Serbia Needs to Respond to Suit by March 2010

The court gave Serbia a deadline by March 22, 2010 to answer Croatia´s suit for violating conventions that speaks of the crime of genocide.

The International Court of Justice in The Hague, the main court body of the United Nations, gave Belgrade a deadline until March 22, 2010 to answer Croatia’s suit against Serbia for genocide, reported the ICJ on Thursday in a report on their website.

On July 2, 1999, Croatia started a suit before the ICJ against Yugoslavia at the time, for violating the 1948 convention on stopping and punishing the crime of genocide, carried out in Croatia between 1991 and 1995. Croatia requested that Yugoslavia be convinced of committing genocide in Croatia, and that the citizens of Croatia were victims of that genocide. Croatia requested that Yugoslavia punish all of the perpetrators of genocide that are under their jurisdiction, that the truth be found out about missing Croatian citizens, and that cultural good be returned that went missing during that period, and in the widest sense that the damage to Croatia and its citizens be made up for.

On November 18, the International Court of Justice rejected Serbia’s complaints and declared themselves to have jurisdiction of Croatia’s suit against Serbia for genocide, and the government in Belgrade announced a counter suit against Croatia for crimes committed during the police and army liberation Operation “Storm” in 1995.