153 testified against KLA Special, over 400,000 pages of material

The prosecution also says that the supporting material for the indictment presented for confirmation had more than 400,000 pages.

The status conference in the case against former Kosovo president Hashim Thaci, former head of the Democratic Party of Kosovo, Kadri Veselin, former KLA spokeswoman Jakup Krasniqi, and former KLA member General Staff Rexhep Selimi will be held in The Hague on Wednesday.

Against them has been confirmed the indictment of war crimes and crimes against humanity. All currently are in custody at The Hague and have been declared innocent.

The status conference, or conference on the performance of the issue, calls the judge of the preliminary procedure and it is aimed at organising exchanges between the parties. At this conference, the prosecution is expected to show with what kind of evidence.

According to a specialised prosecutor's statement sent to the Special Chambers for this conference, published on their website, the prosecution claims that for confirmation of the indictment it has obtained material of some 43 thousand pages, including reports, witness statements, photographs, and over 20 hours of audio-visual material.

The prosecution says the defence predicts to hand over evidence such as reports, photos, KLA documents, including orders, regulations, etc.

Equipment of the procedure and evidence in front of the Specialised Chambers predicts that the Specialised Prosecutor should announce the protection for any material and evidence he owns, as well as at the request of protection, the specialised prosecutor makes available any statements, documents, photographs. This should happen within 30 days since the tribunal's first appearance of indictees. However, the prosecutor should present excuses in case of delays.

According to the prosecution's statement, it envisions detailed security of the material with evidence for protection until April 30th 2021, while adds that it will be able to offer the full list of witnesses by 31 May 2021, provided that current preliminary procedures near the Specialised Chambers are nearing completion and that the start of the trial is planned at the same time.

The procedure currently envisions the addition of approximately 50 other witnesses to the trial list, although the final number of witnesses can be changed, depending on the outcome of the remaining” investigations, it says on this parachute.

The prosecution in the parapet says that editing materials is something that needs to be done carefully, as well as that translating the document's supporting material into Albanian is under way.

The prosecution accuses Thaci, Veselin, Krasniqi and Selimi of committing war crimes against hundreds of civilians and persons who did not participate in the fighting.

The indictment allegedly claims that from March 1998 to September 1999, Hashim Thaci, Kadri Veselini, Rexhep Selimi, Jakup Krasniqi and other members of <x0 criminal establishments have shared the same goal of taking and exercising control all over Kosovo with all means, including intimidation, mistreatment, the exercise of violence and elimination of those whom they considered to be rivals”.

The prosecution claims the victims were mostly people who were perceived during wartime as collaborators of Serbian forces, officials or state institutions, or even not supporting KLA goals.

This, according to the indictment, included persons linked to the Democratic League of Kosovo DK and persons of Serbian, Roma and other ethnicities”.