Page 8577
1 Thursday, 18 July 2002
2 [Open session]
3 --- Upon commencing at 9.02 a.m.
4 [The accused entered court]
5 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. Madam Registrar, you may proceed. Please call
6 the case.
7 THE REGISTRAR: Okay. Good morning, Your Honours. And this is
8 the case number, IT-99-36-T, the Prosecutor versus Radoslav Brdjanin and
9 Momir Talic.
10 JUDGE AGIUS: Mr. Brdjanin, good morning to you. Can you hear me
11 in a language that you can understand?
12 THE ACCUSED BRDJANIN: [Interpretation] Good morning, Your Honour.
13 Yes, I can.
14 JUDGE AGIUS: You may sit down.
15 General Talic, good morning to you. Can you hear me in a language
16 that you can understand?
17 THE ACCUSED TALIC: [Interpretation] Good morning, Your Honour. I
18 can hear you in a language I understand.
19 JUDGE AGIUS: I thank you. You may sit down.
20 Appearances for the Prosecution.
21 MR. CAYLEY: May it please Your Honours. My name is Andrew
22 Cayley. I appear on behalf of the Office of the Prosecutor with my
23 learned friend Joanna Korner, and our case manager Denise Gustin, and
24 Hasan Younis.
25 JUDGE AGIUS: I thank you and good morning to you.
Page 8578
1 Appearances for Radoslav Brdjanin.
2 MR. ACKERMAN: Good morning, Your Honours. I'm John Ackerman,
3 with Milan Trbojevic and Marela Jevtovic.
4 JUDGE AGIUS: Good morning to you.
5 Appearances for General Talic.
6 MR. ZECEVIC: Good morning, Your Honours. Slobodan Zecevic with
7 Natasha Ivanovic-Fauveau for General Talic.
8 JUDGE AGIUS: Good morning to you.
9 Any preliminary observations, remarks? Yes, Ms. Korner.
10 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, it's a question of timing now that I
11 want to raise with Your Honour, because we need to make arrangements
12 depending on what's agreed. But it's a -- as it were, a timely matter,
13 because Mr. Ackerman has drawn my attention to a memorandum which I have
14 not seen before and I don't know whether Your Honours have, sent out by
15 the Deputy Registrar on the 10th of July. And perhaps I can read it.
16 "Following discussions held at the bureau meeting, I wish to
17 inform you of the following: Witnesses should not stay longer than five
18 days in The Hague, including the days reserved for travelling. Dates of
19 travel as communicated to the witnesses can be changed only once because
20 of problems met with the Bosnian authorities as a consequence of multiple
21 changes of dates. For example, one witness was given five different
22 dates."
23 Now, Your Honour, I'm bringing to it Your Honours' attention
24 because if this was followed, the upshot would be that a witness in the
25 middle of giving evidence about documents, or as this witness is about
Page 8579
1 serious events would be told, "Sorry. That's it. Your five days are up.
2 Home you go." Your Honour, it seems to me that perhaps somebody ought to
3 bring to the Deputy Registrar's attention that witnesses are not all
4 simple straightforward witnesses, and some of them are going to be here
5 longer than five days.
6 Secondly, that changes of date -- that has happened in this case
7 quite a lot because witnesses have either gone short or gone longer. We
8 do our best, but I think all cases have the same problem. Indeed
9 yesterday Judge Schomburg had to intervene with the Victims and Witnesses
10 Unit because a witness was required urgently and they said there was
11 insufficient notice. But it -- I'm bringing it to Your Honours' attention
12 simply so that perhaps Your Honours could raise the matter with those
13 appropriate.
14 But Your Honour, what I want to know is about next week. We've
15 got a five-day sitting next week. And I just don't know at the moment --
16 I appreciate how difficult it is, particularly with a witness like this.
17 But if the Defence could let us know or let Your Honours know how long
18 they anticipate cross-examination will take. Mr. Cayley will finish
19 probably by the first break this morning. That would assist in knowing
20 whether to bring another witness here for next week. We would in fact be
21 moving to the Kljuc area, although we've still got one witness left from
22 Sanski Most and one from Banja Luka who we've just disclosed.
23 JUDGE AGIUS: Let's see if there are any remarks from Mr. Ackerman
24 or from Mr. Zecevic.
25 MR. ACKERMAN: As I view the matter now, Your Honour, I think my
Page 8580
1 cross-examination will take a session. I can't be absolutely precise, of
2 course, but I think around that area is probably close.
3 JUDGE AGIUS: Mr. Zecevic.
4 MS. FAUVEAU-IVANOVIC: [Interpretation] Mr. President, I think that
5 my cross-examination will take between one or two hearings, probably two.
6 And I would like to say that as Mr. Cayley has said, that we will know
7 until 48 hours in advance that we will start to the cross-examination. I
8 spoke to Mr. Cayley yesterday and he didn't object to me commencing with
9 my cross-examination today and that I should continue on Monday, that I
10 could interrupt the subject.
11 JUDGE AGIUS: So basically, as I see it, we would --
12 cross-examination -- the last of the cross-examinations will be over on
13 Tuesday.
14 MS. KORNER: Well, Wednesday, I think. If Madam Fauveau is going
15 to take roughly two sessions and just -- if not sitting tomorrow.
16 JUDGE AGIUS: Well, roughly two sessions will be today and
17 Monday.
18 MS. KORNER: Yes. But, I don't think she wants to go very far
19 today. As I understand it, she just wants to do a few preliminaries.
20 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, I see.
21 MS. KORNER: You see what I mean. So the proper
22 cross-examination -- if she takes two days, Mr. Ackerman takes one, that
23 means we could have a witness here for Thursday. So we'll try -- we'll
24 try and make arrangements. As I say --
25 JUDGE AGIUS: See if you can get a witness that you can deal
Page 8581
1 with --
2 MS. KORNER: A short witness.
3 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, exactly. Dispose of frankly in two -- two
4 sessions.
5 MS. KORNER: Well, Your Honour, we were hoping to start Kljuc with
6 somebody again who could give an overall picture of the events. But in
7 the event, we'll try to find a shorter witness who just deals with an
8 incident or so.
9 JUDGE AGIUS: With regard to the first point you raised,
10 Ms. Korner, a situation very -- if I were to put it, very, very bluntly is
11 one to which -- or which has -- which reflects a problem that has been
12 brought to the attention of the Judges, mainly because of the financial
13 involvement and the prospects or lack of having our budget or the budget
14 of this Tribunal ever increased in the future. As at present, the average
15 stay of a witness is of seven point something days, which is considered to
16 be excessive, and there is, I would say, a collective effort or an effort
17 to have a collective effort to try and bring down, reduce, the number of
18 days a witness on average stays here in The Hague.
19 I fully agree with you. There's no -- I mean, I don't need to
20 hide it, that we have witnesses which we disposed of, I mean, one day --
21 in less than one session and witnesses that have lasted here days. I
22 mean, I can go and face anyone and state that -- that's not due to the
23 fault or inefficiency or lack of planning or experience of anyone. But
24 it's just because some witnesses are more important than others and have
25 got more to say than others. One of the witness that is has been heard in
Page 8582
1 Stakic, for example, has been coming and going from, I understand it, the
2 beginning of June. And I don't know how important or not important he is,
3 but that's the fact; he's been coming and going, and coming and going
4 and -- the same applies to, for example, some of the witnesses we have had
5 here.
6 So on my part, I think I can refer this to who represents Trial
7 Chamber II on the bureau, and I think we have discussed it at some point
8 in time already, but I also think that it is the case of the Prosecutor to
9 bring this matter up as well because I understand that in order for this
10 sphere or area of activity to be controlled better, there needs to be
11 better communications and better liaison. The general impression that is
12 given sometimes is that there is lack of planning. And I don't think I am
13 qualified to comment on that. My personal impression is far from agreeing
14 with that statement. I think it's just circumstances. If you get -- as
15 we have had here, a client -- not a client, sorry, a witness that all of a
16 sudden gets stuck here or finishes a day in advance. And it -- it
17 happens. I mean, what can you do? And then all of it changes. It
18 changes the statistics and unfortunately what is happening in several
19 jurisdictions is also happening here. It's become a matter of -- when I
20 was young, I used to refer to pounds and pence. It has changed now.
21 But -- but that's what it is. You know, I mean, everyone is concerned
22 about -- worried about that, and so one has to engage in a collective
23 effort.
24 MS. KORNER: I think, Your Honour -- I see that it was addressed
25 to the chief of the Prosecutions and the chief of investigations. It
Page 8583
1 hadn't been brought to any of our attention, that is, the trial attorneys
2 yet, but I'm sure that there will be some discussion and trying to --
3 JUDGE AGIUS: Initially the idea, Ms. Korner, was to have even us
4 exercise some kind of control. I can -- I can say that's not something
5 that falls, according to me and according to others, within our sphere of
6 activity or our concerns or whatever. I mean, it's --
7 MS. KORNER: Well, Your Honour --
8 JUDGE AGIUS: I'm not going to tell you when to bring over the
9 witness.
10 MS. KORNER: No.
11 JUDGE AGIUS: I mean, that's ...
12 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, I think what's not appreciated is that
13 you cannot sort of effectively time with certainty how long a witness will
14 take, save the roughest estimate. I do happen to know, however, that the
15 witnesses are actually installed in not perhaps one of the cheaper hotels
16 in The Hague. So if they wanted to look to saving money, that could
17 certainly be one of them, but anyhow, I only brought -- I
18 appreciate --
19 JUDGE AGIUS: No. But you will have the support of this Trial
20 Chamber. I don't think any one of us three will accept a situation
21 whereby we are told -- I mean, you have to dispose of a witness or any
22 witness in a matter of three days or -- which means one -- you have to
23 brief him when he arrives or when she arrives here. It's -- it depends.
24 I mean, I would definitely not condone or agree with keeping a witness
25 here for a -- for a holiday before and after. I mean, it's -- that, I
Page 8584
1 definitely would -- would be dead against.
2 MS. KORNER: Yes. And Your Honour, may I just change the subject
3 completely for one moment. We had an animated discussion yesterday as to
4 whether the Sanski Most exhibits that were on the list had been admitted
5 by Your Honour into evidence. The -- apparently the registry didn't think
6 they had, so we went back and checked, and we found that right at the
7 beginning before we started the Sanski Most, Your Honour had admitted into
8 evidence all the exhibits on the list subject to the usual caveats as to
9 indicia of reliability. But I just want to make that clear because --
10 JUDGE AGIUS: And to think that the Chinese are so many hours
11 ahead.
12 MS. KORNER: Well, quite. Because, Your Honour, we will -- what
13 we'll do is before we start Kljuc is go through the same procedure.
14 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. Okay, Ms. Korner.
15 So I think we can pull the curtains down, disappoint the public,
16 go into closed session.
17 [Closed session]
18 (redacted)
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13 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned
14 at 1.43 p.m., to be reconvened on Monday,
15 the 22nd day of July, 2002, at 2.15 p.m.
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