99. Lastly, there is the issue of ascertaining whether, as affirmed by the Applicants,
handling of the matter had been frozen for over five years between 2001 and 2006. In
answer to a question from a member of the Court on this issue during the Public Hearing
of 8 March 2013,
Counsel to the Respondent
refuted the allegation and indicated that
acts of investigation, especially the hearing of witnesses, did take place during that period.
100. As mentioned earlier, by letter dated 25 April 2013, the Respondent State submitted
to the Court Registry, infer alia, nine (9) reports of hearings, adversarial procedure and
submissions as part of the investigations of the case during the period of suspension of
hearing of the principal suspect (supra, paragraph 30).
101.
Following
submitted
the
Public
to the Court,
Hearing of 29
by letter dated
November
2013,
18 December
2013,
the
Respondent
additional
further
documents,
including a number of other minutes of hearings of witnesses or of the civil suit (supra,
paragraph 42).
102. Consideration
of all the documents
submitted
minutes of hearings, indicate that between
to the Court and,
15 May 2001
in particular, the
(date of the first adversarial
procedure between the principal accused and the main witness) and 31 May 2006 (date
of the second and last adversarial procedure between these two same persons), there
was
indeed a number of hearings of witnesses or of the parties to the civil suit.
The
hearing of witnesses accordingly took place on the following dates: 30 May 2001 (one) ; _
2 November
2001
(two);
December 2003 (three);
18
December
2003
(one);
19
December
2003
(one);
26
22 April 2004 (one); 23 April 2004 (one); 5 May 2004 (two); 6
May 2004 (one); 5 January 2005 (one); 9 May 2006 (one). As for the hearing of the parties
in the civil suit, this occurred on the following dates: 22 February 2006 (three); 4 May
2006 (one); and 4 May 2006 (one).
103. It is therefore clear that although the adversarial procedure between the principal
accused
and the main witness was
indeed
suspended
between
2001
and 2006 for
reasons of illness, investigations however, continued during that period especially with
the hearing
of witnesses.
The
Respondent
suspended investigations during the period.
cannot therefore be accused
me
of having