The debate over proposed changes to the law on the Specialist Chambers has drawn renewed attention following a letter from British Prime Minister Andy Burnham to Prime Minister Albin Kurti. In it, Burnham reaffirms the United Kingdom’s support for a sovereign Kosovo and stresses the importance of international justice, accountability and the rule of law. The letter has also revived discussion about Kosovo’s relations with its international partners.
Speaking to Bota sot, Professor Enver Bytyçi described the attempt to intervene through legislation in matters affecting the Specialist Chambers as a political gamble. He said it risks both relations with European partners and the judicial proceedings in The Hague. He urged institutions to act prudently when reconsidering the law and to avoid steps that could be seen as interference in the court’s work.
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Bytyçi said that, when the law on Kosovo’s Specialist Court in The Hague was imposed, he had warned of harm to those convicted at first instance and to Kosovo’s relations with Europe. He recalled that Kurti had also raised this concern, but claimed the prime minister accepted an ultimatum from those he calls extremists in the Democratic Party in exchange for their votes to elect the president. According to the professor, they threatened civil war, surrounded institutions and wrote graffiti that, as he put it, will be condemned by Kosovo’s history.
Returning to the message from London, the professor noted that objections to the law have come not only from European Union figures but also from British representatives. He said Burnham had recently urged Kurti to respect the mandate of the Specialist Chambers in The Hague, linking this to Kosovo’s Euro-Atlantic integration. Bytyçi also cited President Shiroka-Pula’s decision to return to parliament for reconsideration a law that, he said, had been passed in haste and under pressure. He sees her action as a sign that institutions are responding.
The professor questioned why Kosovo’s parties and parliament made legislative changes to a judicial matter. In his view, the opposition wanted to present itself as the winner over the government and increase its electoral support, while the majority used the occasion to secure the election of the head of state. He said the majority wanted to form the institutions, having already gained its electoral benefits in the most recent elections.
The result, according to Bytyçi, is damage to Kosovo’s interests. He argued that when political groups put electoral calculations first, the country does not benefit, and those groups may not achieve their own aims either. In this context, he referred to parties that, he said, joined the wave of protests and pushed the legislature toward a mistaken decision.
Bytyçi called the law on the Specialist Chambers a failure and said that outcome had been predictable from the outset. According to him, the politicians who imposed it relied on the argument of Kosovo’s sovereign right, even though they themselves had undermined that right by voting for the law. In this context, he also mentioned the laws on the Serb Association in Kosovo and on the transfer of 8,200 hectares of territory to Montenegro. He sees the attempt to change the rules after the decision of the Specialist Court in The Hague as a lack of seriousness on the part of politicians and institutions, with consequences for Kosovo’s efforts to establish itself internationally as a state.
The professor’s criticism also extended to the protests ahead of the announcement of the decision concerning five defendants in The Hague. He said neither the protests nor the law had helped the proceedings in the Specialist Chambers. According to him, the protests were a mistake and were exploited politically not only in Kosovo but also in Albania and North Macedonia. Bytyçi called the political use of the defendants’ situation unfair and dishonest, saying it harmed efforts to defend them. He suggested it may also have influenced what he described as an incomprehensible decision imposing a total of 81 years in prison on four people who remain in The Hague.
Faced with a situation he described as uncomfortable for the EU, Britain, the president, the PDK, the government, the defendants in The Hague and Kosovo, Bytyçi urged institutions not to repeat immature political actions. He stressed that such laws and positions toward the Specialist Court would not improve the defendants’ position on appeal. On the contrary, he said, such conduct could further motivate the Court of Appeals to convict those described as liberators.
Finally, Bytyçi called on the public, institutions and parties to ask why three former commanders of the Kosovo Liberation Army’s General Staff are not in The Hague. He named Agim Çeku, Sulejman Selimi and Kadri Kastrati, arguing that if the KLA were to answer for war crimes or more serious crimes, its former General Staff commanders should be held accountable. According to him, they are free, while the defendants in The Hague were not involved in commanding the KLA during or after the war, but in politics. He concluded that misguided politics today will not help them.
