War damage census: What has the statistics revealed, overlooked, and what next with the collected data?

According to Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti, the data from the Kosovo population census, conducted during April and May of this year, are more than just numbers. However, regarding the figures obtained about war damages, interlocutors of Kosovo Online express reservations. The reported material damage in households amounting to €5,081,493,000 should, they believe, undergo a verification process requiring evidence. Furthermore, it is pointed out that the Serbs expelled from Kosovo after June 1999 did not have the opportunity to report on war damages they suffered.

Written by: Dusica Radeka Djordjevic

A total of 154,272 households claimed to have suffered war damages. It is estimated that 30,787 households incurred damages up to €10,000, 26,791 households reported damages between €10,000 and €20,000, and 30,330 households between €20,000 and €40,000, while 66,364 households estimated their damages exceeded €40,000.

Apart from material damages, it was also reported whether any family members were killed, missing, or wounded during the war. The census showed that 11,417 people were killed, 1,047 went missing, 6,682 were injured, and 3,312 were detained.

Given that the census defined the war period as from February 28, 1998, to June 11, 1999, Nikola Kabasic, a former judge at the High Court in Kosovska Mitrovica, tells Kosovo Online that the collected statistical data are incomplete because they lack statements from members of the Serbian community and other non-Albanian communities who lived in Kosovo until 1999 and were then expelled.

"More than 240,000 Serbs, Montenegrins, and other non-Albanians were expelled from Kosovo from 1999 to 2004, when there was another wave of violent expulsions, and they did not have the opportunity to declare the damages they experienced. The Serbian community suffered the greatest destructions from June 1999 until the end of 2000, when the entire Metohija was expelled from the cities, so these data are incomplete," Kabasic states.

Regarding whether the collected data are realistic, Kabasic says he cannot assess due to the nature of the questions posed and because citizens chose from several options regarding the amount of damage.

"These are large figures, as in 2017 damage estimates came out at two billion euros. I assume that after this first phase in which the data are statistically presented, a more thorough determination will probably begin, going from household to household and seeking some evidence. These should be material, proving that someone had certain property, that it had a certain value, and that it was destroyed during the armed conflicts in Kosovo and during the NATO aggression on the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. Or, as is the case everywhere in Kosovo, it will be proved with the help of two witnesses, as many legal proceedings are conducted," emphasizes Kabasic. He notes that here we are only talking about material damage related to the population, while infrastructure, industrial facilities, communication tools, railways, roads, bridges, and similar were not considered.

Our interlocutor adds that the issue of war reparations that Kosovo seeks from the Republic of Serbia is often raised in Kosovo over the last twenty years and is mostly motivated by political goals, as a mechanism to pressure Serbia to extract other solutions.

At the same time, he reminds that some citizens have already tried to seek compensation for the damages they suffered through the courts.

"There have been instances of individual lawsuits against the Republic of Serbia in Kosovo courts for compensation for damages incurred during the armed conflicts, but these courts have regularly rejected them since 2015, and even reached the Constitutional Court of Kosovo which also denied such cases. I also know that the Humanitarian Law Fund from Belgrade and some private attorneys represented individually Albanians who suffered material damage in the courts of the Republic of Serbia in Belgrade and some of them were successful in these procedures or it was like in the case of Bogujevci for non-material damages," says Kabasic.

Considering that the census of war damages was conducted 25 years after the conflict, it is questionable whether the necessary evidence of what was destroyed still exists today, but Kabasic says that evidence such as videos and photographs, which are abundant on the internet, whether taken by citizens of their property before, during, and after the conflict, as well as related to events following the arrival of international forces, exists.

"A lot is documented and they will use it. The Republic of Serbia should not be naive and asleep to say that any lawsuit will not be successful because Kosovo is not a state and is not a member of the United Nations, so it cannot sue Serbia before the International Court of Justice. Serbia should not sit idle, but should document the damage it suffered as a state, referring to the large property it had in Kosovo, and the property of all citizens who were forcibly expelled from Kosovo. These proofs exist, and where they do not, probably an indirect method will be used with the help of witnesses who will confirm that someone had certain property and that it was destroyed during the war operations," concludes Kabasic.

Commenting on the results of the census in Kosovo regarding war damages, Bekim Blakaj from the Humanitarian Law Fund assesses that it is impossible for the amount of war damage and the structures that were destroyed during the war in Kosovo to be reliably registered during the population registration process, as, he says, during the census people could probably report something that did not exist.

Blakaj stated for Kosovo Online that Albanians lived in large families that split after the war and that it is very possible that multiple members of one family reported the same object as war damage, which is why there is a possibility that some reported amounts were duplicated. "Also, people can arbitrarily report something if they are not asked for any confirmation, any evidential document, and as far as I know, this was not requested in this process, so, probably people could report something that did not exist. Because of this, such damage should be registered by a special commission that would be well-trained and competent to request documentation based on which the war damage would then be approximately determined," says Blakaj.

As he believes, it is almost certain that evidence of the damage inflicted for each destroyed object cannot be provided. Regarding whether it should be expected that the data obtained from the census about war damage will be used as pressure on Belgrade, Blakaj says that remains to be seen.

"But most likely, politicians will refer to the data published by the Statistical Agency after the population registration," he believes.

Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Political Sciences in Belgrade, Stefan Surlic, reminds that Albin Kurti has mentioned demands for war reparations to be addressed to Belgrade several times, but believes that based on this census, it will neither receive international support nor the support of expert bodies dealing with the issue.

Surlic points out for Kosovo Online that all those who dealt with confronting the past and transitional justice stated both before and during the census that there were no adequate conditions to talk about the war damages incurred.

The census of war damages as part of the population census, according to him, was a populist measure because those being censused had complete freedom to determine the amount of damage, which brings the accuracy of the data into question. "We cannot consider citizens experts to speak about the real market value of any damaged object. I see all this as a clear populist measure to reach that infamous figure of five billion euros and present it as another argument in negotiations in the context of some demand for war reparations towards Belgrade. Albin Kurti has mentioned such a request several times, but I think it will neither receive international support nor the support of expert bodies dealing with the issue. To verify that figure, special commissions would have to conduct the census again and interview and obtain evidence from everyone who claimed to have suffered some kind of damage during the war," states Surlic.

The census in Kosovo was conducted from April 5 to May 17, and Serbs in northern Kosovo mostly boycotted it.