PRESS BRIEFING BY CHIEF PROSECUTOR, YUGOSLAVIA/RWANDA TRIBUNALS

Press Briefing

PRESS BRIEFING BY CHIEF PROSECUTOR, YUGOSLAVIA/RWANDA TRIBUNALS

The Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunals in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, Judge Louise Arbour, this afternoon described as extremely important the arrest on Friday, 18 July, in Kenya of seven people -- virtually all of them key figures in the national leadership of the 1996 interim Government in Rwanda.

Speaking at a Headquarters press briefing, Judge Arbour said those arrested had included the Prime Minister of the interim Government, a female Cabinet Minister responsible for Women's Affairs, two important military leaders, and the Prefect of Butari. The exercise was a result of a renewed leadership within the Tribunal and was conducted with the involvement of Tribunal Registrar Agwu Okali and of Deputy Prosecutor Bernard Muna, who joined the Tribunal last May.

Immediately upon his arrival the Office of the Prosecutor in Dar es Salaam, the Deputy Prosecutor focused on a pro-active approach, Judge Arbour said. At the Tribunal's plenary session in early June, the judges were informed of that Office's intention to target persons responsible for violations of international humanitarian law at the national level. It was pursuing that mandate in a very aggressive manner.

The operation was also a testimony to the increased support that the Tribunal was receiving in the region, in particular on the part of the Government of Kenya, Judge Arbour said. "This operation is unprecedented. This is the first time that a Government has offered its assistance to the Tribunal on that scale, and we are obviously very grateful for this assistance and for the manner in which this was discharged."

Judge Arbour said the operation was a signal to the people of Rwanda and of the entire region that the international community was extremely serious about breaching that culture of impunity, in the interest of peace and reconciliation. It had taken a very long time to bear even those modest fruits, but in the scale of things it was not a very long time. "Frankly it is immensely encouraging that we find ourselves today with renewed visibility, clear progress and a lot of encouraging signals in terms of the support we're going to be getting from the region", she said.

She said the recent arrests paralleled some successes at the former Yugoslavia Tribunal. Nevertheless, the scale of what was accomplished in Nairobi was greater than the two arrests there -- one on 27 June in Eastern Slavonia and another on 10 July in Prijedor.

Tribunals Briefing - 2 - 21 July 1997

Asked to elaborate, Judge Arbour said the signs for the former Yugoslavia were very encouraging. Before the arrest of Slavko Dokmaovic in Eastern Slavonia, the Tribunal had gone for months with few encouraging signals that anyone would be arrested. However, there was now every reason to be optimistic and to believe that a momentum had been created.

To a question as to whether there might be more sealed indictments, Judge Arbour said that was not an instrument that the Chief Prosecutor could use at her sole discretion. She had to be able to convince the confirming judge that it was in the interest of justice that the existence of the indictment sought and the arrest warrant not be made public.

"I won't say that I will do it in every single case", Judge Arbour said. "I may sometimes come to the conclusion that in a particular instance, it may be more advantageous or conducive to an arrest to have an indictment announced publicly even prior to the arrest." However, it was generally more conducive to a successful arrest when the accused was not told about it ahead of time. That was a standard in any criminal justice system when dealing with an offender who, it was believed, would not surrender voluntarily.

Asked to confirm that some suspects had escaped during the Kenyan operation, Ms. Arbour said she could not comment. "As you can well imagine, the success of this kind of operation lies essentially in the discreet manner with which it is performed."

A correspondent asked about problems involved in apprehending former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic and Serb military commander Ratko Mladic, and possible reluctance of French troops to go after them. Judge Arbour said she had no information as to how decisions were made within the Stabilization Force (SFOR) to proceed in any particular fashion.

Did the Chief Prosecutor share the concern that the lack of "spine" among some members of the Security Council, may have encouraged the spread of aggression in some parts of the world? a correspondent asked. Judge Arbour said the success of the International Criminal Tribunals would go some distance in deterring those who, at a time of armed conflict, might want to take advantage of the situation to perpetrate the kinds of atrocities that were committed in Bosnia and Rwanda.

Had the Prosecutor known in advance of last week's arrests? a correspondent asked. Had her Office asked again for the arrest of Karadzic and Mladic? Judge Arbour said she had a standing request, in the form of an arrest warrant that had been served on States and international entities, and she constantly asked that those warrants be executed.

Tribunals Briefing - 3 - 21 July 1997

Judge Arbour drew attention to a significant decision by the Trial Chambers in The Hague on 18 July. She said she had requested for issuance of a subpoena to compel the production of documents by the Republic of Croatia and its Defence Minister. Despite a vigorous challenge by Croatia, the Trial Chambers upheld her request. Such decisions were absolutely critical if the court was to be capable, of rendering justice.

To another question about the arrests in Kenya, she said the operation had required considerable coordination, and that there had been consultations with the Government of Kenya. In the history of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, the attitude of the Government of Kenya had certainly changed dramatically from its position at the outset when it was not receptive to the Tribunal's work.

Was there sufficient cooperation among Member States of the United Nations on the subject of capturing Karadzic and Mladic? a correspondent asked. Judge Arbour said that, in a sense, the commitment had been there in setting up the Tribunal in the first place, and there was now cause for some optimism. What happened in Eastern Slavonia and in Bosnia demonstrated the existence of a larger community of interests in support of seeing the Tribunals fulfil their mandates.

Support for the Tribunal was also demonstrated by the provision of sufficient resources to enable it to carry out its mandate, Judge Arbour said. She would be back in the fall making budgetary submissions for both Tribunals. Since last fall, the number of people in detention with respect to the Rwanda Tribunal, had almost doubled. People could not be kept in pre-trial detention for years, she said.

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