Concern over defence costs at ICTR

US delegate Thomas Repasch on Friday expressed his concern to the Fifth Committee (Administrative and Budgetary) of the UN at the “large and growing costs of defence counsels” at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). Given that many of those being tried were formerly senior officials in Rwanda, Repasch said he was surprised by their pleas of poverty - leading to the appointment of free counsel - and asked what efforts were made to investigate them, a UN press release stated. The Tribunal had also been “hampered by problems with finance and procurement functions,” he said, wondering whether a suitably qualified people had been found to address these issues and whether procurement rules were being followed.

Warren Sach, a programme planning and budget official with the UN, said the information on procurement and defence was not readily available but would be given to committee members at informal consultations. He also said the linguistic requirements of the ICTR, including local languages that were not official UN working languages, had caused difficulties - not least when the urgent translation of large volumes of documents caused scheduling problems. On staffing, Sach said a Deputy Prosecutor position would become vacant at the end of May and that potential candidates were being reviewed for a senior administrative post.