Thaci and friends of war appear in mid-term session: Protection requires parole

David Hooper, lawyer of former Kosovo President Hashim Thaci, said they will soon apply for his bail.

Before the judges of the preliminary procedure, Hooper said he has accepted the warrant issued to Thaci, in which, according to him, there are strange editings.

It is our intention to apply for his parole. I have also suggested at the previous session, and I want to stress today that the modalities or ways in which this exercise should be performed. [...] I've received the edited version of the prosecution's request for an arrest warrant, and I have to say there are some strange editings in this documentation. For example, paragraph 2 says that given the articles, then the rest is edited, then the laws, then it's part edited, I don't know what their goals are with such editings, in my opinion, such editing cannot be justified”, he said.

Hooper said the witness's names have been carefully edited.

“References indicate the behaviour or misbehaved behavior of Mr. Thaci during the documentation. The witness names are unnecessaryly edited while part of their statements are understood, so I would like to ask the prosecutor to reconsider the editing once more and to have less proofreadings of these documents, and all evidence to be cited at the bottom of the page, with introductory, at the request of the prosecution”, he said.

Even according to Ben Emmerson, lawyer for the former head of the Parliament, Kadri Wessel, the four indictees should not be held in custody until the same are represented innocent.

He said the defence has not been given the reason why the four accused in custody should be kept until, according to him, there is no danger of escape or failure.

They haven't given us the information on which they base this claim, how do we present a meaningful statement if we don't have information, this is a game that the prosecution is playing in the interest of achieving a procedure that Mr. Smith has already left the hearing is not here. We will submit a skeleton application and the prosecution must respond in a way that realistically and detailedly articulates the reasons why these four indictees should remain in prison, despite presumption of innocent”, he said.

These statements were made by lawyers in the second part of the status conference held today.

Today's session, aimed at discussing the outcome of the case, the Specialised Prosecutor's Office said there is no reason for the trial against the four accused not to begin in June 2021.

This was strongly opposed to all defence lawyers, under whom it takes at least 18 months for the defence to conduct investigations.

They claimed that the trial process could not begin earlier than the summer of 2022.

Today was former President Hashim Thaci's second appearance, former Speakers of the Parliament, Jakup Kranisqi and Kadri Veselini, and the chief of deputies of the Vetevendosje Movement, in front of the Specialised Chambers.

They travelled to The Hague early in November since they were staying in custody.

An indictment of alleged war crimes against humanity was confirmed against former UCK leaders.

The next session about the performance of the issue is expected to be held mid-December.