Subject: Commission on Crimes in former Jugoslavia
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Memo by Prof. Cherif Bassiouni
1. The Commission of Experts was notified that it should conclude its work
by the end of April 1994.
2. The Commission had anticipated since August 1993 that it woukd complete
its work by the end of July 1994. This was implied in the "plan of action"
described in the Second Interim Report of August 1993 whic was communicated
by the Secretary-General to the Security Council on 9 October 1993, and
that the "plan of action" cannot be implemented by the end of April 1994.
3. The reason for the early termination seems to be based on the lack of
U.N. resources available to fund the Commission until 31 July 1994 and on
the fact that the Security Council has already named a Prosecutor who eill
start his work in February 1994.
4. At present the Budget Committee of the G.A. has noti provided any funds
for the Commission, even for the period 1 January to 30 April 1994. The
U.N. Secretariat will however allocate a modest sum from its budget to the
Commission, but this will be insufficient to cover the Commission's rugular
budget.
5. The Commission will therefore have to use funds from the Voluntary Trust
Fund to partially support itself as of 1 January 1994. Even so, the
Commission will not have enough funds to operate until 31 July 1994. The
maximum projection of presently available funds is 30 April, (and that
will take a significant portion of resources away from investigations).
6. The Commission plans certain major investigation between January and
July:
(a) rape and sexual abuse (3 months)
(b) mass graves exhumations in UNFPA's Sector East and West
(2months) [n.b. Because of weather conditions the mass grave
exhumanations can only start in mid April and will take 6-8
week).
(c) Crimes against Humanity in the Prijedor Area (3-4-months)
These Commission also plans to complete certain ongoing studies, among
them:
7. The Commission also plans to complete certain ongoing studies, among
them:
(a) The Battle and Siege of Sarajevo
(b) Systematic Sexual Assault policy
(c) Ethnic Cleasing
(e) Mass Graves
These studies are presently undertaken by the "Chicago Team" (De Paul
Univesrity, International Human Rights Law Institute, "IHRLI"), under the
direction of Chairman Bassiouni and are at no cost to the Commission.
8. During the period January-July, the Commission hopes to work on a
transition with the Prosecutor and his staff, in order to assist him in
estabilishing a data-base from Chicago to the Haugue. The Commission isa
also ready to brief the Prosecutor and his investigation activities. This
trasitional work will require time and resources (bearing in mind that the
Prosecutor's office will probably not be fully operational before March or
April).
9. The resorces presently available in the Voluntary Trust Fund are not
sufficient to complete the aboe-mentioned "plan of action" in the period of
time specified (for the rasons stated in paragraphs 3-4).
10.The Commission Therefore needs an additional $ 350.00* to fund its
remaining activities between January -July 1994 (since no resources are
available from the UNited Nations regular budget to fund it as of January
1994.**
These additional needed budget to funds can be made available by
contributions to the Voluntary Trust Fund estabilished by the Secretary
General for the Commission, pursuant to the Secretary-General's letter to
Member-States of May 1993. The Voluntary Trust Fund is with the Chemical
Bank, United Nations General Trust Fund Account NO: 015-004473.
*N.B. of these some $ 50.000 will be taken by the U.N. for overhead
charges, leaving the Commission only $ 300.000.
**N.B. Without these resources the Commission will be unable to complete
its mass grave investigations as well as other projects and studies. The
Prosecutor will not likely be able (for a variety of logistics and other
reasons) to complete these projects and studies during the year and 1994
and that makes it necessary for the Commission to complete this "plan of
action" in 94, and then prepare its final report for submission to the
Secretary General for trasmission to the Security Council which report will
be then available to the Prosecutor.
