Franko Simatović

The defence teams of Jovica Stanisic and Franko Simatovic urged the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals in The Hague on Tuesday to acquit both men of committing crimes during the wars in Croatia and Bosnia from 1991 to 1995.

The prosecutor at the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals in The Hague, Douglas Stringer, urged the UN court on Monday to impose life sentences on former Serbian State Security officials Jovica Stanisic and Franko 'Frenki' Simatovic for crimes committed during the wars in Croatia and Bosnia.

Closing arguments in the case against former Serbian State Security officials Jovica Stanisic and Franko Simatovic, who are accused of controlling Serb fighters who committed crimes during the Croatian and Bosnian wars, are being heard from Monday to Wednesday at the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals in The Hague.

The president of the UN's International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals in The Hague, Carmel Agius, told the UN Security Council on Monday evening that the final verdict in the case against wartime Bosnian Serb military chief Ratko Mladic is due in May next year.

The president of the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals in The Hague, Carmel Agius, told the UN Security Council on Monday evening that the final verdict in the Ratko Mladic trial will be delivered nine months after appeals hearings are finally held.

The Association of Defence Counsel Practising Before the International Courts and Tribunals urged the UN's Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals in The Hague on Friday to free elderly war crime convicts to help ensure that they are not infected with the COVID-19 virus.

Jovan Dimitrijevic, who was in charge of logistics for Arkan's paramilitary unit, told the retrial of Jovica Stanisic and Franko Simatovic at the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals in The Hague that weapons for the unit's wartime activities were supplied by the Yugoslav People's Army, not the Serbian State Security Service.

Petar Djukic, a former high-ranking Serb police officer in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, told the retrial of Jovica Stanisic and Franko Simatovic at the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals in The Hague on Tuesday and Wednesday that military volunteers who came to Bosanski Samac in Bosnia in April 1992 were brought by political parties and not by Serbian State Security, SDB.

Three brigades of the Serb-dominated Yugoslav Army took part in fighting in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1993 and, like the special operations unit of Serbian state security, were known as 'Red Berets', a defence witness in the retrial of two top Serbian state security officials in The Hague said on Thursday.

Witness Dejan Lucic told the retrial of Serbian State Security Service officials Jovica Stanisic and Franko Simatovic at the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals in The Hague on Thursday that the defendants did not send Dragan Vasiljkovic, alias Captain Dragan, to Croatia in 1991 to set up a training camp for rebel Serb fighters.