Closing Statement by President Hashim Thaçi
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Lirim Grejçevci: For the benefit of our international friends, I am sharing President Thaçi’s closing statement in English, delivered at the conclusion of his trial at the Kosovo Specialist Chambers in The Hague:
Honourable Presiding Judge Mr. Smith,
Your Honours,
Yesterday, the people of Kosovo celebrated the 18th anniversary of the Independence of the Republic of Kosovo.
On 17 February 2008, feeling the heartbeats of our ancestors, we declared Kosovo an independent and democratic state.
From here, I wish to convey my warmest congratulations to all citizens of Kosovo on this magnificent holiday.
Your Honours,
For nearly three years in this courtroom, you have heard the Prosecution’s allegations and the Defense’s arguments.
You have seen the facts. You have heard the truth.
There is only one truth: that the charges don't stand.
I am completely innocent.
But I have said it, and I say it again, with full conviction: I sympathise with and express regret for all victims who suffered in Kosovo, regardless of their ethnic background.
Your Honours,
At the time of the massacres in Qirez, Likoshan, and Prekaz, at the beginning of 1998, I was a student at the University of Zurich.
I was not making plans to take control in Kosovo.
I was making plans to prepare for my exams.
The only person making morbid plans was Slobodan Milosevic.
Plans for another genocide, this time in Kosovo.
Like many other citizens, I too was forced to leave Kosovo.
Because Milosevic’s regime was pursuing me.
It had convicted me in absentia, accusing me of violating its discriminatory laws.
Later, that same regime would convict in absentia President Clinton, Secretary Albright, Prime Minister Blair, Chancellor Schröder, President Chirac, the Secretary General of NATO, Solana, and others.
Seeing the massacres against my people, I, like many others, could not remain indifferent.
I decided to return to Kosovo. This was an entirely personal decision on my part.
Because I could not stand aside while my family and my people faced extermination.
I did what any of you would do if your country were in danger.
For that, I am proud, and I never regret it.
Your Honours,
The Prosecution claims that the purpose was to gain and exercise control of Kosovo.
This is not only completely untrue and utterly absurd, but also deeply offensive.
It is an insult to the memory of the thousands of heroes who gave their lives for freedom.
It is an insult to the tens of thousands of innocent victims who were killed and massacred.
It is an insult to the efforts of NATO and the Western alliance, with whom I worked closely, to save the people of Kosovo from genocide.
Allow me to repeat an eternal truth: my only opponent, the opponent of the people of Kosovo and of the democratic world, was Slobodan Milosevic and his regime.
It is painful to hear this accusation.
Especially when, during the war, I did not know whether I would be alive from one day to the next.
I was not sure whether I would see my family again, my wife.
Or hold my newborn son in my arms again.
Let alone dream of exercising control in a Kosovo that was fully occupied.
The fact that some of us are alive today is purely a matter of chance.
I did not return to risk my life for control and power.
I returned to my homeland, risking my life for freedom and peace.
The question is: take control from whom?
The truth is that all control and power were in Milosevic's iron fist.
Albanians were not exercising power; they were being oppressed by power.
Our mission as a people was clear: survival, freedom, and peace.
I had no illusions.
Our only hope of salvation was the democratic world: the United States and NATO.
Throughout that time, my sole focus was building and strengthening this alliance.
For that purpose, I travelled to many capitals to persuade them of our just cause: Brussels, London, Berlin, Paris, Bern, Oslo, Vienna, and other places.
Wherever I was, I was in contact with officials from the American administration.
Milosevic had started the war, while we, the Kosovars, were defending ourselves.
But only NATO could end the war.
And that is what happened.
Had it not been for NATO’s intervention, Kosovo would never be free.
This Prosecution has given me too many accolades, titles, and ranks, which I neither held nor deserved.
It was not I who transported the resistance from the West to Kosovo.
I joined it in Kosovo.
My return from the West was not the reason the KLA was growing in numbers.
The reason was Milosevic.
As Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said at the time: “Milosevic, with his behaviour toward the people of Kosovo, is the biggest recruiter for the KLA.”
The KLA was not an army of a state.
It was a popular organisation defending itself from an aggressive state.
The fact that the KLA was not organised in the way the Prosecution claims it was does not diminish its role in Kosovo’s freedom in any way.
It does not make its cause for liberation any less noble, nor the achievement of independence any less historic.
Kosovo’s victory was more political and diplomatic.
The greatest success for the people of Kosovo was full cooperation with the West.
They helped us precisely because they knew who we were and what our aims were.
At no price and under no circumstances would I have put that alliance at risk for anything in the world.
Because in doing so, I would have put at risk Kosovo’s very freedom.
I would have put our collective existence at risk.
The goal was peace; it was not war.
When the democratic world decided to convene the peace conference at Rambouillet, we responded positively to their invitation.
The KLA was one of the three groups represented from Kosovo.
Nevertheless, throughout the process, we worked together as a Kosovo delegation.
We accepted the peace agreement, even though it did not meet all our legitimate demands.
We chose peace and democracy; Serbia chose war and genocide.
And to help the international community, just as they asked us to, the three groups, LDK, KLA, and LBD, agreed to form a joint government.
Until the first free and democratic elections.
It was an agreement to join forces for a common purpose: Kosovo’s freedom.
How can anyone claim the goal was to gain control when we accepted that the international community would have the final say in Kosovo?
That the KLA would hand over its weapons to NATO?
After Milosevic’s capitulation, Kosovo came under United Nations administration.
UNMIK clarified that all executive, legislative, and judicial power was in its hands.
These were new circumstances.
Afterwards, I worked with UNMIK and other political parties to help implement its mandate in the interests of the people of Kosovo.
I worked in joint structures with UNMIK.
During that time, the only power I had was the power of my voice.
And, Your Honours, as you have seen during the trial, I used my voice to promote a tolerant and multi-ethnic society in Kosovo.
I called on local Serbs to remain in their homes and build a new life together with us.
They, and other minorities, like us, were victims of Milosevic.
It was not at all easy for me to do this, after everything that had happened.
But it was the right thing to do.
In Kosovo, fresh graves were being dug everywhere for thousands of victims.
Thousands of the missing were not being found.
Thousands of Albanian hostages had been taken to Serbia.
The pain was deep and collective.
What I was doing could have had physical consequences and an electoral cost for me.
But Kosovo was more important than my personal fate.
After NATO entered Kosovo and Serbian forces withdrew, the citizens of Kosovo were not fighting.
They were celebrating. The long-awaited freedom.
During the nine years before independence, we were citizens of the United Nations in our own country.
During that time, I called on the population to be patient, tolerant, united, and to have faith in our international partners.
Independence was the fruit of our alliance with the democratic world.
After independence, I worked with the European Union and the United States to normalise relations with Serbia.
Your Honours,
What we faced was not only the period of war.
It was a century of oppression and apartheid.
Collective trauma caused a strong feeling of anger and revenge, both during and after the war.
President Clinton visited Kosovo and told us, “We won the war, and you must win the peace.”
I took that message seriously. I used my voice to call for peace and unity.
For most of the post-war period until the declaration of independence, I was out of power.
But throughout that time, I respected democratic norms and election results.
And whenever my party was in power by winning elections, it was always in coalition with the LDK and other non-Albanian political parties.
Together, we made the state of Kosovo a reality.
But Russian and Serbian propaganda would not forgive us easily.
After they failed to delegitimise Kosovo’s independence at the International Court of Justice here in The Hague, they turned to the Council of Europe.
They revived horrific allegations of organ trafficking.
Allegations that had previously been investigated by the Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, UNMIK, and EULEX.
And dismissed as unfounded.
As soon as Dick Marty’s report was published, as Prime Minister of Kosovo, I convened key international representatives, the Quint embassies, and the leadership of EULEX.
I requested yet another independent investigation.
They promised they would remove the black cloud over Kosovo.
The truth is that Russian and Serbian propaganda manipulated Dick Marty.
He became a victim of their campaign.
They fed him false information and, in the end, they even attempted to kill him in order to frame us.
The aim was clear: to discredit the most successful political and military project of the Western alliance in recent decades.
When we voted in Parliament to establish this court, we believed it would address the allegations in Dick Marty’s report.
And would operate in accordance with the Constitution and laws of the Republic of Kosovo.
In practice, neither of these happened.
I was criticised heavily in Kosovo, and I still am, for supporting the establishment of this court.
Critics say this court aims to criminalise our war for freedom and the idea of independence.
I did not believe that at the time we voted.
But I sincerely hope that time will prove that I was right and the critics were wrong.
This Prosecution, instead of removing the black cloud over Kosovo, seeks to block out the sun over it with a black storm.
With a so-called joint criminal enterprise.
Many of the allegations I have heard from this Prosecution in this courtroom, I have also heard during election campaigns in Kosovo.
It is truly painful that this Prosecution attempts to dismiss the testimony of senior officials of NATO, the United States, the United Kingdom, and the United Nations in this court.
Of those and their people who were with us the entire time.
Those who were the eyes and ears of the West in Kosovo.
Worse still, this Prosecution claims that I misled the internationals during the war.
It seems the Prosecution once again gives me more credit than I deserve.
On the other hand, it praises the fabricated evidence from the era of Slobodan Milosevic’s regime.
In doing so, it ignored the truth itself.
Your Honours,
My commitment to justice and to the victims has been steadfast.
In Rambouillet, I supported a request that the Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia investigate alleged crimes by all sides.
And, since the end of the war, all powers for investigating war crimes were in the hands of the internationals: ICTY, UNMIK, and EULEX.
I supported their work.
No one accused in Kosovo of war crimes has evaded justice.
And not even a single window has been broken to oppose legal proceedings during the 25 post-war years.
Even after the declaration of independence, when I was Prime Minister of Kosovo, I agreed that independent investigations into war crimes should remain in EULEX’s hands.
As President of Kosovo, I engaged eminent international and local experts from all communities to create a transitional justice forum for victims: the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
But the truth is that justice for victims cannot be served by pursuing the innocent.
Reconciliation cannot happen through selective, monoethnic prosecutions.
Your Honours,
Throughout my life, I stood with the people in defence of freedom, life, and dignity.
Always guided by the Western ideals of democracy, equality, and justice.
Today, at the conclusion of this trial, I have only one plea for you: that your judgment be guided by the Kosovo Constitution, the law, the evidence, and justice.
And the evidence presented makes it very clear that the charges don't stand.
Therefore, the only just decision is full acquittal.
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