[JURIST] UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon [official website] said [transcript; UN News Centre report] on Tuesday that the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) [official website; JURIST news archive] will continue to operate beyond its originally planned end date at the end of this year. Ban estimated that it will be necessary for the court to remain open until 2013. Part of the reason for the extension is that two of the primary suspects remain at large. Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladic [case materials; JURIST news archive] and political leader Goran Hadzic [case materials] both face a significant number of charges. Ban said:

When these Special Tribunals were established, they were established for a temporary purpose with a certain date fixed. ... There is some broad agreement now that ICTY may need at least a few more years, to 2013 or so. Our hope is that all these pending cases should be expedited. If and when these two fugitives are arrested, then we will have to discuss again how we can adjust, or we can leave it to other mechanisms - this was discussed already between the ICTY and the Security Council. At this time, since we do not have any clear idea when these two fugitives would be arrested, with the help of those countries concerned, then they should live up to their schedules according to exit strategies.