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‘DEL PONTE CASE’: MERON PUTS BALL INTO MERON’S COURT

2013-11-11 THE HAGUE



Theodor Meron, the Tribunal’s President, has dismissed Karadzic’s request for the appointment of a special chamber to consider the possible culpability of Carla Del Ponte, citing lack of jurisdiction. Since Karadzic has in the meantime submitted the same request to the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals, the ‘Del Ponte case’ was thus referred to its president: Judge Meron

Theodor Meron, president of the Tribunal Theodor Meron, president of the Tribunal

Theodor Meron, the Tribunal’s President, dismissed the motion Radovan Karadzic filed on 27 September 2013, in which Karadzic called for an investigation of the actions of former chief prosecutor Carla Del Ponte. Karadzic wanted the Tribunal to appoint a special chamber to investigate if Del Ponte was in contempt of court when she disclosed the names of some confidential witnesses in Slobodan Milosevic’s defense case in a conversation with US officials in April 2004. Del Ponte’s actions were revealed when a diplomatic cable was published on the Wikileaks website.

President Meron first granted Karadzic’s request and appointed a three-member chamber to establish if there was a prima facie case against the former chief prosecutor. The Special Chamber, led by German judge Fluegge soon declared it lacked jurisdiction, as from 1 July 2013 on, all contempt of court cases are under the jurisdiction of the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals. The Del Ponte case was thus referred back to President Meron.

Karadzic then turned a new leaf and filed a new motion on 4 November 2013, with essentially the same request. The motion was addressed to the President of the Mechanism. In the motion, Karadzic asked the President to appoint a single judge to investigate the possible culpability of Carla Del Ponte, rather than a special chamber as he did in the initial motion.

Meron signed the decision in which he declared that he lacked jurisdiction and dismissed Karadzic’s motion as the Tribunal’s President. The decision itself is the response to the first motion the accused submitted on 27 September 2013. The decision on Karadzic’s second motion of 4 November 2013 will be thus taken by the President of the Mechanism, Judge Theodor Meron.


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