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UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs |
RWANDA: UN Security Council extends terms for tribunal judges
NAIROBI, 20 May 2003 (IRIN) - The UN Security Council extended on Monday the terms of office for four judges at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, allowing them to complete the genocide trials that they are involved in, UN News reported.
The council, meeting at the UN headquarters in New York, unanimously adopted a new resolution enabling Judges Pavel Dolenc of Slovenia, Yakov Ostrovsky of Russia, Navanethem Pillay of South African and Winston Maqutu of Lesotho, to complete the trials, which began before the expiry of their contracts.
The council did not re-elect the four judges on 31 January for a second term. The terms of 11 of the permanent ICTR judges will expire on 24 May.
In a letter to the council, Pillay, who is the tribunal's president, said the reason for the extension request was because the trials were at an advanced stage.
UN News reported that if the judges had not been allowed to continue their work, it would have been necessary to begin the trials anew with fresh panels of judges.
The Security Council established the tribunal in 1995 to try the perpetrators of the April-June 1994 genocide in Rwanda, which claimed lives of at least 800,000 people.
Theme(s): (IRIN) Human Rights
[ENDS]
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