Croatia News - CroatiaPress.com

Zagreb, March 10 (CP) – Just a few days before the start of the long-awaited trial of generals Ante Gotovina, Ivan Cermak and Mladen Markac, the Croatian government has decided to forward to The Hague Tribunal (ICTY) Interior Ministry documents dating from the time of the Storm operation.

The chief prosecutor in the Storm case, Alan Tieger has said at the pre-trial hearing on Monday that this evidence may be extremely important.

It seems that the papers have not as yet reached The Hague.

According to unofficial sources, the documents in question contain reports of local police stations as well as the Gracac special police commander Zeljko Sacic forwarded to his commander Mladen Markac.

Sacic has said that nothing in the said documents could in any way harm the generals, but just the opposite. He claims that they confirm that everything was done by the book in a dignified and humane manner.

Markac’s attorney Goran Mikulicic sees the introduction of such important documents into the case such far down the road as not being incorrect and irregular.

He said that prosecutors would have to explain why the documents were being introduced four years after Markac’s indictment. Mikulicic added that once the defence sees the documents it would be able to decide on whether it is to oppose their introduction.

Generals Gotovina, Markac and Cermak have been indicted for war crimes committed in 1995 during operation Strom.