Rexhep Meidani, who was president of Albania during the war in Kosovo, has reacted to the ruling by the court in The Hague, which sentenced four KLA leaders to a total of 81 years in prison.
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Meidani recalls that during the difficult years of the war, when he held the office of president of the Republic, Albania opened its borders and supported the people of Kosovo, who were being driven from their homes and lands by the militias and paramilitary forces of Slobodan Milošević’s repressive regime.
He emphasizes that he had experienced the repression against Kosovo earlier as well, when he was a lecturer at the University of Pristina, particularly after 1981. According to him, lecturers were then not allowed to continue their classes, and communication with students became extremely difficult.
As a politician and head of state, Meidani says he witnessed firsthand the escalation of Milošević’s violence and repression against the people of Kosovo, which reached genocidal proportions.
Commenting on the verdict announced in The Hague, he questions the legitimacy of a court that speaks on behalf of the people of Kosovo when none of its judges is from Kosovo and the proceedings did not take place on its territory.
Meidani asks on whose behalf this court is speaking when the people it claims to represent have no voice or influence within the institution, but are protesting outside it and in Kosovo’s squares. He stresses that the ruling is a first-instance decision and that the process is continuing, while the justice that has been denied must be established in accordance with the will of the people of Kosovo rather than disappointing them.
The former Albanian president considers the historical context of the war indisputable: Kosovo and its inhabitants were victims of violence by the Serbian state and cannot be treated as an equal party to the aggressor.
According to him, even if individual responsibility existed, it could neither undo this historical reality nor cast doubt on the freedom and independence of Kosovo, won through the sacrifice and lives of its people, especially its young people. Meidani adds that many Western voices have expressed this position in recent days and during the Kosovo crisis.
Meidani says that no court ruling can deny Hashim Thaçi, Kadri Veseli, Jakup Krasniqi and Rexhep Selimi the place they, in his view, hold in one of the most important chapters of national history.
He says that at a time when Kosovo’s freedom and peace in the region were still an uncertain ideal, these four men took on a historic burden to bring freedom to their people, while no outcome was guaranteed.
Meidani recalls that during his presidential term he witnessed the danger firsthand through images of forced expulsions and mass killings. He adds that he knew Thaçi, Veseli, Krasniqi and Selimi as young men, brave fighters and leaders, ready to make sacrifices, and not as people capable of criminal activity, as they are portrayed today.
He believes that the Assembly of Kosovo should take a position on the continuation of this court’s activities because, in his view, it does not recognize the people of Kosovo as its own and cannot continue speaking on their behalf.
Meidani says he is thinking of the four defendants and their families, who have been facing the burden of this process for nearly six years. He says they continue their battle and sacrifice for a free Kosovo and that he will stand by them, as he has done before.
He also recalls that Albania chose a Western orientation in the early years of democracy and that he supported this path both as a citizen and as president. However, according to him, loyalty to the West does not mean remaining silent in the face of what is considered unjust.
Meidani calls on Western allies to respect, in every case and toward every people, regardless of its size, the principles on which democracy was built: freedom, equality and justice for all without exception.
In conclusion, he declares that the sentences must be challenged all the way to the final instance, using every legal means available. According to him, the Assembly of Kosovo has a duty to decide that the Special Court, in its current form, must not continue speaking on behalf of a people it does not recognize as its own.
