Former Kosovo President Hashim Thaci was found guilty of war crimes including murder, torture and illegal detention by the Kosovo war crimes tribunal on Wednesday.
Thaci, 58, was sentenced to 25 years in prison for crimes committed as top commander of the ethnic Albanian Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) during the territory’s violent break from Serbia in the 1990s.
The tribunal said he was guilty of the murder of 96 political opponents and perceived collaborators with Serbian security forces by Kosovo Liberation Army forces during the conflict.
He was also convicted for the arbitrary illegal detention of 385 people, torture of 303 people and cruel treatment of around 50.
The court said Thaci had “actively participated in and encouraged crimes”.
Thaci, who stood in silence as the judge read out the conviction and the sentence, had denied all charges.
The ruling was closely watched in Kosovo and Serbia, where the legacy of the 1998-99 conflict and Kosovo’s 2008 declaration of independence remain a source of tension between ethnic Kosovo Albanians and Serbs.
Thaci remains a revered figure for many Kosovo Albanians, while the tribunal itself is deeply unpopular in Kosovo.
In Pristina, thousands of people watching the verdict on a big screen booed the verdict and chanted “Thaci, Thaci” as some burst into tears.
Outside the Kosovo Specialist Chambers in The Hague dozens of Thaci supporters had gathered ahead of the verdict waving KLA flags and chanting “UCK”, the Albanian acronym for the army.
(Reuters)
