TRIAL OF KORDIC AND CERKEZ TO BEGIN IN THE HAGUE ON MONDAY

THE HAGUE, April 11 (Hina) - The trial of Bosnian Croats, Dario Kordic and Mario Cerkez, is to commence on Monday at the International War Crimes Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague. The trial will be held before the Trial Chamber presided by a British judge, Richard May. On the first day of the trial of these two defendants who surrendered voluntarily 18 months ago, the Prosecution headed by Briton Geoffrey Nice is to expound the indictment. Both Kordic, aged 38, and Cerkez, aged 40, are charged as individuals and as superiors with four counts of crimes against humanity, eight counts of grave breaches of the Geneva Convention and ten counts of violations of the laws or customs of war. The two men have previously pleaded not-guilty to all charges. They have been spending the last days prior to the trial reading statements of about a hundred possible witnesses, forwarded by the Prosecution just recently. "Both defendants are mentally ready for the start of the trial," said Kordic's defence attorney Mitko Naumovski. The indictment accuses Kordic and Cerkez of the systematic persecution of Bosnian Moslems - civilians "on political, racial, ethnic or religious grounds" in the area of the then Croatian Republic of Herzeg-Bosna (HR H-B) from the end of 1991 to March 1994. Cerkez, who was a commander of the HVO (Croatian Defence Council) unit in the Vitez area, is held accountable for such crimes committed in the area of Vitez, Novi Travnik and Busovaca (central Bosnia) from April 1992 to August 1993. Just before the commencement of the trial the Prosecution issued the so-called pre-trial summary on some 50 pages claiming that with regard to a possibility that war crimes perpetrators could leave little evidence behind themselves this case is based, to a great extent, on correct conclusions derived from facts which surround the case and which are occasionally clarified by direct evidence on participation in mentioned crimes or similar acts. The Prosecution maintained that the difficulty, in itself, in identifying a role of the defendant could point to his guilty. This summery also read that according to the fact that Kordic had assumed high-ranking positions, he was a part of a group of Bosnian Croat leaders who planned, ordered, instigated and carried out a campaign of persecution over Bosnian Moslems in areas covered by the then Croatian Community of Herzeg-Bosna (HZ H-B), with an aim of reducing a number of Moslem residents and forcing them to leave the area which the Bosnian Croat leadership wanted to control. According to the Prosecution, Kordic held positions of great power and influence in Herzeg-Bosnian bodies that he must have been in the circle of crimes persecutors. The objective of Bosnia-Herzegovina's Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ BiH), the HZ H-B and subsequently HR H-B, and the HVO, was to join Croatia, by a political and military campaign with the purpose to gain control over Herzeg-Bosnian territory and cleanse it from Moslems, the Prosecution claimed. According to the Prosecution, the campaign was carried out through attacks against towns and villages, the killing of the Moslem population, the sparking of ethnic hatred, taking Moslems captive, forcible relocation, physical and psychical abuse, using people for human shields or for digging ditches, destruction of personal property and Moslem religious and cultural institutions. The Prosecution believed that being a commander of the Vitez Brigade, Cerkez had been implementing the goals and policy of the HDZ BiH, the HR H-B, HZ H-B and the HVO, by military means. The Defence also released a 160-page pre-trial summery saying that the Prosecution has offered an unclear and undefined case based on indications and presented political circumstances distortedly and incorrectly. The thin fibre of evidence based on circumstances, rumours and distorted "proof", offered by the Prosecution, is noticeable also by a lack of specific facts which may link Kordic with most of specific acts of which he is accused, Kordic's defence said. The Defence described the central thesis of the Prosecution that being a Bosnian Croat leader, Kordic must have been included in deliberate and planned persecution of innocent Moslems, as a caricature of the historical reality. The Defence rejected the Prosecution's conclusion that a lack of evidence points to Kordic's guilt, describing such a statement as amazing, and assessed that in case it was accepted, an unbelievable standard would be introduced - less evidence there is, more convincing the guilt is and more obvious crime is. The defence team of Kordic consists of Naumovski and American lawyers - David Geneson, Turner T. Smith Jr., Ksenija Turkovic, Stephen Sayers, Robert Stein and Leo Andreis whereas Cerkez's defence attorneys are Croatian lawyers, Bozidar Kovacic and Goran Mikulicic. Kordic and Cerkez, along with other eight Bosnian Croats, surrendered voluntarily on October 6, 1997. They went to The Hague with guarantees of Croatia's and the United States authorities that their trials, which were due to have begun within five months after their surrender, would proceed fairly and expeditiously. (hina) ms ,