REL: Executive has found legal violations of several plants in Kosovo

He has participated in dozens of protests against the introduction of the Lepenc River, which runs near his home.

Rushiti says it is the last time the government takes punitive measures against companies that have built hydropower plants, damaging nature.

I'm showing you that there's nothing, no prison, no money that can pay the damage, because the oak doesn't return to its previous condition. These guys have destroyed everything. Nature can regenerate if there are disruptions of these activities. I'm sure this nature will regenerate and come to the previous state of”, Rushiti says.

Rushiti says companies that have built hydropower plants cannot repair nature, but for that, according to him, greater civic and institutional commitment is needed.

Rushiti says the hydropower plants have not only damaged the nature around their homes in the village of Downty, but also made life difficult for them.

Government with report for plant violations

A ministerial commission has found numerous violations in the permit procedures, as well as the operation of hydropower plants in Kosovo.

Environment Ministry Deputy Minister Linda Cavdarbasa confirmed this on Thursday, July 8th, speaking at the conference “The European Green Agreement: The goals Kosovo must meet towards energy efficiency and the healthier” environment.

Cavdarbasa has said that shortly after the government's coming to power, it has dealt with the issue of hydropower, meeting residents, different operators, as well as nongovernmental organisations.

The recorded violations, according to the deputy minister, are summed up in a report that has been handed over to the cabinet of Environment Minister, Spatial Planning and Infrastructure, Lieburn Aliu.

The “is quite a volume report and includes all Kosovo hydropower plants. So we've seen a lot of violations. The violations are administrative. There are violations in water acts, in environmental acts, violations in the Inspectorate part, which has not had enough visits to the ground. We have seen violations in transparency and many other violations, for which a <x1-> decision must be made, Cavdarbasha has declared.

Radio Free Europe has tried to get more details from the report, about which hydropower plants have been found in violation, but Deputy Minister Cavdarbasa, through a written response, has said they are still under review of the report and cannot be declared for the media.

Activists Say Punishment Is Inevitable

Ardian Noecaj, environmental activist, says that depending on the findings of the ministerial commission's report on hydropower plants, measures should be pronounced against hydropower plants.

He says past governments have failed to take care of nature, allowing the construction of hydropower plants without respecting legal criteria.

The legal breach has been only clear, but I hope the ministerial commission has counted one by one those violations. Something has to be done, because the situation is very bad”, Noecaj says.

According to him, granting permission to build and operate hydropower plants has been forwarded with numerous legal violations.

He says none of the institutions have heard local residents before being granted permission for hydropower.

The demands of local residents should also be taken into account. We cannot water a company and neglect the demands of residents who live from water”, says Noecaj.

The ombudsman pronounced numerous violations

At the beginning of this year, the ombudsman's office in Kosovo published a report in which it found numerous violations in the plant construction procedures.

The ombudsman's report on hydropower plants is said to have been passed on with continuing shortcomings, both in the procedural and access to information, public participation and access to justice.

According to this institution, the processes for building hydropower plants have not properly included the public and the concerns of local residents, as well as civil society.

The ombudsman had recommended that the Government balance public interests with economic ones, carefully weighing the interest between the importance of energy production and the impact it may have on nature.

The ombudsman had invited the institutions of justice to address priority cases related to damage to nature.

The construction of hydropower plants in Kosovo is constantly followed by criticism. In particular, residents of Decani and Shrpca have protested dozens of times the damage to nature.

Despite investments in hydropower, about 95 percent of Kosovo's electricity is produced with coal, while only 2.7 percent of the plants. The rest are produced by wind as well as solar panels.