Karadzic told war crimes trial will go ahead
Radovan Karadzic has request to delay start of war crimes and genocide trial rejected at The Hague
Tuesday, 03, Nov 2009 03:06
By Matthew Champion.
The presiding judge in Radovan Karadzic's war crimes and genocide trial has told the former Bosnian Serb leader he has no right to determine the start of his trial.
Mr Karadzic told the court in a preliminary hearing today, his first appearance since the trial began last week, that he was still not ready for the trial to begin, citing a wealth of prosecution and defence material to sift through.
His trial in The Hague began last week without him in the dock, with the prosecution opening its case on Tuesday and throughout the remainder of the week.
The 64-year-old said it would be "criminal" if he participated in the trial now, saying he had 45,000 documents, 23,000 exhibits, vast numbers of witness testimonies, 1.3 million pages of material and 300 days of audio and visual testimony to trawl through.
But presiding judge O-Gon Kwon, who had called the hearing to determine how to proceed in light of Mr Karadzic's threatened boycott, said the defendant was "simply repeating" previous claims.
"This trial chamber and the appeals chamber have carefully considered these submissions and determined you have had adequate preparation time," he said. "Clearly you disagree with these decisions.
"However, as I previously stated to you it is the trial chamber not the accused person which determines readiness for trial, taking into account all the relevant circumstances."
Judge Kwon added: "At the end of the day it is in your best interest to attend and participate fully in this trial so justice can be done."
Earlier in the hearing, Mr Karadzic, who faces life in prison over accusations he is responsible for atrocities committed in the 1992-95 Bosnian war, had said: "I don't want to boycott proceedings but I can't take part in something that has been bad from the start."
He went on to tell the court: "I will come into court as soon as I'm ready and I will inform you all two or three or weeks in advance.
"It is my fundamental right to be prepared; otherwise what kind of trial is it going to be? That is my position and I would like you to take it seriously because the defence has been serious all the time and it has attracted obstacles - nothing but obstacles."
Last week prosecutor Alain Tieger described Mr Karadzic as the "supreme commander... who harnessed the forces of nationalism, hatred and fear" to create a Bosnian Serb state devoid of Muslims.
Mr Karadzic faces 11 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity, including genocide, dating back to the Bosnian war.
He is suspected of being directly involved in the killing of 8,000 Muslim Bosnians in the town of Srebrenica in 1995.
The 64-year-old was arrested in Belgrade last year after more than a decade on the run during which time he posed as an expert in 'human quantum energy'.