Courtroom 1
Courtroom 1 was finalised in 1995. It was approx. 470m2 in size and cost in excess of USD 2,5 million to build. Courtroom 1 was the most elegant of the Tribunal’s three courtrooms. It is where much of the trial against Slobodan Milosevic was held and where most of the Tribunal’s many judgements were delivered. The courtroom was constructed in what was previously the cafeteria of the Nieuwe Eerste Nederlansche (EN-NEN) insurance company for which the building had been built in the early 1950s.
In the mid-2000s many of the Tribunal’s cases were so-called ‘mega trials’, that is, related cases against several accused which were joined together for reasons of judicial economy. In 2006 the courtrooms were therefore redesigned to accommodate the additional caseload that this entailed. From having been originally designed for cases against three accused, Courtroom 1 was extended to handle cases of up to six accused and their Lead and Co-Counsel plus legal assistants.
