A mountain of paper, little time in Bosnian Serb leader’s case

THE HAGUE - The case against former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, which comes before a war crimes tribunal in the Hague Monday, comprises roughly 600,000 documents and more than 1,000 legal papers. Karadzic has been indicted on 11 counts of war crimes, crimes against humanity, including two counts of genocide, during the 1992-1995 Bosnian war.

He has repeatedly complained that he has not had enough time to study the case against him — that pouring over the documentation alone could take years.

But the tribunal is under pressure to wrap up proceedings in the trial of a man who is widely seen as one of few who can shed light on events during the collapse of the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s. Former Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic died in detention more than four years into his war crimes trial.

Ever since Karadzic first appeared in The Hague in August 2008, the tribunal, which is to conclude its work by mid-2013, has repeatedly urged the prosecution to reduce the number of charges to speed up the legal proceedings.

Tribunal judges have limited the presentation of the prosecution’s evidence to 300 hours maximum. The court calculated that this would give the prosecution an entire year, based on a full work week.

Karadzic has requested the same amount of time to present his case. Experts, however, estimate the entire trial will take three years.

Karadzic himself has contributed to the drawn-out nature of proceedings and the mountain of legal documents in the case. By the time he first stepped into the dock, he has filed 100 motions.

On Sep 4, he asked for a 10-month postponement to the start of the trial, claiming he needed 22,145 hours to study 591,315 documents and 5,420 hours for witness reports. The request was rejected.

The first indictment against Karadzic was filed at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) July 24, 1994 and amended at least twice in the run-up to trial.

By Oct 12, the tribunal had made a total of 584 decisions and orders. Around 310 motions were filed, along with 255 exhibits, 227 responses, 92 notices, 30 warrants and subpoenas and eight so-called briefs.

Among the tribunal’s decisions and orders, 15 originated from the appeals chamber, the remainder from the trial chamber. The tribunal’s president issued four decisions and gave 24 orders; the registry issued two decisions.