Testimony, diagnostic and analysis surrounding Europe's youngest state.

1. ©Donal Kennedy 2015
Donal Kennedy An inconvenient Kosovan truth January 2015
Upon landing in the scorching Western Balkan heat at Adem Jashari International Airport in mid-July, a
co-ordinator of the intercultural study programme of which I was to be a participant, after taking my
baggage at Arrivals, quickly moved on to more important affairs with a blunt question closely along
the lines of: so, where were you on 17 February 2008 when Kosovo won its independence?
What was to follow was 10 days of intercultural discovery and exchange with fellow participants from
all over the world. The discovery was to begin immediately. I was shocked by the ubiquitous presence
of Austrian, Hungarian and Italian NATO peacekeeping troops. Amongst other highlights, we received
Adrian Prenkaj, a Presidential Advisor, who spoke glowingly of Kosovo’s path of European integration,
and visited the now-quasi shrine of the revered (or alternatively despised) Adem Jashari, leader of the
officially defunct Kosovo Liberation Army. We visited the so-called Prizren-based League for the
Defence of the Rights of the Albanian Nation, and also Mitrovicia, a deeply divided city where Serbs,
residing North of the Ibar River, are separated from Albanians, living South of the river. Italian
Carabinieri were keeping the peace on the bridge the day we visited, while amused children stared at
their armoury.
Kosovo’s declaration of independence was a unilateral one and came after long-running bitter ethnic
tensions in addition to an international intervention led by NATO forces. Today, the national identity
of Kosovo seems to be synonymous with uniquely secular Muslim and thoroughly Albanian values. I
saw that where the blue and gold Kosovo flag (introduced after independence) flies high, the grand
Albanian black eagle on a red background flies beside it. This surely runs counter to what the same
Kosovo flag is meant to stand for: the six stars to represent the principal ethnicities present and given
official recognition in the new state of Kosovo? On occasion, the flags of the EU, the USA and NATO
are privileged with their own flagpoles beside the Kosovo flag. Bill Clinton has his own boulevard
named after him.
We were accommodated in the so-called “Grand Hotel”, central Prishtina. It is an immense, even
gigantic structure built on order by Tito. Grand Hotel holds many dark secrets of a tragic period in the
history of the Western Balkans. What seemed like a vast network tunnel in the basement is penetrable
from the ground floor. The 4th
floor was reserved for the Yugoslav nomenclatura. Zeliko Raznatovic, a
Serbian paramilitary figure and racketeer took over the same floor in 1992. In an interview with
KosovAlive.org, a former,( a fortirori Serb) manager of the Grand Hotel told of how, after the Kosovo
War had ended, he had accompanied KFOR soldiers through the vast basements when they
discovered “young girls’ underwear, socks and slippers, medieval binding devices and two fire pits...”.
Late night a few evenings, I, along with other participants roamed around the vast building, wandering
through abandoned sections still under construction, the haunting basement network, and a separate
luxurious floor of bedrooms.
In 2011, under the auspices of the EU Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo (EULEX, the Special Investigative
Task Force (SITF) was set up to conduct an “independent criminal investigation” into allegations
published in the same year by a Council of Europe (CoE) report in relation to “inhuman treatment of
people and illicit trafficking in human organs in Kosovo”. The report pointed the finger squarely at
senior figures within the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA). Late Summer 2014, the SITF published a
thorough statement. It found “compelling evidence” against these guerrilla leaders leading to an
“indictment against these individuals for serious violations of international humanitarian law, including
crimes against humanity and war crimes”. In addition, it concluded that certain senior leaders usurped
power for personal enrichment. Crucially, the SITF concluded that the victims of KLA’s mob tactics

2. ©Donal Kennedy 2015
were mainly “Serbs, Roma, and other minorities, but also Kosovo Albanians who were labelled either to
be collaborators with the Serbs, or, more commonly, to have been political opponents of the KLA
leadership”. The prosecutorial findings make notable reference to a very thorough 1999 Human Rights
Watch report. It was complied overwhelmingly on the basis of on-site research, field-visits, and first-
hand testimonials.
The report, even at what transpires to be an "early" stage, was very hard-hitting on summary and
unlawful killings of minorities in "New Kosovo" (with concrete examples (e.g. the fate of elderly ethnic
Serb residents in Prizren, or the fate of one Serb Professor at the Economics faculty at the University
of Prishtina, or the dramatic decline in the Roma population, amongst others), desecration and
burning of places of worship (incl. a monastery in Musutiste blown up by explosives), even abduction
and executions of ethnic Albanians opposed to the KLA and so on particularly south of the River Ibar.
This report was superseded by a more legalistic one by the same NGO in 1998. All in all, the STIF’s
findings make for harrowing reading and it may remind us of the danger of selective indignation when
it comes to identifying victims in (any) conflict. Carla Del Ponte, the well-respected Swiss prosecutor
wrote in her memoirs, The Hunt: Me and War Criminals, dedicated to her time at the head of the
International Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, how credible evidence and testimonials came to her
attention of 300 cases of Serb victims of organ trafficking taken to a house-clinic in Albania. “Prisoners
were aware of the fate that awaited them, and according to the source pleaded, terrified, to be killed
immediately”, Del Ponte writes, as per her comments relayed by The Guardian. She was silenced by
the Swiss government, and has told of how the UN agencies in Kosovo deliberately blocked her
attempts to investigate the case of these missing Serbs.
In Prizren, the group visited an old Serbian church, that today benefits from permanent and round-
the-clock armed police protection in light of a 2004 looting and subsequent torching that completely
destroyed the interior and damaged the structure. March 2004 saw multiple Orthodox places of
worship looted or arsoned. We walked in the ruins of one of these churches: those of the Church of
the Holy Saviour, Prizren.
The Kosovan Foreign Ministry is continuously engaged in a campaign to increase recognition and rally
support for the nascent state. During my stay in Kosovo, we received the then bombastic Foreign
Minister, Enver Hoxhaj, who seemed elated, much to the group’s bemusement, upon just having won
the support of one mighty and hegemonic Togo... For often heteroclite or plainly unrelated reasons;
sometimes citing the general principle of territorial integrity or instead weary of encouraging native
secessionist movements, countries as diverse as Spain, Argentina, Algeria, Greece, but of course
Russia and Serbia, have refused to grant recognition and proceed with establishing those crucial
diplomatic relations. Brazil has taken a remarkably hard-line stance. Kosovo’s independent status has
not gained unanimity amongst Muslim-majority states. Countries, such as Iran, have a more nuanced
position saying that should Belgrade alter its position vis-à-vis its former province, they too would
review their Kosovo policy.
Kosovo is more troubled than maybe the European Union integrationist “cheerleaders” acknowledge.
Several international commentators and specialists have spoken in the past with a critical voice, and
continue to do so. This, in the wilderness. Certain NGOs have precociously raised the alarm regarding
renewed ethnic tensions, showing remarkable prescience. In fact, it is difficult not to get an impression
of how the European Union, in its various composites, or via its satellite agencies and civil society
partners in the region is not engaged in a sort of propaganda campaign to sell to the international
community a rather ill-fitting, idealised portrayal of Europe’s youngest state.