Legal experts: Kosovo's threats to sue Serbia for genocide without legal grounds

"On the day when Kosovo's Prime Minister Albin Kurti appointed the Director of the Institute to deal with crimes committed during the 1998 and 1999 war, Minister of Justice Albulena Haxhiu announced that the Kosovo Government was dealing with a lawsuit for genocide against Serbia. Interlocutors from Kosovo Online point out that there are no conditions for a genocide lawsuit against Serbia because Kosovo is not a member of the United Nations or a signatory to the Genocide Convention. Regarding the formation of the Institute, they warn that it could be used for political purposes.

Haxhiu said yesterday that the genocide lawsuit was in the 'Government's program', and that Prime Minister Albin Kurti, President Vjosa Osmani, and Parliament Speaker Glauk Konjufca were engaged in the process.

Dusko Celic, an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Law, University of Kosovska Mitrovica, in response to the announcements from Pristina that a genocide lawsuit against Serbia is being prepared, tells Kosovo Online that there is no basis for such a thing and that it is more, as he said, a media story due to pressure on Serbia.

"Legally speaking, such threats are absolutely unrealistic; there are no procedural or material conditions for such a lawsuit. Material conditions do not exist because the facts are not on the side of any such ideas, and procedural conditions do not exist because Kosovo is neither a UN member nor a signatory to the Genocide Convention, nor can it be a party to proceedings before the International Court of Justice, which should be competent for such matters. Here, it seems to me, it's more about a media story and pressure on Serbia", Celic says.

When asked whether such announcements were merely internal needs or a call to the West for new pressure on Serbia, Celic says - both.

"It seems to me that there are elements of both. Albin Kurti's regime is doing everything to build its 'image' on an unfortunately anti-Serbian discriminatory policy that it brutally enforced in recent months in Kosovo. On the one hand, this is addressing its voter base, and on the other hand, it seems that, given that he often makes moves in line with a part of the international community, or with a part of Western powers, we can speculate that there is a kind of agreement to exert further pressure on Serbia through such media appearances in terms of possibly giving up on Resolution 1244 and national and state interests on the territory of Kosovo," Celic says.

Lawyer Branko Lukic emphasizes that Serbia should not see the formation of the Pristina Institute for Crimes Committed During the War in Kosovo as a smoke screen and that there is a great danger that it will be used for political purposes. As he says, it is known how the West operates, and they will, he believes, try to use it primarily against Serbia.

"There may be demands, as we have seen, for Kosovo to seek the extradition of our people, which is impossible under any law. First, there must be a state, and Kosovo is not a state. There must be an agreement between states, between Serbia, for example, and Kosovo, for someone to be extradited. At this moment, such a possibility certainly does not exist, but tomorrow, given how the West treats Serbia and the Serbs, we may be in great danger that there will actually be arrests and extradition of people in Kosovo, that they will be tried down there, which would be a catastrophe for those people and for the country", Lukic said.

When it comes to such matters, Lukic emphasizes that one should not "bury their head in the sand".

"They would obviously be tried in Pristina, and the consequences could be that they are given the opportunity, for example, to sue for compensation before the International Court of Justice, as Bosnia and Herzegovina tried, of course, they did not succeed since there was no basis for that. Law is not an exact science; the law can be both black and white, and often gray, but it can be a great danger for those people and for the country", Lukic concluded.

Kosovo's Prime Minister appointed Atdhe Hetemi as the Executive Director of the Institute for Crimes Committed During the War in Kosovo yesterday, emphasizing that they were "reviving the Institute that will deal with the crimes of Serbia in the 1998-1999 war".