BELGRADE – While Serbian officials, opposition politicians and NGO activists claimed that the first-instance verdict against the former leaders of the Kosovo Liberation Army is a crucial acknowledgement of wartime atrocities committed by KLA, they also heavily criticized the legal parameters of the ruling.
Marko Milosavljević, representative of the Youth Initiative for Human Rights, told N1 that by today’s verdict in the Hague “the KLA’s terror policy has been punished”.
According to him, part of Kosovo society, who sees the former KLA leaders as liberators and not as war criminals, “expected them to get on the train of impunity”.
For their part, opposition Green-Left Front stated that the most important thing is that the verdict brings the victims and their families what they have been waiting for almost three decades: “admitting that war crimes were committed and establishing responsibility for them”.
“Unfortunately, the indictment only covers the period until September 1999, while numerous victims who suffered after the war remained outside its framework, and their families are still waiting for justice”, ZLF stressed.
Acting Serbian Minister of Internal Affairs, Ivica Dačić stated that by the first-instance verdict against four former KLA commanders, “the false narrative about national heroes was overthrown and the true character of the Kosovo Liberation Army was confirmed”.
