Kosovo Liberation Army emblem. Photo: Sgt Craig J. Shell, US Marine Corps/Wikimedia Commons.
An Albanian lawyer representing Kosovo ex-guerrilla Dritan Goxhaj, who was arrested on Monday in Tirana, told BIRN that he has been charged over an article he wrote for a media outlet exposing the names of some of the potential protected witnesses in a war crimes trial of another guerrilla in The Hague.
Lawyer Bashkim Nikolla said Goxhaj is accused of having “intimidated and obstructed the criminal process” in the case against Salih Mustafa, a Kosovo Liberation Army officer who was sentenced to 26 years in prison by the Hague-based Kosovo Specialist Chambers in December last year.
Albanian media reported that in the article that Goxhaj wrote, which was published by a Kosovo outlet, he mentioned five names of “protected and hidden witnesses” that he said he had “decided to expose”.
Goxhaj is currently awaiting extradition to the Kosovo Specialist Chambers in The Hague to face the charges.
Both the Specialist Chambers and the Specialist Prosecution declined to comment to BIRN about the Goxhaj case.
Witness protection has been a key concern for the Kosovo Specialist Chambers from the outset, and was one of the key reasons why the war crimes court, which is trying former KLA guerrillas, was established outside Kosovo and staffed by internationals, although it is part of Kosovo’s justice system.
Previous trials of KLA ex-guerrillas both inside Kosovo and at the UN’s International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia have been marred by the intimidation of witnesses. In some cases, even after they were relocated, they were approached by relatives or others trying to convince them to withdraw their initial testimonies.
The former leader and deputy leader of the Kosovo Liberation Army War Veterans’ Organisation, Hysni Gucati and Nasim Haradinaj, have already been jailed for obstructing justice and intimidating witnesses by the Specialist Chambers.
They were prosecuted after they received batches of legal documents leaked from the Specialist Chambers which contained confidential information about protected witnesses, including names and personal information, then held press conferences to urge media to publish extracts from the leaked files.
Albania’s General Prosecutor’s Office said on Monday that Goxhaj is suspected of the criminal offences of “intimidation during criminal proceedings” and “obstructing officials in the performance of official duties”. No more details of the alleged crimes have been provided.
“Mr Goxhaj will be detained in Albania, pending a decision by the Albanian authorities on the transfer of Mr Goxhaj to the detention facilities of the KSC in The Hague,” the Kosovo Specialist Chambers said on Monday.
This is the first case at the Kosovo Specialist Chambers in which an Albanian from Albania has been arrested.
The Kosovo Specialist Chambers are trying former KLA guerrillas for crimes including murder, torture and illegal detentions.
Among those already on trial are former Kosovo President Hashim Thaci and former parliamentary speaker Kadri Veseli, who were senior KLA figures during wartime. Both have pleaded not guilty to war crimes and crimes against humanity.
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