Kandić distinguishes ruling against former KLA leaders from convictions of Serbian officials

Serbian human rights activist Nataša Kandić has highlighted the difference between today’s sentencing of former KLA leaders by the Specialist Chambers in The Hague and the court rulings against senior Serbian officials over crimes committed in Kosovo.

According to her, Hashim Thaçi, Kadri Veseli, Rexhep Selimi and Jakup Krasniqi were convicted of war crimes. Meanwhile, the Hague Tribunal found Nebojša Pavković, Vladimir Lazarević, Sreten Lukić and Dragoljub Ojdanić guilty of crimes against humanity.

In a post on the X platform, Kandić wrote that the KLA leaders received sentences for war crimes because the attacks and punitive measures did not target the civilian population. She explained that opponents were targeted because of their individual circumstances, not because they belonged to the civilian population.

Kandić stressed that the situation was different in the case of the offenses for which the Serbian officials were convicted, where the civilian population itself was the target of the crimes.

She reiterated that Nebojša Pavković, Vladimir Lazarević, Sreten Lukić and Dragoljub Ojdanić were convicted of crimes against humanity by the Hague Tribunal, emphasizing that the attacks targeted civilians.

The Serbian activist also responded to a statement by Ivica Dačić, who said the judgment against Thaçi proves that the KLA was a “criminal and terrorist organization.”

Kandić reminded Dačić that the policies of the Socialist Party of Serbia led to the creation of mass graves containing murdered Albanians on Serbian territory.

In her response, she equated the SPS with mass graves in Serbia and reminded Minister Dačić that his party’s policies resulted in mass graves containing murdered Albanians in Batajnica, Petrovo Selo, Rudnica, the Kizevak mine and Lake Perućac. Kandić added that this is a fact confirmed by the judgment.