“The Path Towards Justice for Victims of Sexual Violence”? International Responses to Wartime Rape in the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY)

Abstract

accused pleaded guilty to a violation of the laws or customs of war and was sentenced to five years' imprisonment.The case is now closed.The remaining seven cases (Kupreskic and Others, Kordic!Cerkez, Jelisic, Simic, Kunarac, Krnojelac and Kvocka!Radic!Zigic!Kos) are in various stages of pre-trial preparation, with the Kupreskic trial scheduled to commence on 17 August 1998.The Appeals Chamber remains seized of the appeal in the Tadic case, with the Defence requesting the assistance of the Chamber in seeking access to evidence that was allegedly unavailable at trial.In the Erdemovic case, the Appeals Chamber established the preconditions for the acceptance of a guilty plea and, by majority, found that duress cannot afford a complete defence under international law to a soldier charged with the killing of innocent persons.In addition to entertaining numerous applications for appeal against interlocutory decisions of the Trial Chambers, the Appeals Chamber heard a request from the Republic of Croatia for review of the decision of Trial Chamber II upholding the issuance of subpoenae duces tecum in the Blaskic case.The Chamber pronounced upon the power of the Tribunal to issue subpoenas and binding orders generally and, in particular, to States, state officials and individuals.The Office of the Prosecutor has continued with its dual roles of investigating violations of international humanitarian law and of prosecuting cases of such violations in court.The arrival of 19 new accused to the Tribunal's custody, however, had seen the balance of the Prosecutor's limited human resources shifted away from investigative activities and applied towards assisting pre-trial preparations of the new cases.Increased budgetary resources, however, have enabled the Office of the Prosecutor to resume previous high levels of investigative activity.Such activity has encompassed successful exhumation programmes for both 1997 and 1998, and has recently been extended by the Security Council to cover the conflict in Kosovo.In addition, the Office of the Prosecutor has, during the reporting period, obtained search warrants authorizing the seizure of large volumes of documentary evidence, opened a liaison office in Banja Luka, developed and put into operation information retrieval systems, conducted sexual assault workshops and contributed to the initiative to establish a permanent international criminal court.The Registry of the Tribunal, with its Judicial Department and Administrative Department, has provided support to the expansion of the Tribunal's judicial and prosecutorial activities.The Judicial Department has responded to the increased workload of the Tribunal during the reporting period by expanding, fine-tuning and developing procedures of court management necessary to operate three courtrooms on a full-time basis, administering a legal aid system of assigning defence counsel to indigent accused, supervising the Detention Unit and maintaining diplomatic relations with States.The Administrative Department has, similarly, overseen the growth of the infrastructure of the Tribunal, including the construction of two new courtrooms and the expansion of the Tribunal into additional building space./ ...