In cowsheds and basements, chained, covered in mud and surrounded by human and animal excrement, hung upside down and beaten, with their nails pulled out and limbs broken…
Hundreds of people considered opponents of the KLA – schoolteachers, farmers, foresters, ordinary workers and, in some cases, women and children – were said to have been arbitrarily detained and mistreated in these ways during the last war in Kosovo, in 1999.
The four former leaders of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) were convicted of these war crimes on September 16 by the Kosovo Special Court in The Hague.
The verdict was of first instance and the defense teams of Hashim Thaçi, Jakup Krasniqi, Kadri Veseli and Rexhep Selim warned that they will appeal it.
Since the day of its proclamation, every night, Skanderbeg Square in Pristina gathers thousands of people who chant “Not in my name” and oppose the punishment of those they consider “heroes” and “liberators.”
Amidst the speeches and songs, almost no one talks about the victims. Why?
Agon Maliqi, a non-resident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Center for Europe and an expert on developments in Kosovo, says this is because the verdict has attacked the legacy of the liberation war and the country’s history.
According to him, the debate should be refocused on “the individual responsibility of those who committed the acts, and not by building a narrative of the criminal motives of the KLA leadership.”
“We must honestly ask: are the convicted people the ones who carried out and ordered the crimes, and does this type of verdict establish justice?” Maliqi tells Radio Free Europe.
He insists that the decision has not brought justice to either the victims or the convicted, as responsibility has been attributed to the command level without individualizing each case.
The Trial Panel linked the responsibility of the four former KLA leaders to a common criminal plan to target persons considered opponents of the KLA.
The four defendants were said to have contributed to the creation and implementation of this plan and to have taken no steps to stop it, while the area commanders were “zealous implementers” of this criminal intent.
“Although the responsibility of the accused is individual and personal, what they did could not have been accomplished by a single person. They did it together, with determination and with the help of others,” the summary of the verdict states, which speaks of a common criminal intent.
And it was precisely the mention of a “joint criminal enterprise” that provoked a reaction among citizens who felt that this tarnished the war waged by the KLA.
Some citizens interviewed by Radio Free Europe say they do not believe the accusations are based on sufficient facts and evidence, describing them as speculation and unacceptable to the people of Kosovo.
“Who has ascertained them? Where are the facts? Where is the evidence? They are just speculations,” says Milaim Llugaxhiu from Suhareka.
“Those accusations are ridiculous, a joke for our people,” says Liridon Sheholli from Podujevo.
“It’s not true, we all know it,” according to Qemajl Hasani from Vushtrri.
“There are no facts and as such they are unacceptable for us and for the people of Kosovo,” says Bajram Beqiri, also from Vushtrri.
The full verdict in this case has not yet been published.
But, beyond the legacy of the KLA, expert on developments in Kosovo, Agon Maliqi, says that the victims have not received much attention due to two other key factors: anonymity and suspicions about their profile.
“The existence of suspicions that a good part of them may have been spies, or collaborators and witnesses processed by Serbia, makes many not see them as victims, but simply as legitimate collateral of war,” says Maliqi.
In the summary of the verdict, the trial panel found that the detainees were personally accused of being spies and traitors and of collaborating with the Serbian regime.
But, “with limited exceptions,” the judges said they “found no evidence that the victims had committed criminal activity, had actively participated in hostilities, or posed any other legitimate concern for the security of the KLA.”
Maliqi says that at that time there were people who collaborated with the Serbian authorities, adding that there is a consensus that “in wartime circumstances, at least, the detention of suspects is a legitimate practice.”
“However, it is widely known that people are often targeted baselessly and arbitrarily out of a spirit of distrust, political disagreements or personal grudges,” he says.
But, since the names, the faces of their stories – except in the case of Behajdin Allaq – remain anonymous, there is distrust towards them.
Radio Free Europe contacted Allaq’s family for comment following the verdict, but did not receive a response.
Maliqi says it is understandable that victims and witnesses have requested anonymity “to protect themselves from public judgment”, but that this has created the perception “that they are guilty and have something to hide”.
“Especially knowing that facing these abstract victims in the dock are not the perpetrators themselves, but figures of historical importance, who are being judged based on the logic of the command structure – which automatically shifts empathy towards them,” says Maliqi.
Among the victims were said to be people who were detained solely because they were considered “[Ibrahim] Rugova’s soldiers,” as they supported the Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK) and the Armed Forces of the Republic of Kosovo (FARK).
Radio Free Europe requested comment from the LDK regarding their mention in the conviction verdict for the former KLA leaders, but received no response.
Publicly, this party came out on September 16 with a statement opposing the Special Court’s verdict, saying that “the KLA remains the proudest part of the modern history of our people” and that it only “defended the doorstep.”
In this statement, as in almost all public statements made after this verdict, the crimes committed by Serbian forces in Kosovo were emphasized.
Kosovo’s Prime Minister, Albin Kurti, reacted similarly that day, describing the decision as “unacceptable injustice, a great and harmful punishment.”
“In these difficult moments, we stand by the families of the former KLA leaders and all fellow liberation fighters,” he said, without mentioning the victims in that reaction, but calling the conclusions that they had targeted people considered collaborators of the Serbian regime “unfair findings.”
Since then, he has pledged to provide all possible support, through a state strategy, to assist defense teams in appealing the verdict.
Political analyst Ilir Deda tells Radio Free Europe that supporting the appeal of the verdict “should not turn into a denial of the suffering of the victims.”
“Respect for the victims does not weaken the defense; on the contrary, it adds credibility,” he says, emphasizing that the criminal responsibility of individuals cannot be transformed into the collective guilt of the KLA or the state of Kosovo.
In Kosovo, most organizations dealing with justice and human rights issues also opposed the verdict and avoided mentioning the victims.
On September 25, 11 of them responded to Amnesty International, objecting to the way it linked the verdict to “thousands of victims of the war in Kosovo,” without mentioning the crimes committed by Serbian forces.
Amnesty International, in its response, said that the sentences “give hope to thousands of victims of the war in Kosovo.”
They demanded that Amnesty distinguish between the victims and crimes addressed in the case against Thaçi and others and other victims of the war – mostly victims of Serbian forces.
The Kosovo Humanitarian Law Center, on the other hand, focused on the victims of the case of former KLA leaders.
“Political elites in Kosovo have entrenched the narrative of the KLA’s heroic fight for freedom against Serbian forces as almost the only permissible interpretation of the war. This narrative cannot change the facts established by the verdict,” the reaction states.
However, the Fund acknowledged that the dissatisfaction in Kosovo stems from the “almost complete lack” of prosecution of Serbian officials of the time in courts in Serbia.
He insisted that the facts established in the verdict cannot be relativized by labeling the victims as “collaborators.”
Radio Free Europe contacted this organization to discuss the position of the victims in the debate created after the verdict, but did not receive a response.
According to the verdict, at least 385 people were illegally or arbitrarily detained, 303 were tortured, 49 were cruelly treated and 96 were killed. (RFE)