That Someone Guilty Be Punished - International Center for ...

Change, Analysts Say,” New York Times, Nov. 20, 2000. Despite this, the fall of Milošević from power
may have made it easier for Bosnian Serb leaders to moderate their own stance toward the ICTY.
Around the time of the collapse of the Milošević regime, the leader of Republika Srpska, Milorad
Dodik, was taking steps that seemed encouraging to outsiders, including then ICTY Prosecutor
Carla Del Ponte. In a press statement dated October 6, 2000, Del Ponte described her visit to the
RS capital Banja Luka:
In Banja Luka I was very pleased to receive the assurance of Prime Minister Dodik that his
government is prepared to open investigations and to bring to justice the killers who were
responsible for the thousands of murders involving the Muslim victims of Srebrenica in
1995. This is a very positive development, which would see The Hague Tribunal prosecuting
the higher level perpetrators and the Republika Srprska would prosecute lower level
perpetrators. I am willing to co-operate with the Republika Srprska if Mr. Dodik is serious
in relation to this new initiative.
Statement by Carla Del Ponte, Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former
Yugoslavia, made on 6 October 2000, PR/P.I.S./532-e, at http://www.icty.org/sid/7816.
749. Address by his Excellency, Judge Claude Jorda, President of the International Criminal Tribunal
for the former Yugoslavia, to the UN Security Council, set forth in ICTY Press Release of Nov.
27, 2001, JD/P.I.S./641-e, at http://www.icty.org/sid/7927.
750. Id. See also Address by His Excellency, Judge Claude Jorda, President of the International
Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, to the United Nations Security Council, July 23 2002,
ICTY Press Release JDH/P.I.S./690-e (July 26, 2002), at http://www.icty.org/sid/8080 (giving “certain
cases of lesser significance to the national courts … is the only way we will be able to … close
the investigations around 2004 and finish the first instance trials around 2008”).
751. Report on the Judicial Status of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia
and the Prospects for Referring Certain Cases to National Courts, UN Doc. S/2002/678, 32
(June 2002).
752. Interview with David Tolbert, then deputy prosecutor, ICTY, The Hague, Mar. 5, 2007. See
also Letter dated 17 June 2002 from the Secretary-General Addressed to the President of the Security
Council, UN Doc. S/2002/678 (June 19, 2002) (after noting that the ICTY’s proposed completion
strategy would entail transferring cases of mid-level suspects to local courts, the Secretary-General’s
transmittal letter continued: “In view of the location where the crimes concerned are alleged to have
been committed, all of these cases would be referred for prosecution and trial to the national courts
of Bosnia and Hercegovina”).
753. Report on the Judicial Status of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia
and the Prospects for Referring Certain Cases to National Courts, UN Doc. S/2002/678, 49
(June 2002). See also Letter dated 21 May 2004 from the President of the International Tribunal
for the Prosecution of Persons Responsible for Serious Violations of International Humanitarian
Law Committed in the Territory of the Former Yugoslavia since 1991, addressed to the President of
the Security Council, UN Doc. S/2004/420, 29 (May 24, 2004).
754. These efforts are described in the ICTY’s Ninth Annual Report to the UN General Assembly
and Security Council. See UN Doc. A/57/379-S/2002/985, 18-21 (Sept. 4, 2002). One option considered
by the ICTY judges but ultimately rejected was to create an international court in Bosnia.
But the costs of such an effort would defeat the goal of curbing expenses associated with the ICTY’s
192 NOTES