Imams to legalise in Kosovo prisons against radicalism

The same ones, from Kosovo institutions, continue to be considered a potential risk, so it is also working for their debliance.

In the process, so-called redeployment, several state institutions, the Islamic Community of Kosovo, civil society, are involved, but a primary commitment also has the Ministry of Justice.

Justice Minister Abelard Tahiri, in an interview for Radio Free Europe, has said radicalism exists in Kosovo prisons. So according to him, this phenomenon will be fought through imam speeches in corrective centers.

He has indicated that very soon they will sign a memorandum of co-operation with the Islamic Community of Kosovo, suggesting that even the imams who will legalise money to prisoners have been selected.

“has always been a tendency of some prisoners leading to violent radicalism. The following days, I will sign a memorandum of understanding with the Islamic Community of Kosovo, which enables the keeping of speeches by persons who will be authorised by the Islamic Community of Kosovo to prevent such radicalism in the prisons of the Republic of Kosovo”, the minister Tahiri has said.

According to Tahiri, it is very important that persons named radicalised are offered the opportunity to integrate into society so that they do not pose risks after the end of the sentence.

“This is also the goal of those who are doomed to a constitutional law implementing criminal sanctions, which serve sentences at correcting centres in the Republic of Kosovo, the moment they end the sentence to be persons who will not pose any further risks to our society, not pose risks to young people, not to reach out for young people to follow the path on which they have at least sent them to the correctional centers” said Tahiri.

Minister Tahiri has also spoken of Kosovo citizens who continue to be at war grounds in Syria or Iraq, saying that together with the Kosovo Intelligence Agency, they will work for their return to their homeland.

We're dealing with people who have already spent several years in those war sites, and of course we have to be careful about them, we need to approach them carefully. Those people under no circumstances should be overlooked, those people should not be left out on the side of society, but they should be treated in the context of the laws we have at our power” the minister of justice added.

From 2012 to war zones in Syria and Iraq, over 300 Kosovo citizens have gone, and according to Kosovo Police data, 70 of them have been killed.

About 130 have already returned to Kosovo, and almost all have been arrested for criminal acts linked to terrorism and participation in foreign wars.

Currently, 27 children and 44 women continue to be in these areas, according to official data.