UNMIK/PR/5

30 JUNE 1999

PRESS RELEASE

UNMIK APPOINTS FIRST JUDGES AND PROSECUTORS FOR INTERIM  KOSOVO JUDICIARY SYSTEM

PRISTINA-The Special Representative of the Secretary-General, Sergio Vieira de Mello, today appointed nine judicial officials who will form the core of the interim judiciary to be established by UNMIK’s Civil Administration.

Five Albanians, three Serbs and one Turk were sworn in today at UNMIK headquarters. Justices Aquif Tuhina, Branimir Aleksic and Bajram Tmava will sit on a judicial panel. Justices Aziz Rexha and Zoran Tabakovic were named investigating judges. Also sworn in were four prosecutors: Miftar Jusiqi, Aleksandar Obradovic, Dritta Hajdari and Ismet Sufta.

Their first tasks as the embryonic interim judiciary of Kosovo will be to address the cases of 221 people detained or charged by KFOR for crimes committed over the past three weeks in Kosovo.

Ultimately the UN is seeking justices and prosecutors for 22 municipal-level courts and five district courts, as part of the interim civil administration of Kosovo.

The judges and prosecutors sworn in today had all served with previous court systems in Yugoslavia, and were selected from among a list of candidates by the Joint Advisory Commission on Provisional Judicial Appointments, appointed by the SRSG on 28 June.

The Commission, composed of five former  judges in Kosovo and three international lawyers, made their selections guided by UNMIK’s goal to establish an independent, impartial and  multi-ethnic judiciary.