Claims of obstructing justice administration, Fraser's testimony questions charges against Thaci

In Kosovo Specialised Chambers ( The DPS) in The Hague has completed testimony by the criminalist expert Helen Fraser in the trial of Hashim Thaci, the Smakaj Union, Isni Kilit, Fadil Fazliu and Hajredin Kuci, who are charged with criminal acts against justice management.

Lawyer Ardian Bajraktari said Fraser's testimony has only exposed the weaknesses of the Specialised Prosecutor's charges.

Of course, through the testimony of this witness, in my conviction, only what we've said at the beginning of the time, that these charges of obstructing the administration of justice, with particular emphasis in relation to Mr. Thaci, do not stand. Because the more consideration is that Mr. Thaci has already five years and more to the extent of his detention, while the criminal act of obstructing the official person in carrying out the official office, the essential element has the exercise of serious rowage or violence, which of course is impossible under those circumstances. Therefore, such an attempt, in my conviction to this phase of the process, has failed to argue on the part of the Specialised Prosecutor”, he said, Online Economy broadcasts.

Bajraktari added that details released during the testimony may have an impact on the progress of the judicial process.

Of course, these may have impacts on the process's performance because in such circumstances sometimes there are the details that have a very important role in running the process. Therefore, I believe that the defensive side is extremely professionally achieving success in countering the prosecutor's views on these claims”, he said.

The lawyer said the allegations of pressure on the witness was spent, according to him, the approach of the Specialised Prosecutor.

This is, first of all, the first thing to say to my belief, the approach and tendency that the Specialized Prosecutor has been ongoing. And of course, in my conviction such an approach is extremely disturbing and deserves attention, because in the last instance, there is no excuse in taking such action to exercise any form of pressure or pressure in relation to anyone. Furthermore, every prosecutor, even the specialised prosecutor, is there to carry out her duties and responsibilities, and in not a few cases we have seen violations of basic principles of justice, which is the fact that the specialised prosecutor in the concrete case has the obligation to take into consideration even the excusing evidence, which in the greatest case, and in the same case as against the administration of justice by the Special Prosecution, has not been taken into account at the time, the lawyer Bajrac stated.

He added that any evidence given under pressure is invalid. Of course it is because, above all, in the first place, every witness is initially informed of his rights and any evidence given on pressure, in pressure, of course making him invalid. Of course, the defense in my obedience has been and continues to be sufficiently prepared in a professional sense in terms of successful counterconception, and I believe it will analyse all the details so that then during the subsequent performance of the process presented with concrete proposals in terms of even the witness survey in question, but others that have been administered until this phase of the”, said lawyer Ardian Bajraktari.

KLA Veterans Organisation Chairman Hysni Gucati said recent developments only strengthen their conviction for irregularities in the process.

This shows a testimony, even a testimony strengthens the injustice of this court, the irregularities of this court. They are now being pressured by a witness to accept artificial intelligence, which allegedly listens to members of the Kosovo Liberation Army. Now it well confirms this international English organization that has found violations. Now this is a huge plus that was found a violation, which means now these days that it was found, that have pressured a witness to accept all that intelligence”, he said.

Gucati said international reports and findings for violations, according to him, are strengthening the defence of former KLA leaders.

And even I believe that this strengthens us, strengthens them, strengthens them, strengthens their defenses that have facts and arguments to expose everything to this court that is unfair, is a very bad court, even is a unilateral court. I've said it before, inshallah is not a political court. But for us, that's very good. This proves now to the internationals what these prosecutors do, but prosecutors do what they do, and pressure internationals themselves to accept these alleged wiretappings that they have done and talked about, even now intelligence. I am absolutely convinced that justice will be served by seeing all these offenses now. And it's also good that the international report has been strengthened, the English report together, with the ombudsman who has done a lot of hard work, the ombudsman who congratulates him on this job, who did and found all these misdemeanories that I can count all day long and night over here can't count all the offenses that have been made to the special court --”

This witness has been called by Hashim Thaci's defence and is the first witness to have witnessed physically in this court case after witnesses from the prosecution. During the end of her testimony, Helen Fraser told prosecutor Joshua Hafetz that during the interrogations at the hearing, he was pressured to admit that the results of Artificial Intelligence have been essential to the assessment.

Fraser said he used Artificial Intelligence during her work on the report regarding the interpretation of the sounds of the prosecution transcripts, but stressed that her assessment has been detailed and that it is not fully based on ChatGPT.