Former Ambassador Greicevci, part of Hashim Thaci's defence team

Former Kosovo Ambassador to The Hague Lirim Gajchev has become part of former president Hashim Thaci's defence team, which is being charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity by the Special Court in The Hague.

He confirmed this himself in an Indescline interview.

“Yes, as it was defined in the decision to leave the mission, I have completed my diplomatic mission in The Hague on August 30th 2021, and returned to Kosovo. But now I have returned to The Hague as adviser to Mr. Hashim Thaci”, he has said.

Regarding the co-operation Kosovo institutions have with the Special Court, Gajchev said he is unprecedented anywhere in the world.

“I have not publicly commented on the work of Specialised Chambers during my mandate as Kosovo's ambassador to The Hague. I think state officials should refrain from commenting on judicial decisions. The less I will comment now that I am accredited as part of a defence team. But I can say that, in the quality of Kosovo's citizen: Kosovo's co-operation with international justice is unprecedented anywhere in the world. No KLA member, who has been asked by international or local justice, has avoided it. Specialised rooms are the fourth mechanism of internationals to investigate and try The KLA, a volunteer force for the liberation of Kosovo, the NATO ally and the West”, has said further.

“Nakq, The Hague Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia had charged and tried six KLA members, five of them being acquitted. This large number of innocent people is a disturbing indication of the level of evidence used to accuse them. Each of them has lost many years of life in custody at The Hague. While UNMIK and EULEX have tried dozens of cases in Kosovo. If we add to the cases of former KLA members who have been tried by Serbia, as well as those from the Kosovo judiciary from 2018, when it took over its powers for the first time, then it happens that six different judicial mechanisms, until now, have followed and tried. KLA. This of the many in Kosovo and abroad is seen as persecution, as judicial terror, against a voluntary, self-aware structure, which was aimed at only preventing Serb violence in Kosovo, as was NATO”, he said among other things.

Contrary to that, there are only four Serbs who have been convicted in The Hague for crimes committed in Kosovo. While the fifth, former Serbian President Milan Milutinovic, was acquitted of charges for joint criminal enterprise, a president of an organised state structure that has rejected the Rambouillet peace agreement, which has enabled genocide over the people of Kosovo, has voted to join NATO as a member of the Supreme Defence Council, along with Slobodan Milosevic. He was even allowed to complete his mandate as president of Serbia and was handed over to The Hague after his end. While all other Serb criminals, who have executed Serbian genocide plans in Kosovo, roam free in Serbia. This contrast, to microscopicly examine the KLA, the self-protected side, and to free the Serbian aggressor side, will go down in history as the greatest injustice in modern times”, he said.