The prosecution submitted a motion to stay the decision of the tribunal on provisional release so that it might be allowed to appeal against the tribunal's decision of 30 July on releasing temporarily Jadranko Prlic, Bruno Stojic, Slobodan Praljak, Milivoj Petkovic, Valentin Coric and Berislav Pusic pending trial.
The six war-time Bosnian Croat political and military leaders surrendered voluntarily to the Hague-based UN court on 5 April this year.
"The prosecution asked to be allowed to appeal against the decision on provisional release of the six Croats," lawyer Zeljko Olujic said today adding that the ICTY judge on duty was expected to decide on the issue in the course of the day.
"There may be several outcomes. The decision is to be made by the ICTY judge on duty as the trial chamber (for the case) is on summer holidays," Olujic said explaining that it was possible for the judge to turn down the prosecution's motion, which would mean that the six indictees could be temporarily released, as well as to grant the prosecution's motion for the stay which would mean that they would remain in custody.
On Monday, the trial chamber in the case 'Prlic and Others' said in a press release that it ordered the provisional release of Prlic, Stojic, Praljak, Petkovic, Coric and Pusic "under certain specific terms and conditions detailed in the Decision".
The 26-count indictment, issued by the ICTY, charges the six Croats, former high-ranking political and military officials of the so-called Herceg Bosna, on the basis of their individual and command responsibility, with crimes against humanity and breaches of the laws and customs of war as well as of the Geneva conventions, committed through the persecution of several thousand Bosnian Muslims and other non-Croats, murder, rape, deportation, the detention of civilians, inhuman treatment, the destruction of property and the destruction or wilful damage done to institutions dedicated to religion or education, the appropriation of property and the unlawful infliction of terror on civilians.
The ICTY prosecutors claim in the indictment that "from on or before 18 November 1991 to about April 1994 and thereafter, various persons established and participated in a joint criminal enterprise to politically and militarily subjugate, permanently remove and ethnically cleanse Bosnian Muslims and other non-Croats who lived in areas on the territory of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina which were claimed to be part of the Croatian Community (and later Republic) of Herceg-Bosna, and to join these areas as part of a 'Greater Croatia', whether in the short-term or over time and whether as part of the Republic of Croatia or in close association with it".