“The government has allocated a land for the construction. They (UN) asked for a small space and we have given them five acres,” the spokesperson of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Assah Mwambene, told Hirondelle News Agency on Thursday.
ICTR archives and those of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) will be managed by the International Residual Mechanism (IRM) which is due to take over essential functions of the two UN tribunals.
The IRM will have one branch in Arusha and another one in The Hague, which will house ICTY’s archives. The Arusha branch will start functioning on July 1, 2012, followed on July 1, 2013 by The Hague’s division.
In its resolution 66/240, the UN General Assembly decided to allocate three million USD as initial amount for overall construction of the building in Arusha and authorised the Mechanism to commence the design phase of the project. A part from space for the archives, the building will also include a courtroom and offices for the staff.
The two branches shall share one permanent President, presently American Judge Theodor Meron, one Prosecutor, who is Hassan Bubacar Jallow from Gambia and Registrar, currently Australian John Hocking. Each of them may seat at either of the divisions, depending on his duties.
FK/NI/ER