Even after 20 years, Kosovo has managed to document war crimes

Of these victims, 76 percent are believed to be civilians. In terms of ethnic affiliation, 10,000 and 794 are Albanians -- two thousand and 197 Serbs -- while others belong to other ethnic affiliations. Another plague of war is about 1,000 and 600 people found.

However, two decades after the war ended and 11 years from declaring independence, the state of Kosovo has not yet managed to do the exact and complete record of crimes that have occurred. With the goal of documenting war crimes in 2011, the Kosovo Government had established the Institute for Investigation of War Crimes (IHKL), which was operational by 2018.

Former director of this institute, Ismet Salihu, says the institute, now closed, has published 9 books on the killings, missing persons, Serbian genocide and the destruction of Albanian monuments and wealth.

However, Salihu admits that not enough has been done in the identity and record of the murders but also the collection of facts and evidence from eyewitnesses and survivors of various massacres.

According to him, the institute has been unable to do more because it is not supported by institutions, adding that the greatest effort was done by various civil society organisations.

We've been six people and one technician, seven. But they haven't backed us up, we haven't been allowed the tools to explore the field, what we could do ourselves, more on voluntary grounds we've done those research”, Salihu says.

The non-vident and non-publishment of data in Albanian, English and Serbian, for each crime committed, according to Salih, is a double crime on war victims.

Any mass massacre, for each mass cemetery, has to be done a special research..., for Meja, for Izbica, for Recak, for others, and by name and last name and photo, to be written and published in Albanian, English and Serbian, so that the Serb population of Kosovo and Serbia can also have access to the crimes committed. Unfortunately, this has not been done and is unlikely to do so, which has started since 2011, namely now,” estimates the former director of the War Crimes Research Institute.

Even Bekim Blakaj, from the Fund for Humanitarian Law, estimates that Kosovo state institutions have not done enough in investigating war crimes and gathering facts and testimony from witnesses and survivors, adding that the greatest effort has been done by various organisations and civil society.

According to Blakaj, the complete non-evident of crimes and the failure to collect evidence even two decades after the end of the war creates major difficulties in the process.

“20 years later (after war) it is a bit difficult to find primary resources. Many witnesses, many survivors are no longer in life. Unfortunately, there are very few written records. However, institutions would have to be more pro-active to create closer co-operation with civil society organisations, seek out from The Hague Tribunal, respectively, now from the mechanism that has inherited The Hague's Tribunal, to get all the archives in terms of the materials or evidence that have been administered there for the Kosovo case, and also to try to establish some kind of co-operation with Serbia's prosecution and trial bodies so that the prosecution of those against whom it has committed crimes in Kosovo has been conducted,” emphasises Blakeaj.

Even in the Ministry of Justice, they agree that “has not been done enough to record all crimes committed against the civilian population.

The minister of this dictatorship, Abelard Tahiri, says the former institution's work will continue the Department of Transitional Justice, under the Justice Ministry that was founded last year.

“Already elected director of this department (Ir Guta) and we are in the top functioning of this institution. I think it will be an adequate institution that will address issues that are quite sensitive and that are becoming 20 years in reality, and as the Republic of Kosovo, we have not been able to do enough in gathering facts and data, which document and expose even more crimes, genocide, committed by the Serbian government at the time, in Kosovo, in 1998-99,” he says.

Following the election of Ilir Guta to the office of director of the department, Minister Tahiri says the rest of the staff will soon be recruited, as well as the rest of the staff, about 10 persons who will indefinitely work on the record of war crimes.

So we can't have a plan like this, so when it might end, because we don't prefer to have a specification or a date for such agendas where we can say that this institute's work on this agenda will be completed, but this will continue as long as necessary. I think it is extremely necessary for a long period of time to be able to consolidate and collect as much material and facts as possible for crimes that have occurred in the Republic of Kosovo in the 1998-99 war, the minister for Tahiri adds.

According to the justice minister, the previous institute has not had a clear structure as the law envisions it, so according to him, the Department for Tranzicioal Justice has been established.

But, former director of the Institute for Investigation of War Crimes, Ismet Salihu, believes that instead of closing the institute, the Government of Kosovo has had to strengthen it with professional frameworks and enable research on the ground.

To argue, enumerated and to keep them from being forgotten urgently, (the government) has to re-open the Institute for Investigation of War Crimes, and, at that institute, scientists, five, six or seven science doctors who know this job, of the criminal court. Five or six field researchers, to be provided with the maximum working conditions, so that in the last 10 years, this crime can be recorded and published,” proposes Salihu.

In fact, according to Salih, besides re-opening the institute, after the end of the process of investigation and documentation of war crimes, the Government of Kosovo should also open the War Crimes Museum where facts and collected evidence would be exposed.

In the meantime, the impasses in this process have also affected the judgment of war crimes.

According to Bekim Blakaj, this has happened after courts are demanding undeniable evidence and evidence to condemn someone.

“Feelings and criminal judgments are much more complicated than the record process. Thus, it is much harder to prosecute war crimes cases because undeniable evidence is needed. We are witnesses that there have been various convictions, but not always these convictions have been concluded with condemnation, even in cases of court proceedings. The court must have undeniable evidence, beyond suspicion based on condemning someone”, Blakaj says.

Based on this and monitoring judicial processes, Blakaj says the number of war crimes convicts is too small compared to the number of victims and crimes committed.

“We have monitored war crimes trials in Kosovo and in September last year we have published a report on which only 40 people in Kosovo have been convicted of war crimes, and most of them are Albanians, in fact, 35 Albanians, 4 Serbs and a Roma. So the number of war crimes convicts is extremely small if you compare it to the number of victims”.

“On the other hand, there is also a special war crimes chamber in Serbia, which, with almighty justice, has convicted 15 Serbs of crimes committed in Kosovo during the war, and as we know, The Hague Tribunal has prosecuted three cases against Serbs, where 6 persons for war crimes were convicted in Kosovo. So the number of convicts is too small compared to the number of victims and the number of crimes committed during the war in Kosovo”, he estimates.

While there is only one special chamber in the courts in Serbia for the trial of war crimes, Kosovo has established a Special Court for War Crimes.

Earlier, the war crimes trial against civilians, during 1997-99, has also made The Hague International Tribunal in the Netherlands.