The judges have once again reminded Karadzic it would be better for him to channel his efforts and resources into preparations for the trial – scheduled to resume on 1 March 2009 – than into writing motions, ‘out of moral duty’, when he knows "they are not going to bear fruit"


The Trial Chamber with Judge O-Gon Kwon presiding rejected today Radovan Karadzic’s motion in which he challenged the legal validity and legitimacy of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. Karadzic was assisted in preparing the motion by Dr. Kosta Cavoski, member of the Serbian Academy of Arts and Sciences, who has been arguing the Tribunal is ‘illegal and illegitimate’ for more than a decade. He is mentioned in a footnote.

The question of whether the establishment of the Tribunal was legal was dealt with unequivocally in 1995, the Trial Chamber notes in its decision today, when the Appeals Chamber found in the Dusko Tadic case that the Security Council had the power to establish international courts under Article 41 of the UN Charter. The Appeals Chamber decided that when the Security Council founded the Tribunal, it implemented its fundamental mandate, which is to keep international peace and security. The argument put forward by the accused that such tribunals may only be established by international treaties is groundless because international treaties are just one of the ways in which international courts may be founded.

In the final paragraph, the Trial Chamber brought up Karadzic’s claim that he wrote the motion challenging the legal validity and legitimacy of the Tribunal ‘guided by a feeling of moral obligation before the global public and history, regardless of what the Trial Chamber will decide’. The judges took the opportunity to remind Karadzic once again it would be better for him to channel his efforts and resources into preparations for the trial – scheduled to resume on 1 March 2009 – than into writing motions, ‘out of moral duty’, when he knows they "are not going to bear fruit".

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