The Hague Prosecutor's Office today requested a sentence of 45 years in prison for former KLA leaders Hashim Thaci, Kadri Veselji, Rexhep Selimi and Jakup Krasniqi, charged with war crimes in Kosovo and Albania in 1998-99.
At the beginning of her closing arguments, Chief Prosecutor Kimberly West assessed that the evidence presented during the trial showed that the crimes in the indictment were committed and that "the defendants bear criminal responsibility."
"The evidence justifies long prison sentences for all defendants," the chief prosecutor said.
Thaci, Veselji, Seljimi and Krasniqi are accused of crimes against Serbs, Roma and Albanians, declared "collaborators", in around 40 KLA detention centers in Kosovo, as well as in Kukes and Cahan in northern Albania, from March 1998 to November 1999.
The chief prosecutor specified that the defendants are responsible for the deaths of at least 100 victims and the abuse of hundreds of people.
Vestova also indicated as proven the accusation that the four KLA leaders were "protagonists of a joint criminal enterprise" with the aim of taking control of all of Kosovo.
According to Vestova, their target was everyone they perceived as "opponents" of the KLA - Serbs, Roma, Albanians whom they declared collaborators of the Serbian authorities, and members of Ibrahim Rugova's Democratic League of Kosovo.
Referring to the evidence, Prosecutor Vest assessed that the accused were "key members of the KLA Main Staff" and that "the commanders of the KLA operational zones received orders from them, and it was not the other way around," as the defense claimed.
Vest called these defense claims a "cynical distortion of the truth."
The prosecutor labeled the testimonies of seven international officials, including General Wesley Clark and Ambassador Christopher Hill, in defense of the first defendant, Thaci, as unreliable.
According to Vestova, these testimonies were based on the "limited knowledge" of witnesses who were "paratroopers" in the complex situation in Kosovo and had no knowledge of the internal organization of the KLA and its operations on the ground.
The Chief Prosecutor extended special gratitude to the victims and witnesses who testified despite the "persistent climate of intimidation in Kosovo", that is, the "threats, fear and stigma" to which they were exposed.
Before the trial chamber presided over by US President Charles Smith, prosecutors and defense attorneys will present closing arguments by February 18th.
According to court rules, the verdict against the four former KLA leaders will then be pronounced within 90 days.
If the judges need more time to decide, the deadline for pronouncing the verdict may be extended by another 60 days.
According to the indictment, Thaci, Veselji, Seljimi and Krasniqi are individually criminally responsible for the atrocities committed by members of the KLA during a non-international armed conflict as part of "widespread and systematic attacks on persons suspected of opposing the KLA".
The indictment charges Thaci, Veselji, Selimi and Krasniqi with ten counts: persecution on political and ethnic grounds, imprisonment, unlawful arrest and detention, other inhumane acts, cruel treatment, enforced disappearance, torture (two counts) and murder (two counts).
Members of the KLA committed crimes against approximately 407 detainees, of whom at least 102 were killed, from March 1998 to September 1999, the indictment states.
The indictment identified 750 victims - 51 Serbian, 23 Albanian and one Roma.
Six counts of the indictment charge Thaci (56), Veselji (57), Selimi (53) and Krasniqi (74) with crimes against humanity, and four counts of war crimes.
According to the indictment, Tača, Veselja, Seljima and Krasnić were participants in a joint criminal enterprise.
The goal of this criminal enterprise was to take control of the whole of Kosovo by violence against all whom the KLA considered "adversaries".
KLA officers Azem Sulja, Ljah Brahimaj, Fatmir Ljimaj, Sulejman Seljimi, Rustem Mustafa, Shukri Buja, Ljatif Gashi and Sabit Geci are also listed as accomplices in the criminal association.
All defendants pleaded not guilty.
They have been in custody in The Hague since their arrests in Kosovo on November 4 and 5, 2020.
The trial of Thaci and his co-defendants began before the court in The Hague on April 3, 2023, and prosecutors completed their evidence presentation on April 15 last year.
125 prosecution witnesses testified in the Hague courtroom, and the prosecutors introduced the statements of dozens of other witnesses as evidence in written form.
The prosecution's evidence includes 3.000 documents in Albanian, Serbian and English.
Seven witnesses testified in Thaci's defense, former British and American officials who met and held talks with him in 1998-99.
These witnesses gave almost identical statements that Thaci was not a military commander, but a political representative of the KLA, and that he could not have been the perpetrator of the crimes in the indictment.
According to defense witnesses, the KLA was not even an organized army with a central command and chain of command.
When questioned by prosecutors, Clark, Hill and other witnesses for Thaci's defense confirmed, however, that at that time they did not have detailed information about the internal organization and activities of the KLA on the ground, nor about the abduction and detention of civilians.
Defense evidence in written form was also submitted by the representatives of the fourth defendant, Krasnići.
Believing that the prosecutors had not proven their guilt, the second defendant Veselji and the third defendant Seljimi did not present defense witnesses to the court.
More than 150 victims of crimes from the indictment are participating in the trial of Thaci and his co-accused.
During the trial, the court heard reports from two experts on the material, physical and mental damage suffered by the victims.
If Tači, Veselji, Seljimi and Krasnići are found guilty, all victims participating in the trial will have the right to compensation.
The Kosovo Specialized Chambers, as the court is officially called, were established in 2015 by the Kosovo Assembly under international pressure caused by the report by Council of Europe rapporteur Dick Marty on KLA crimes in Kosovo and Albania, published in 2011.
The court is formally part of the Kosovo justice system, but operates in The Hague. In its judgments and other documents, the court has found that there is a persistent climate of intimidation and harassment of witnesses in Kosovo against accused members of the former KLA.
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