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UN Security Council extends terms of judges on international criminal tribunals

14 December 2010 22:22 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. The UN Security Council on Tuesday extended the terms of judges serving on the UN tribunals charged with trying the alleged perpetrators of atrocities committed in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda in the 1990s, APA reports quoting Xinhua News Agency.

The 15-member Security Council unanimously adopted two separate resolutions -- on the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and on the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) -- granting the term extensions.

U.S. Ambassador to the UN Susan Rice, who holds the rotating Security Council presidency for December, urged both tribunals to take all possible measures to complete their work and complete all proceedings.

Following the brutal conflict in the Balkans, the Hague-based ICTY was set up in 1993 and has indicted 161 individuals for war crimes committed in the former Yugoslavia.

Established in November 1994 and based in the Tanzanian city of Arusha, the ICTR is tasked with the prosecution of those responsible for genocide and other serious violations of international humanitarian law committed in Rwanda that year.

The Rwandan genocide resulted in the murder of 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus at the hands of Hutu extremists over the course of 100 days.