Former Foreign Minister Elisa Spiropali has voiced a strong position after the Special Court in The Hague handed down its verdict against four former leaders of the Kosovo Liberation Army: Hashim Thaçi, Jakup Krasniqi, Kadri Veseli and Rexhep Selimi.
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She described the court’s decision as a direct attack on the foundations of Kosovo’s freedom and a clear attempt to criminalize an entire liberation movement by using a distorted political narrative.
In a statement to the media, Spiropali drew parallels with the former persecution by the Belgrade regime and stressed that the impact of this judicial process extends beyond the four individuals involved.
“The Milošević regime once sentenced Hashim Thaçi to 10 years in prison simply because he chose the path of armed resistance rather than submission. Today in The Hague, it was not merely four names that were targeted; through carefully chosen language and political interpretation, what was a liberation struggle for Albanians and the international community was placed in the crosshairs,” she declared.
Spiropali went on to criticize the way the judicial panel constructed its legal argument, calling the attempt to portray the KLA as a criminal enterprise a historical absurdity.
“A court may rule on individual responsibility, but it has no right to rewrite history and turn a nation’s struggle for liberation into a criminal project. The KLA emerged as a response to Serbia’s state violence and served as the foundation of Kosovo’s freedom,” she stressed. She then issued an immediate appeal for bilateral institutional action: “The Parliament of Albania and the Parliament of Kosovo must urgently adopt a joint resolution to defend the historical truth of the liberation war and oppose any attempt to blame the KLA and an entire people.”
