Former Kosovo president Hashim Thaci on Monday pleaded innocent to charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity as his trial began at a special court in The Hague, with protesters rallying outside in support of a leader once feted by the West.
Thaci and three co-defendants face 10 charges of persecution, murder, torture and forced disappearance of people during and shortly after the 1998-99 insurgency that eventually brought Kosovo independence from Serbia and made him a hero among many compatriots at home and abroad.
Hashim Thaci resigned from office in 2020 to defend himself against charges including murder, torture, and persecution allegedly committed during his country’s war for independence from Serbia.
The case has stirred an outpouring of support from across the political spectrum in Kosovo. On Sunday, thousands of people took to the streets to show their support for the defendants. Many Kosovars consider the Netherlands-based court an injustice and view it as an attempt to rewrite the history of their struggle for independence. The trial is taking place at the Kosovo Specialist Chambers, which is based in the Netherlands but is part of Kosovo’s legal system. Thaci is standing trial along with Kadri Veseli, Rexhep Selimi, and Jakup Krasniqi for offences allegedly committed across Kosovo and northern Albania from 1998 to September 1999, during and after the war. They all have pleaded not guilty.
Prosecutors allege that they are responsible for crimes committed by Kosovo Liberation Army guerillas against hundreds of civilians and other people who were not taking part in the fighting. Most of the 13,000 people who died in the 1998-1999 war in Kosovo were ethnic Albanians. A 78-day campaign of NATO air strikes against Serbian forces ended the fighting. About 1 million ethnic Albanian Kosovars were driven from their homes. The court in The Hague and a linked prosecutor’s office were created after a 2011 report by the Council of Europe, a human rights body that included allegations that KLA fighters trafficked human organs taken from prisoners and killed Serbs and fellow ethnic Albanians.