Hearing on Croatia’s Charges Against Serbia Begins

The first oral hearing is held almost ten years after Croatia filed charges against former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in 1999.

ZAGREB, CROATIA - On Monday morning, the International Court of Justice, the highest international juridical body, started a five-day hearing on charges of genocide in the 1991-1995 war filed by Croatia against Serbia.

The first oral hearing on this issue is held after almost ten years after Croatia filed charges against former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia on July 2, 1999, for violation of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide from 1948.

The defendants will be the first to exhibit their arguments and they will have the whole day. Tomorrow (Tuesday) afternoon and on Wednesday morning, the Croatian representatives will present their arguments to the Court.

The Court is not competent in the quarrel with Croatia?

According to Serbian tabloids, the representatives of Serbia, led by Tibor Varadi, will prove that the Court is not competent in the quarrel with Croatia, as the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was not a member of the UN at the time Croatia filed the lawsuit and was not signatory the Statute of the International Court of Justice or the Convention on Genocide. In April 1992, after the worst crimes were committed in Croatia, it did not even exist as a state, Belgrade thinks, although they once insisted that Serbia and Montenegro had the state continuity of former Yugoslavia.

Serbia also thinks that Croatia’s charges are in some parts not based on the Convention on Genocide, for instance the request to return cultural heritage or the disclosure of the fate of the missing.

The Croatian representative, Ivan Simonovic, thinks that Croatia has counter-arguments for all Serbian’s positions, as it worked as a state the whole time, including the period starting from 1991 when the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was born, and that for the whole time it was signatory of the Convention.

Both parties expect the decision of the ICJ on its competence in the case by autumn. If the Court declares itself competent, then it will start working on the contents of the charges. Serbian representative Varadi announced the possibility that Serbia, in case the Court declares itself competent, files counter charges against Croatia, on which they have been working for several years.

Charges of genocide, not aggression

Croatia in its charges asks the Court to confirm the responsibility of Belgrade for the genocide in Croatia, and that Belgrade persecutes all the responsible individuals, that it give out the fate of the missing (1,419), to return the seized Croatian cultural heritage, and to compensate Croatia’s losses.

According to Croatia’s charges, throughout four years of war, Serbia committed genocide through the ethnic cleansing of Croatian inhabitants, that is displacement, murder of 10,572 people, rape, illegal internment of 7,000 people in camps, and destruction of their property.

The contents of the charges regard the crime of genocide, and not of aggression. Therefore it contains only evidence which concern the Convention on Genocide.