The
International Criminal Court (ICC) is seeking Sh1 billion to prosecute
cases against President Uhuru Kenyatta, his Deputy William Ruto and
radio journalist Joshua Sang next year.
The cases have
cost Sh2.5 billion since 2010 when The Hague court took up
investigations into the 2008 post election violence that left 1,300
people dead and displaced 300,000 others.
This year, the court has spent Sh793 million to fund the two high profile cases involving the President, his deputy and Mr Sang.
Yesterday,
President of the Assembly of States Tiina Intelmann said the court’s
budget of Sh12.6 billion was inadequate for the work ahead and could
expose it to investigation setbacks.
“Consultation
meetings held this week will provide an outcome to the budgetary
problems that have curtailed in-depth investigations on the accused by
the court,” Ms Intelmann said.
The budget proposals
were presented at the ongoing Assembly of States on Saturday and are
expected to be approved later this week.
“The draft budget is considered and commented upon by the Committee on Budget and Finance (CBF),” said Ms Intelmann.
ICC
prosecutor Fatou Bensouda has urged CBF to push for better budgetary
allocations that will enable the office to perform duties. The court
recently experienced setbacks over shoddy preliminary investigations.
According
to the proposed 2014 budget Sh336 million would be used to finance
court operations, while an additional Sh546 million would be spent on
funding the court’s field operations in the two Kenya cases.
The
court projects that in 2014 there will be a substantial increase of
activities on the Kenyan situation with two trials expected to go for 12
months each.
President Kenyatta’s trial will start on
February 5 while Ruto and Sang’s case which was adjourned on Friday will
resume on January 13.
The court has proposed the procurement of video teleconferencing facilities to be used in the Kenya cases.
The President and his Deputy have been pushing for physical absenteeism from the court.
“In the Kenyan cases, Chambers envisage having the accused follow the hearings via video teleconferencing (VTC) from Nairobi.”
More VCT facilities would also be ordered to facilitate witness participation in the cases.
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