seven accused are on trial for crimes committed in Srebrenica and Žepa.

The Trial Chamber said that there are strong grounds to conclude that joinder would adversely affect the rights of the accused to a fair trial, and that in addition it has not been proven that the interests of judicial economy would be better served in any significant way by a joinder of the two cases.

The Trial Chamber granted certification to file an appeal against that decision within seven days. In that case the final decision on the question of joinder would be given by the Appeals Chamber.

Then a small announcement regarding the case of Momčilo Krajišnik: today the BCS translation of the Appeals Chamber decision of 11 May granting Krajišnik’s self-representation was filed. We can send the decision by email to interested journalists.

I assume that you saw our press release on Friday concerning the decision revoking the referral of Sredoje Lukić to Bosnia and Herzegovina. He will be tried before the Tribunal together with Milan Lukić. This also means that there are no further requests pending before the Referral Bench for the referral of cases to domestic courts. I have for you copies of an updated Info Sheet which contains information on all decisions regarding the referral of cases.

The ICTY has referred to national courts a total of eight cases involving thirteen accused against whom indictments were raised by the Tribunal. Majority of those cases was transferred to the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which plays a central role in processing war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide that occurred in Bosnia and Herzegovina between 1992 and 1995. The Tribunal will continue to co-operate closely with the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina in the pursuit of justice.

That is all from me, thank you for your attention.

Questions and answers will be available later today.