Tibor Varadi, an international law expert and Serbia's former chief legal representative at the Hague-based International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the case of Croatia's genocide lawsuit against Serbia, has said that the Hague war crimes tribunal verdict in the case of Croatian generals Ante Gotovina, Mladen Markac and Ivan Cermak does not have any significant impact on the proceedings at the ICJ regarding Croatia's genocide lawsuit against Serbia and Serbia's counter-suit, and that it would be reasonable to discuss dropping the lawsuits.
In an interview with the Belgrade-based Danas daily of Wednesday, Varadi said the verdict of the Hague war crimes tribunal showed that very serious crimes had been committed during the 1995 Croatian army and police operation "Storm", but that Gotovina was not convicted for genocide, while the ICJ's jurisdiction referred only to the crime of genocide.
As for the crimes committed in Croatia's territory, regardless of whether they were committed by Serbs or by Croats, the Hague war crimes tribunal did not qualify any of those crimes as genocide, Varadi said, adding that this meant that neither Croatia's lawsuit nor Serbia's counter-suit had any chance at the ICJ.
Asked if negotiations on mutually dropping the genocide lawsuits were possible at the moment, Varadi said that it would be "very reasonable".
Stressing that people should not change their position towards the Hague war crimes tribunal with each new verdict, Varadi said that people in Serbia, Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina should keep a normal dose of trust in the tribunal.
