JURIST - Paper Chase: UN extends terms for international tribunal prosecutors until December 2014

[JURIST] The UN Security Council [official website] on Wednesday extended the terms for prosecutors from the International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and Rwanda (ICTR) [official websites] until December 31, 2014. In unanimously adopting resolutions 2006 and 2007 [press releases], the Security Council extended the terms of prosecutors Serge Brammertz [official profile] and Hassan Bubacar Jallow [Cornell profile]. Brammertz has served as Prosecutor of the ICTY since 2008, and Jallow has served as Prosecutor of the ICTR since 2003. The Security Counsel emphasized that both terms will expire when the tribunals complete their work [UN News Centre] and urged both tribunals to complete their cases by December 2014.

The tribunals, created by the UN in 1993 and 1994, have been working to complete their caseloads. Last week, the ICTY convicted [JURIST report] ex-Yugoslav army chief Momcilo Perisic [JURIST news archive] for crimes against humanity and war crimes committed during the wars in Bosnia and Croatia, including his participation in the Srebrenica massacre [JURIST news archive]. Ratko Mladic [JURIST news archive], with whom Perisic allegedly collaborated, is still awaiting trial for genocide at The Hague. The ICTR also continues to try suspects for crimes occurring during the 1994 Rwandan genocide [JURIST news archive]. Earlier this year, the ICTR transferred its first case [JURIST report] to a Rwandan court, saying that Rwanda was capable of accepting and prosecuting the case of former Rwandan pastor Jean-Bosco Uwinkindi [case materials].