“The former president of Kosovo, Hashim Thaçi, has been sentenced to 25 years in prison. For the West, this could mean that he collaborated with a war criminal.” Thus begins an article in the well-known German newspaper “Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung” written by journalist Michael Martens.
Full text:
Kosovo Tribunal finds Hashim Thaçi guilty
The Special Tribunal for Kosovo in The Hague sentenced former Kosovo President Hashim Thaçi to 25 years in prison on Wednesday. Parts of the verdict, read by US judge Charles Smith III, said Thaçi had been personally involved in some of the crimes he was accused of. He was aware of others, but did nothing to prevent, investigate or punish the perpetrators. Instead, he participated in efforts to cover up the crimes.
The court found Thaçi guilty of torturing prisoners on more than 300 counts. In 96 cases, the murder charge was also proven. Thaçi and his three co-defendants had sought an independent Kosovo and were willing to use violence to achieve it. The court emphasized that it was not the defendants’ goals that were illegal, but some of the methods they used to achieve those goals. The court rejected the defense’s argument that the crimes of Thaçi and his co-defendants were individual acts of revenge committed in a chaotic situation.
The court detailed the extreme brutality with which prisoners were treated in 1998 and 1999 in the camps of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), which Thaçi co-founded. Victims had their arms, ribs or legs broken. Others had their nails pulled out. Many were beaten and knocked unconscious. Some succumbed to the effects of the abuse. Survivors suffered lifelong physical and psychological problems.
The three judges, Charles Smith III, Christoph Barthe (Germany) and Guénaël Mettraux (Switzerland), took into account the fact that Thaçi had initially supported the creation of the special court and had immediately surrendered to the court voluntarily after the charges were confirmed as mitigating circumstances.
Born in 1968, Thaçi became politically active at a young age. In the early 1990s, he lived as a refugee in Switzerland and enrolled to study political science at the University of Zurich. During this time, he also learned German. In the mid-1990s, Thaçi was one of the founders of the KLA (Kosovo Liberation Army), where he used the codename "Gjarpri". Since August 1998, he has been the political leader of the KLA.
In 1999, Thaçi agreed to disarm the Kosovar rebels.
The KLA (Kosovo Liberation Army) used terrorist methods, such as attacks on Serbian police officers and soldiers, to defend itself from Serbian state terrorism in Kosovo. Due to the escalation, NATO intervened in the conflict. From March to June 1999, the alliance bombed Serbia as part of Operation Allied Force. The bombing ended after Belgrade agreed to withdraw all security forces from Kosovo. In June 1999, the NATO-led Kosovo Force (KFOR) entered the territory with approximately 50,000 troops. At the same time, Thaçi signed a declaration on the disarmament and demobilization of the KLA. Formally, Kosovo remained part of Serbia, but was placed under United Nations administration.
After the war ended, Thaçi founded the Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK) – both as a haven for KLA veterans and as a vehicle for his own political ambitions. Thaçi, whom future US president Joe Biden once called “the George Washington of Kosovo”, became one of the West’s most important interlocutors in the region. When Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008, he was Prime Minister of Kosovo, a post he held until 2014. From 2016 to November 2020, Thaçi served as President of Kosovo.
More than 270 witnesses were questioned in court.
He resigned shortly after war crimes charges against him and three other Kosovo Albanian veterans were confirmed and submitted to the Hague tribunal. The prosecution accused Thaçi of war crimes and crimes against humanity. These crimes included torture, kidnapping, arbitrary arrest, unlawful detention and murder in more than a hundred cases. During the trial, 273 witnesses were heard over 234 days. After the conclusion of the evidence, the prosecution requested sentences of 45 years in prison for each of the defendants.
The allegations made by the late Swiss politician Dick Marty were not part of the proceedings. Marty had alleged that Thaçi led a gang that took organs from Serbian prisoners and sold them on the black market. However, these allegations were never proven. ©Albanian adaptation LAPSI.al
