Monday, July 22, 2013

Ruto wants ‘liars’ to give evidence first in Hague trial

By Ally Jamah
Nairobi, Kenya: Deputy President William Ruto’s lawyers have made an application to theInternational Criminal Court (ICC) over eight witnesses they deem to be “liars”.
They want the witnesses to be called first during Ruto’s trial in order to “expose” them and dismantle the case.
Defence lawyer Karim Khan requested the judges to order Chief Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda to change her previous list of witnesses in the trial and start with the ones Ruto’s lawyers believe are “the most rotten” due to their alleged fabrication of evidence.
“For the sake of fairness plus judicial efficiency and economy, the core of the Prosecution case should be tested at the outset of trial, particularly when the Defence has sound reason to believe that this core is rotten,” said Khan in his application.
Ruto’s lawyer said that should the defence succeed in exposing the alleged fabrication in the testimony of the eight witnesses, Khan would request that the trial be terminated by the judges since they would be no point in proceeding with a discredited prosecution case.
Khan said the eight witnesses should come first since their testimony forms the core of the Prosecution’s case against Ruto.
He said changing the order of witnesses would not negatively affect Bensouda’s case; such things are routine occurrences in trials.
He said the eight witnesses should be called sequentially and should not be allowed to listen to each other’s testimonies or contact each other to minimise risk of aligning their accounts to eliminate contradictions among themselves.
“This scheme links all eight witnesses, has been years in the making and has been, or still is, supported by various international and domestic Kenyan organisations,” claimed Khan.
Ruto’s lawyers said the trial chamber had broad powers to regulate the conduct of the trial to make it efficient and expeditious.

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