Injustice foretold
Kosovo’s Special Court continues to arrest some of the most eminent names in Kosovo’s modern history, forcing a false narration of our Republic that is deeply offensive for the rest of society.
Here are four stories about four men. These are real stories. And these are real men.
In many respects — and with all their human flaws and merits — they represent the best that Kosovo had to offer to its daughters and sons and to our movement for liberation, democracy and independence, firmly anchored in the values and the joint work we shared with the Western allies.
What is happening to them right now is but a painful episode, caused by the worst feature of the tiny and faceless conglomerate of appeasing apparatchiks, informed by appalling prejudices, pushed by the unaccountable apparitors of injustice sitting in The Hague.
But this will be a short-lived and shameful episode that will not erase the role these men played in our history. Read until the end to find out why.
On Hajredin
Prof. Hajredin Kuçi was always a mild-mannered character in Kosovo politics. The soft-speaking professor of international law isn’t prone to sweeping generalizations and polarizing language against those he doesn’t agree with, despite serving as an MP, Minister of Justice and Deputy Prime minister in multiple mandates.
In a normal world, in normal times, Profa (“The professor” as everyone calls Kuçi in sign of respect) would have been deeply immersed in academia. He was a summa cum laude student in early 1990s at the University of Prishtina UP and was a student leader and an editor of the student newspaper, at times when the UP was banned by the Milosevic dictatorial regime. He continued the studies immediately after the war, receiving his PhD degree at University of Graz and received awards from several universities, including La Rouche College, for his role in advancing the rule of law in post-war Kosovo.
Hajredin Kuçi joined politics, winning easily 4 mandates as a Member of parliament for PDK, became one of signatories of Kosovo’s Declaration of Independence and served successfully as Minister of Justice and Deputy Prime minister at the time when Kosovo was establishing its’ own institutions of law after independence of 2008. He was active in all phases of negotiations with Serbia, helping Kosovar team establish the legal platform on normalization of relations with the former foe, based on mutual recognition. He is a firm believer of Kosovo’s European path and destiny. In recent years, Profa was member of defense team of indictees at the Special Court, established initially to investigate grave allegations of organ harvesting during Kosovo war.
On Bashkim
Bashkim Smakaj joined the Kosovo Liberation Army in his early twenties. But he was also a keen student and had graduated both in Faculty of Natural Mathematical Sciences, in the Department of Biology and in the Philosophical Faculty at the University of Prishtina, in Political Science and Public Administration.
After the war ended, Bashkim joined the newly-established Kosovo police force, trained by the OSCE. He attended courses abroad and as a fluent speaker of English, German, Italian and Serbo-Croatian, he rose in the ranks of the first ever democratic police force Kosovo ever had. From the position of Director for Strategic Planning for the Border Police of Kosovo, he was named as the first ever head of the intelligence agency of Kosovo (AKI), which was being set up after independence, with the help of American security establishment, as a non-partisan and independent agency with strong links to sister organizations in the West.
Bashkim was also the longest-serving head of the AKI and dealt with numerous crisis, most of which Kosovan public never knew. As it should be. His role in tackling the inexplicable rise of Kosovar volunteers in the early stages of Syrian war won him plaudits from his peers in West. A special mission that helped return Kosovan kids kidnapped by the few fundamentalist fathers who took them to the short-lived Islamic Caliphate in Levant, also made him a bit of a hero. That spike of foreign fighters from Kosovo was quickly abated and tackled and Kosovo was spared of any terrorist attacks thanks to the work of Bashkim and his team at AKI. He later became national security advisor to the President of Kosovo and in recent years joined the local efforts to help former President Thaçi, after his indictment from the Special Court, established initially to investigate grave allegations of organ harvesting during Kosovo war.
On Fadil
Life was not kind to Fadil Fazliu. The 65-year old economist has a seemingly ordinary life, educated as economist and working his last months before pension at the Kosovo Energy Corporation. But for decades before the war ended, Fadil was also a member of the illegal movements for the liberation of Kosovo from Serbian occupation.
Fadil’s brother Fahri Fazliu was but a young student when he participated in 1981 demonstrations requesting status of a republic of then autonomous province of Kosovo. These demonstrations were violently crushed, but Fahri continued his activities in the first illegal cells, working deeply underground against the communist regime. In 1989 he was shot dead in Prishtina’s neighborhood of Sunny Hill, together with his friend Afrim Zhitia, by the Serbian secret police who was hunting the men they perceived to be existential threat to Belgrade’s role, as Milosevic was making entrance in the political scene of former Yugoslavia.
Fadil’s other brother Bahri was a poet and publicist, but no less fierce fighter for Kosovo. He was a publisher of illegal newspaper Çlirimi, and joined the ranks of the Kosovo Liberation Army in the early days, continuing the path of his late brother. On May 7, 1998, he got involved in a skirmish with the Yugoslav Army in an area called Bjeshka e Bogiqes, at the border between Albania, Yugoslavia, and Kosovo (then Serbia, Yugoslavia), eventually getting killed.
There are many towns bearing the names of Fazliu brothers. Bahri had also joined the KLA but he lived on to witness liberation of Kosovo and establishment of a sovereign, democratic republic.
On Isni
Isni Kilaj comes from Malisheva, one of the poorest towns in Kosovo. In 1990 he was the founder of the LDK branch in the town, the party propagating a Ghandian, civic disobedience to Milosevic regime. In 1992 was fired from his job as an accountant in an agricultural collective, was arrested and became one of the thousands of Albanian political prisoners in Serbia. After his release, Kilaj didn’t stop his activism, though he started believing that peaceful resistance will not stop Milosevic’s genocidal intent.
He joined the guerrilla army but after the war turned to politics, serving as a Mayor of Malisheva for 10 years. He was awarderd the keys of the city of Little Rock, Arkansas (the birthplace of Bill Clinton) for his merits in post-war reconstruction of his town and overseeing massive investments in schools and public infrastructure. He later joined the government as Deputy Minister of finance and Deputy minister of agriculture.
Epilogue
These four men were indicted last week by the Special Court for offenses related to “preventing administration of justice”. The international court that has yet to indict a single Serb soldier or officer, is accusing them of influencing witnesses in the trial against Thaçi and co. They may have spoken to witnesses or not, but we know that Special Court has officially stated that all attempts to counter court, or to even call for its’ sunset — are deemed as dangerous attempts to “prevent administration of justice”. They stated so.
But 80% of Kosovans believe this court now is against the KLA and the history of Kosovo. The Court that was established to go to the bottom of organ harvesting claims, pushed initially by the Russian MP Kosachev at Council of Europe, having found zero evidence on these lurid claims, had a prosecutor (a certain Jack Smith) who started a problematic trial for “command responsibility”.
After half a decade of endless court sessions, these trials are not over — and now the highly paid international prosecutors are extending their salaries by spending millions to hunt something, anything, against all those that belong to the very wide, popular, old liberation movement. They refuse to use in any shape or form the Kosovo flag, though nominally the court belongs to Kosovo (it has been bankrolled by soon approaching one billion euros by the European Union.) They consider the entire KLA criminal. They stated so in no uncertain terms.
So, here we are.
Special Court started with organ harvesting accusation (later repeated by Russians against the Ukrainian defenders), continued with flimsy “command responsibility” charges against leaders of a guerrilla that had neither full command nor full responsibility in a vicious war between mostly rural, ragtag units and the organized genocidal machinery of Milosevic — and is now hunting anyone it deems “preventing administration of justice”. Even those that have contributed mostly to creation of a republic based on peace, democracy and justice.
