Ex-president's lengthy war crimes sentence shocks Kosovo

Kosovo's former president Hashim Thaci was sentenced to 25 years in prison by a tribunal in The Hague on Wednesday for war crimes, in a verdict that sparked shock and anger among many Kosovars.

Judges found Thaci and three other former Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) leaders guilty of illegal arrests, torture, murder and cruel treatment of people during the 1998-1999 war for independence from Serbia.

As leaders of the KLA, they were ruled responsible for murders, illegal detentions, torture and poor treatment by the KLA during, after and before the war.

But among many Kosovo Albanians, Thaci and his co-defendants are still widely lauded as heroes of its independence movement -- with thousands gathering in the Balkan nation's capital to watch the verdict on a large screen.

As the verdict was delivered, silence settled over the attendees, leaving many visibly stunned after weeks of preparations by Thaci's supporters for a possible acquittal.

"This process was not about justice, but politics," pensioner Tahir Bytyqi told AFP among the crowd, which quickly dispersed after the proceedings finished.

Elsewhere in the capital, a crowd of young men marched towards the headquarters of the European Union's Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo (EULEX), waving KLA flags and chanting the guerrilla group's name.

Some scuffled with riot police and threw stones at the building.

In The Hague, angry demonstrators who had gathered near the court also briefly clashed with police, with some climbing onto a police van as officers held them back from the court building.

A water cannon was used to disperse the crowd.

The trial has remained deeply controversial inside the Balkan nation, with the country's prime minister Albin Kurti labelling the verdict "a great and harmful punishment" and calling for it to be "corrected" on appeal.

"These are unjust findings, but they are not final and will be subject to review on appeal," Kurti said in a post on Facebook.

"The reason the KLA was born was not, and cannot, be punished or tarnished."

Thaci was sentenced alongside former senior KLA figures Jakup Krasniqi, Rexhep Selimi and Kadri Veseli. Krasniqi was sentenced to 25 years, Selimi to 13 and Veseli to 18.

The court said they had "contributed significantly" to a common criminal purpose targeting perceived opponents of the KLA's political and military goals.

All four were acquitted of charges of crimes against humanity and can appeal the sentence.

Thaci resigned as president and surrendered to the court after his 2020 indictment. He has been detained in The Hague since, with time served counting towards his sentence.

After the war, Thaci remained a central political figure and played a key role in Kosovo's 2008 declaration of independence.

During the trial, images of the 58-year-old former prime minister regularly appeared on huge billboards across the country.

"We defended our homes, our country. This punishment is a shame for the international community," high school teacher Skender Rexha said in Kosovo's capital.

The Kosovo Specialist Chambers (KSC), although based in the Netherlands and staffed by international judges, was established under Kosovo law specifically to prosecute alleged crimes committed by KLA members during the war.

Deeply unpopular from its foundation, the court's use of evidence supplied by Belgrade, which still refuses to recognise its former province's independence, has further inflamed accusations of political bias.

But its mandate is heavily backed by international allies, and the court has previously convicted several people for crimes committed during the war.

Reading out the verdict, Judge Charles Smith said the "scale and nature" of the men's crimes were "very serious", including 96 murders.

"Murder victims in this case were shot to death, and others died because of the severe beatings," Smith added.

The court said many of the victims' bodies were found in a condition that amounted to a further outrage upon their dignity, he said.

The crimes were committed between April 1998 and June 1999, during and just after the Kosovo war, which claimed some 13,000 lives.