The ICTY Appeals Chamber has granted a request by Gotovina's defence counsel Luka Misetic and Greg Kehoe to file an interlocutory appeal, because an ordinary appeal against a decision on the joinder of cases is not allowed. Lawyers for Cermak and Markac lodged the same kind of appeal with the ICTY Registry earlier this week.
Announcing the defence's intention, Misetic told Hina in a telephone interview on Thursday that the defence was opposed to a joint indictment and a joint trial, because it would be in violation of Gotovina's basic rights.
Gotovina is accused of what the late Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic was accused, notably that he pulled the Serbs out of Croatia in order to settle them in ethnically cleansed areas of Bosnia-Herzegovina and in Kosovo, Misetic said, adding that a joinder of trials might push the three accused generals into a conflict of interest.
A status conference on the Gotovina case has been scheduled for next Thursday. The conference is expected to focus on trial preparations, a possible joinder of the cases and a possible start date of the trial.
Misetic said that the defence team was happy with coordination with the Croatian government regarding access to witnesses and documents. Asked about the inflow of defence funds, he said that compared to the prosecution their possibilities were limited, but that they were using all the available funds for the preparation of defence.
The three generals are charged with crimes against humanity that were committed against Serbs during and in the aftermath of the Croatian military operation "Storm" in the summer and autumn of 1995. Gotovina was indicted in June 2001, while Cermak and Markac were indicted in March 2005.
Cermak and Markac voluntarily surrendered to the ICTY shortly after the indictment against them was made public. They are currently on provisional release in Croatia awaiting trial.
Gotovina has been in the tribunal's custody since December 10, 2005 after spending four and a half years in hiding. He was arrested in Spain on December 7, 2005.
All three generals pleaded not guilty to charges of persecution, murders, deportations, forcible transfer of population, plunder of public and private property, wanton destruction of settlements, and inhumane acts allegedly committed as part of a joint criminal enterprise by the Croatian political and military leadership, headed by the late president Franjo Tudjman, the aim of which was to forcibly and permanently remove the Serb population from the Krajina region of central Croatia.
The ICTY prosecution proposed a joinder of trials in February this year, explaining that it would serve the interests of justice and would not affect the right of the accused to a fair and expeditious trial.