Balkan Courts Gain From ICTY Experience
Participants at Sarajevo event say year-long war crimes justice project has enhanced local judiciaries’ capacity.
Balkan Courts Gain From ICTY Experience
Participants at Sarajevo event say year-long war crimes justice project has enhanced local judiciaries’ capacity.
An ambitious project aimed at strengthening the ability of courts across the former Yugoslavia to handle war crimes cases was completed this week.
The War Crimes Justice Project, WCJP, was launched last year to facilitate the transfer of legal knowledge and materials from the International Criminal Tribunal in the former Yugoslavia, ICTY, to legal professionals in the region.
This four-million euro project was funded by the European Union and implemented by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, OSCE, the ICTY and the United Nations Inter-regional Crime and Justice Research Institute, UNICRI.
Addressing participants at a closing event in Sarajevo, ICTY judge Fausto Pocar said that the "project provided a unique opportunity for ICTY judges and legal staff to share experiences with their local counterparts".
He added that WCJP ensured that "the lessons learned by the Hague tribunal are passed on effectively to current and future generations of legal professionals across the region".
Among the project’s achievements is the training of some 800 legal professionals on international humanitarian law, including judges, prosecutors and defence attorneys; the provision of forums for the exchange of experiences with ICTY judges, prosecutors and victim support providers; the production of a new curriculum on international criminal law and practice for local training institutions, containing ICTY jurisprudence and the region’s developing body of domestic war crimes jurisprudence; and the provision of 60,000 pages of ICTY trial transcripts in local languages, to enhance the ability of local judiciaries to access and use testimonies given before the tribunal.
"This ambitious project has considerably contributed to bridging the gap between the Hague tribunal and the former Yugoslavia, and this was done in full co-ordination with the local actors,” said director of UNICRI, Dr Jonathan Lucas. “I believe this is the main factor which made this project successful."
According to Janez Lenarcic from the OSCE’s Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, “This project was designed to provide what judiciaries in the region really need to do their work in line with fair trial standards, and it targeted the full range of professional groups involved in war crimes trials: judges, prosecutors, defence lawyers, investigators and witness support providers."
According to representatives of the organisations who implemented the WCJP, part of the project's success lies in its sustainability: 30 young professionals have been hired as legal support staff in courts and other institutions dealing with war crimes cases, providing them vital experience and increasing local capacity to deal with these kinds of proceedings.
In addition to that, a Manual on International Criminal Defence was produced to include an overview of some of the most effective and innovative practices developed by ICTY defence attorneys, as well as a training and e-learning portal providing an online platform for legal practitioners and judicial training institutions on issues related to war crimes.
Commenting on the EU's contribution to the project, the European Commissioner for Enlargement and Neighborhood Policy, Stefan Fule, said that "by funding the WCJP project, the European Union expressed its support to the war-affected states in the region in advancing the process of development of justice systems in accordance with accepted rule of law standards".
Fule added that this, "as well as the ability of those systems to effectively address their war crimes caseloads, are among the key objectives in the European integration process".
Velma Saric is an IWPR-trained reporter in Sarajevo.
