WASHINGTON/NEW YORK, March 26 (Hina) - The UN Security Council on Friday adopted a resolution confirming a strategy for the completion of the work of the UN war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague by 2010.
WASHINGTON/NEW YORK, March 26 (Hina) - The UN Security Council on
Friday adopted a resolution confirming a strategy for the completion
of the work of the UN war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in
The Hague by 2010.#L#
Resolution 1534, which also applies to the war crimes tribunal for
Rwanda, was passed unanimously and without debate.
The resolution calls on the Hague tribunal to take all possible steps
to complete all investigations by the end of 2004 and all trials by
the end of 2008, and to complete its work in 2010.
The Security Council called on the Office of the Prosecutor of the
Hague tribunal to examine all its cases as soon possible to determine
which cases would be tried in The Hague and which would be transferred
to national courts.
The resolution further called on the Hague tribunal to ensure that any
new indictments were directed against top officials most responsible
for war crimes.
The tribunal president and the chief prosecutor were requested to
report by May 31, and after that every six months, on the progress in
implementing the exit strategy and to identify the measures that need
to be taken to carry out the strategy.
The resolution reaffirmed the necessity of bringing persons indicted
by the tribunal to justice, and called on all countries, particularly
Serbia and Montenegro, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and the Serb entity
in Bosnia-Herzegovina, to step up their cooperation with the tribunal
and provide it with the necessary assistance to bring in the most
wanted indictees -- Bosnian Serb wartime leader Radovan Karadzic and
military commander Ratko Mladic, as well as Croatian general Ante
Gotovina.
The resolution urged all indictees who are still at large to surrender
to the tribunal.
(Hina) vm