THE HAGUE, Mar 6 (Hina) - The defence attorney of Tihomir Blaskic, a Bosnian Croat recently sentenced by The Hague war crimes tribunal to 45 years in prison, on Monday welcomed the Croatian government's decision to open sealed
archives relative to last decade's war in neighbouring Bosnia-Herzegovina. "We unsuccessfully sought access to those archives since the beginning of the trial. I sincerely hope the key documents were not taken out and destroyed," Anto Nobilo told Hina over the telephone. Nobilo also hopes the government will give him permission to view the documents. Only then will he be able to speak of their value, he said. The documents which the Croatian government recently found could be delivered to the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague as part of an appeal in the Blaskic case, and as part of the Kordic/Cerkez trial if they meet the prose
THE HAGUE, Mar 6 (Hina) - The defence attorney of Tihomir Blaskic, a
Bosnian Croat recently sentenced by The Hague war crimes tribunal
to 45 years in prison, on Monday welcomed the Croatian government's
decision to open sealed archives relative to last decade's war in
neighbouring Bosnia-Herzegovina.
"We unsuccessfully sought access to those archives since the
beginning of the trial. I sincerely hope the key documents were not
taken out and destroyed," Anto Nobilo told Hina over the
telephone.
Nobilo also hopes the government will give him permission to view
the documents. Only then will he be able to speak of their value, he
said.
The documents which the Croatian government recently found could be
delivered to the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former
Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague as part of an appeal in the Blaskic
case, and as part of the Kordic/Cerkez trial if they meet the
prosecution's demands.
ICTY spokesman Jim Landale said today there were two routes of
introducing evidence at this stage in the case of Tihomir Blaskic,
the former commander of the Central Bosnia Operative Zone whom the
tribunal last week sentenced to 45 years in prison.
The documents may be introduced by Blaskic's defence as part of an
appeal to the sentence. The Republic of Croatia also has the
possibility of directly submitting the documentation to the
Appeals Chamber through the ICTY Secretariat.
Croatian Premier Ivica Racan said earlier today the government had
found in Zagreb a few days ago documents on the war in Bosnia "which
by first viewing bring into question the arguments of the verdict,
and the severity of the (Blaskic) sentence itself."
"The documents, it seems, can identify the real culprits of some
crimes, like the one in Ahmici," Racan told the press in Zagreb.
Landale said he had no information that Croatia had already
contacted the ICTY in this respect.
The ICTY on Friday sentenced Blaskic to 45 years in prison for
crimes committed in Lasva Valley, central Bosnia, during the Croat-
Muslim conflict of 1993.
ICTY prosecutors in the Dario Kordic/Mario Cerkez trial also want
the documents on the Bosnian war. The two Bosnian Croats were
initially on the same "Lasva indictment" with Blaskic, but the
latter was tried separately for surrendering first.
The prosecutors in the Kordic/Cerkez case in January told an open
ICTY council session, which discussed problems in the collection of
documents, Croatia had been issued a subpoena to submit documents,
but that its former authorities did not respect it despite
undertaken international obligations.
The new government in the meantime sought an extension of the
deadline after assessing it could not find and submit the requested
documents by February 25. If the found documents met the ICTY
prosecution's demands, Croatia would be bound to submit them.
(hina) ha jn