THE PRESIDENT: As I have already said, the Tribunal will not sit in open session this afternoon.
The announcement that I have to make is in connection with the organizations which are alleged to be criminal under Article 9 of the Charter, and this is the announcement:
The Tribunal has been giving careful consideration to the duty imposed upon it by Article 9 of the Charter.
It is difficult to determine the manner in which the representatives of the named organizations shall be permitted to appear in accordance with Article 9, without considering the exact nature of the case presented for the Prosecution.
For this reason, the Tribunal has come to the conclusion that, at this stage of the Trial, with many thousands of applications being made, the case for the Prosecution should be defined with more precision than appears in the Indictment.
In these circumstances, therefore, it is the intention of the Tribunal to invite argument from the Counsel for the Prosecution and for the Defense, at the conclusion of the case by all prosecutors, in regard to the questions hereinafter set forth.
The questions which need further consideration are as follows:
1. The Charter does not define a criminal organization, and it is therefore necessary to examine the tests of criminality which must be applied and to decide the nature of the evidence to be admitted.
Many of the applicants who have made requests to be heard assert that they were conscripted into the organization, or that they were ignorant of the criminal purposes of the organization, or that they were innocent of any unlawful acts.
It will be necessary to decide whether such evidence ought to be received to rebut the charge of the criminal character of the organization, or whether such evidence ought more properly to be received at the subsequent trials under Article 10 of the Charter, when the organizations have been declared criminal, if the Tribunal so decides.