Tribunal Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia

Page 41

1 Thursday, 2 March 2006

2 [Status Conference]

3 [Open session]

4 [The appellant entered court]

5 --- Upon commencing at 8.00 a.m.

6 JUDGE MERON: Madam Registrar, please call the case.

7 THE REGISTRAR: Good morning, Your Honour. This is case number

8 IT-98-29-A, the Prosecutor versus Stanislav Galic.

9 JUDGE MERON: Appearances, please. The Prosecution.

10 MS. JARVIS: Good morning, Your Honour. Michelle Jarvis appearing

11 for the Prosecution, together with Ms. Helen Brady, and our case manager

12 today, Mr. Sebastiaan van Hooydonk. Thank you.

13 JUDGE MERON: Thank you, Ms. Jarvis.

14 Defence, please.

15 THE INTERPRETER: Microphone for counsel, please.

16 MS. PILIPOVIC: [Interpretation] Good morning, Your Honour. On

17 behalf of General Galic, attorney-at-law Mara Pilipovic, and

18 Mr. Piletta-Zanin.

19 JUDGE MERON: Thank you, Ms. Pilipovic.

20 Mr. Galic, can you understand me, please? Mr. Galic, can you

21 understand me?

22 THE APPELLANT: [Interpretation] Good morning, Your Honour. I

23 understand you crystal clear. Thank you.

24 JUDGE MERON: Thank you, Mr. Galic. You may be seated.

25 THE APPELLANT: [Interpretation] Thank you.

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1 This is a Status Conference called in accordance with Rule 65 bis

2 of the Rules of Procedure and Evidence. Rule 65 bis (B) requires a Status

3 Conference to be convened within 120 days of the last Status Conference to

4 allow any person in custody pending appeal the opportunity to raise issues

5 in relation thereto, including the mental and physical condition of that

6 person. The last Status Conference in this case was held on the 2nd of

7 November, 2005.

8 I would like to ask you now, Mr. Galic, whether you have any

9 issues that you would like to raise at this time. Do you have any

10 concerns regarding your mental or physical well-being?

11 THE APPELLANT: [Interpretation] Your Honour, I have spoken about a

12 number of health issues ever since my arrest. I didn't even realise that

13 I had been indicted, and all of a sudden I was arrested. This was an act

14 of terror carried out against me, although I was not resisting. I was

15 forced into a car, and I received a number of serious injuries on that

16 occasion. I have been suffering from a number of serious health problems

17 since. It was based on that that my Defence filed a request for me to

18 receive treatment in the Republika Srpska or some place like that where

19 the conditions for my treatment would be far better than they are in the

20 Detention Unit.

21 I must say, yet again, that the conditions in the Detention Unit

22 do not preclude treatment, as such, but conditions could improve; that

23 much is certain. There should be better treatment. I was banned from

24 leaving for treatment there, and there was a doctor who examined me here,

25 I believe on the 16th of May, who told me that there was nothing else for

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1 me to do but to keep on suffering and try to cope with it.

2 I have problems with my back; that's what accounts for most of my

3 health problems. The other problems are not that apparent for the time

4 being.

5 These are the fundamental things that I wanted to share with you.

6 I wanted to remind you. You know that best of all because you were there

7 right at the beginning when the first decisions were made, and I would not

8 like to tire you anymore with this now.

9 JUDGE MERON: Thank you, Mr. Galic. I'm sorry to hear that you

10 still have problems with your back, and I will ask the Registrar to

11 inquire with the Detention Unit whether -- about the state of medical

12 treatment that is now given Mr. Galic and whether anything additional can

13 be done to meet his concerns.

14 Thank you, Mr. Galic. You may be seated.

15 THE APPELLANT: [Interpretation] Thank you, too, Your Honour.

16 JUDGE MERON: I believe that there are no outstanding motions in

17 this case. The parties' submissions on the respective appeals from the

18 trial judgement are now complete. The Appeals Chamber hopes that fairly

19 soon it will be able to schedule oral arguments on the merits of the

20 appeals.

21 Before concluding the Status Conference, I want to ask counsel for

22 the Prosecution and for the Defence whether they have any other issues

23 that they would like to raise at this time.

24 Ms. Jarvis?

25 MS. JARVIS: Thank you, Your Honour.

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1 There are no issues from the Prosecution, as such. We would just

2 briefly take this opportunity to update the Court regarding the

3 Prosecution's compliance with its ongoing disclosure obligations. Since

4 the last Status Conference, we have made a number of disclosures to the

5 Defence as documents have come to our attention, and recently the

6 Prosecution has also carried out another periodic electronic search of

7 material which is not already available to the Defence on the EDS. So we

8 were in the process of finalising the reviews from that search. The

9 Defence have been notified by a letter yesterday regarding the procedure

10 for this, and we anticipate that we will be complete with that process

11 within the next couple of weeks.

12 Thank you, Your Honour.

13 JUDGE MERON: Thank you, Ms. Jarvis.

14 Any comments of the Defence on that?

15 MR. PILETTA-ZANIN: [Interpretation] Yes, Mr. Chairman. First of

16 all -- thank you for giving me the floor.

17 Every time that we wish to speak, this was a problem always

18 before, every time that we take the microphone it's always under reserve

19 concerning our pending motion. We -- as you know the -- we always have to

20 treat it carefully when it comes to impeaching. We are now examining this

21 motion that we have received this morning. This is going to be a fourth

22 point, but the third point is: We should be able to organise ourselves

23 very, very quickly, very soon, and we would like to know whether you, your

24 Chamber, or anybody else could tell us what we should do. If the hearing

25 is taking place, we would like to know how long it would take. And also

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1 regarding the length of the trial, that would also be wonderful if we

2 could find out. We were very -- we were advised there was going to be

3 nothing in the month of April. I will then prepare my agenda already now,

4 and this is why I have to tell you that I will not be able to be present

5 in the month of April.

6 And last point, I would like to say this courteously with regards

7 to your Chamber, it could happen, it is not certain yet, but it could

8 happen that I must -- that I will eventually have to withdraw my services

9 from this matter. It could happen, but it is not yet happening.

10 Thank you very much.

11 JUDGE MERON: Ms. Pilipovic, would your colleague's withdrawal

12 from the case affect your readiness for hearing the arguments on the

13 appeal?

14 MS. PILIPOVIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, I have just been

15 informed, and it's only now that I know about this. I will certainly be

16 notifying the Chamber about any decision taken by my learned friend.

17 JUDGE MERON: Let me say that I will be very concerned if anything

18 happens which can delay the hearing of the appeal of Mr. Galic. I think

19 he has been waiting long enough, and we are really moving forward, the

20 Appeals Chamber, the Bench, rapidly towards being ready to hear the

21 arguments. I take note that Mr. Piletta-Zanin would not be available

22 during the month of April. This probably would not be a problem, but I do

23 hope that problems will not arise which go beyond the limited issue of the

24 month of April.

25 As regards the Prosecution, I'm -- I appreciate your continuing

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1 compliance with your disclosure obligation. And again, I hope that the

2 lateness of these additional disclosures would not affect our timetable.

3 I'm anxious to move on with the case and would not -- really would be

4 upset about any delays.

5 MS. JARVIS: Your Honour, if I may just raise one additional thing

6 which is related to the scheduling of this matter for hearing. We'd hoped

7 to have an opportunity to discuss this with my friend before the Status

8 Conference this morning. We certainly hope to take it up with them

9 afterwards. But it has been the Prosecution's practice in recent cases to

10 request from the Chamber in advance of the hearing a list of questions

11 that the Appeals Chamber would most like to be addressed on by the parties

12 so that we can all organise our preparations and provide as much

13 assistance as we can to the Chamber. And certainly, the Prosecution

14 anticipates filing a motion along those lines in this case as well to try

15 and organise our work that way, and we will speak to my friend as well and

16 see if we can organise a joint approach on that.

17 JUDGE MERON: Let me understand -- see whether I understand. The

18 motion would be aimed at asking the Bench to give you in advance key

19 questions that we would be asking?

20 MS. JARVIS: That's right, Your Honour. That's how it has worked

21 in a number of recent appeals, and it would be just for the Appeals

22 Chamber to indicate to the parties the issues or questions that they are

23 most -- would be most assisted being addressed during the hearing. And of

24 course it would be of greatest assistance to the parties in their

25 preparation if we could have that sometime in advance, preferably about

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1 four weeks, if that would be possible.

2 JUDGE MERON: Well, I would be perfectly comfortable with a motion

3 or motions on this matter. It is -- has become increasingly the practice

4 of the Appeals Chamber that even without any motions on the part of the

5 Prosecution or the Defence, we do that. If you look at the Scheduling

6 Orders we issued for the last appeals we heard at Arusha, you will see

7 that they contain questions or areas on which we wanted to benefit from

8 particular attention and focus by the parties. So I don't think this is a

9 major problem, but I take note of your interest in that, and again you

10 are -- you are welcome to present a motion. I'm not sure that, strictly

11 speaking, it's necessary, but no problem, certainly.

12 MR. PILETTA-ZANIN: [Interpretation] Your Honour, I have consulted

13 my colleague, Ms. Pilipovic, and we have just discovered that this is one

14 of the rare issues with which we are in agreement with the Prosecution.

15 We hope that there will be many more of these agreements with the

16 Prosecution during the trial.

17 Thank you.

18 JUDGE MERON: Well, I'm glad to hear that, and I certainly share

19 your hope.

20 So I believe that there are no other issues for the parties to

21 raise today. I see there are no other issues, and therefore it remains

22 for me simply to thank the parties for their attendance and their

23 participation, and I will call these proceedings to a close.

24 Thank you.

25 --- Whereupon the Status Conference

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1 adjourned at 8.15 a.m.

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