Recent Court Documents in the 2 ICC Kenya Cases 30 October 2013

The Common Legal Representative for Victims in the Ruto/Sang case asked permission to participate in the Prosecutor’s appeal to include the dates of 30^th and 31^st December in the temporal scope of charges. The CLR argues that if these dates are not included, victims who suffered harm during those two days will be permanently prevented from presenting their views to the court in the Ruto/Sang case (including seeking reparations if either accused is found guilty).

The Kenyatta Trial Chamber found that the conduct of the Kenyatta defence in the High Court case it filed seeking mobile telephone records did not violate the confidentiality of victims and protected witnesses.

The Prosecutor in the Kenyatta case made a second submission on the conduct of proceedings.

After the Kenyatta Defence made a request for conditional excusal from trial, the Prosecutor responded, asking the Trial Chamber to reject the request.

The CLR in the Kenyatta case joined the Prosecutor in demanding that the request be turned down.

Recent Court Documents in the 2 ICC Kenya Cases 9 October 2013

The Ruto/Sang Trial Chamber ordered that the victim applications of several OTP witnesses (which make them dual-status witnesses) should be confidentially disclosed to the parties.

The Trial Chamber also allowed the Common Legal Representative to prepare Witness 526- who recently completed her testimony- for purposes of examining her in court regarding victims’ interests. The CLR made this request because Witness 526 has a special status as both a victim and a witness

The Kenyatta defence applied for their client to be excused from continuous attendance at his trial. The application provides for Kenyatta’s physical presence at the opening and closing of the trial; but in any other situation where the court requires his presence, he would appear via video-link.

The Trial Chamber V(B)- the Kenyatta trial chamber- allowed the Prosecutor to disclose a less redacted version of witness 232’s victim application.

The same Trial Chamber refused the defence request an adjournment of the trial in order to ‘develop’ software and technology that could be used to analyse data from mobile phone records.

The Prosecutor in the Kenyatta case sought permission to add 2 more witnesses to her case. This follows the withdrawal of witness 426. The two witnesses are referred to as P-066 (who will testify to the nature and extent of sexual violence in the context of the Kenyatta charges) and P-548 (a Mungiki insider testifying as to the alleged Mungiki link with Kenyatta, coordination and organisation of attacks).

The CLR asked the Court to grant the Prosecutor’s request to add witnesses.

The VPRS gave its fifth report on the status of victims in the Kenyatta case.

Recent Court Documents in the 2 ICC Kenya Cases 25 September 2013

The Common Legal Representative of the Victims (CLR) in the Kenyatta case asked the Trial Chamber to compel the Kenyatta defence to state whether it had supplied information to telecoms companies in Kenya that might be used to identify witnesses. This came after the revelation that the Kenyatta defence was, through a confidential application in the High Court, seeking mobile telephone data of certain individuals connected with the Kenyan cases. The CLR worries that by allegedly releasing such data, the Professional Code of Conduct and the Code of Conduct for investigators may have been breached.

The Kenyatta defence replied, saying that the High Court application had nothing to do with the victims. They also protested at the media reports of the High Court application which they termed misleading and inaccurate. Finally the Kenyatta defence termed as unprofessional the manner in which the CLR accused the defence team of unethical behaviour; they asked the Court to dismiss the CLR’s application.

The Prosecutor replied to the Kenyatta Defence application for an updated pre-trial brief by undertaking to file one, though she criticised the defence for bringing to the Chamber a matter that could easily have been handled amicably.

Trial Chamber V(B) in the Kenyatta case reached a decision allowing the Common Legal Representative access to specific confidential filings listed by the Court. The Chamber also reminded the parties that they should notify the CLR of legal filings relevant to the interests of the victims, even if the filings themselves remain confidential.