HEARING IN HAGUE INDICTEE'S LAWSUIT AGAINST CROATIA POSTPONED

ZAGREB, Oct 4 (Hina) - A preliminary hearing in connection with Ante Gotovina's lawsuit against Croatia filed due to the government's refusal to provide his attorneys with the Gotovina-related documentation it sent the Hague war crimes tribunal was postponed at the Zagreb Municipal Court on Thursday due to procedural reasons. Hague indictee Ante Gotovina's defence team, which includes Ante Vukorepa, Marijan Pedisic, and Ivo Farcic, has pressed charges against the Republic of Croatia due to illegal activities under the Administrative Procedure Law. State Prosecutor Milorad Cuculic has requested that the lawsuit be rejected as only a state body, and not the state, can be sued. Vukorepa said in court today the defendant was the government's office for cooperation with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague. Judge Zlatko Pavkovic gave the government an eight-day deadline to take a position on the lawsuit. The hearing resumes on Oct. 25. The government's office for cooperation with the ICTY turned down a request by Gotovina's defence to be granted access to documentation relating to their client as their power of attorney refers only to proceedings before the UN Tribunal. The documentation can be made available to them only after they prove their status before the ICTY, the office says. However, the defence team maintains Gotovina has signed power of attorney for very broad representation in all legal matters, from which it does not transpire that they are authorised for representation before the ICTY. The team is authorised to represent Gotovina before domestic courts and bodies of state authority, the attorneys claim, adding their defence of him in The Hague depends on the outcome of proceedings for his extradition at the Zagreb County Court. By refusing to submit documents about Gotovina, the government has broken a series of their client's constitutional and legal rights, the defence team claims and demands that the judiciary establish if the government has broken the law. (hina) ha sb