"It's good that this conference has taken place. The views presented by ICTY President Patrick Robinson are very close to those of the Croatian government. It's good to take a critical look at the ICTY's contribution and not to shrink from identifying its mistakes, which is necessary for laying a good and firm foundation for a permanent International Criminal Court," Simonovic said.
Asked about the military documents, known as artillery logs, which are sought by the tribunal in the trial of three Croatian army generals, Simonovic said that both he and Robinson had to be careful about what they said on this issue.
Should Croatia ask the Trial Chamber to decide whether Croatia is meeting its commitments towards the ICTY or not and if it is not happy with the response, it would appeal to the Appeals Chamber, which is presided over by Robinson, Simonovic explained. "If we talked about it too explicitly, he would have to be removed from the case, and I don't think it would be good either for him or for Croatia."
Speaking of the positive and negative aspects of the tribunal, Simonovic said the ICTY played an important role in shedding light on war crimes committed during the wars of the 1990s and that thanks to the tribunal some war crimes were discussed in areas where they had not been discussed before.
"I think one of the biggest shortcomings of the tribunal is that, on the one hand, Hadzic and Mladic have not been arrested and brought to justice, while on the other hand, Milosevic was indicted too late and didn't live to hear a verdict against him. I think that verdict should have explained the historical and political circumstances in which crimes were committed in the former Yugoslavia," Simonovic said, recalling that Robinson had presided over the trial chamber in the Milosevic case.
"Sometimes, because of the lack of that general framework, the tribunal's work is focused only on individual crimes and the whole picture is actually lost," he concluded.