Office for Kosovo and Metohija: Arsic verdict confirms a system based on intimidation and disenfranchisement of Serbs

The Office for Kosovo and Metohija stated that the prison sentence imposed on Dusko Arsic in the retrial for an alleged war crime confirms the political instrumentalization of Pristina’s judiciary and a system based on “intimidation and the disenfranchisement of Serbs.”

“This is yet another example that in Pristina there is neither democracy nor courts serving law and justice, but rather institutions that serve exclusively to repress Serbs,” the statement said.

According to the Office for Kosovo and Metohija, it was not proven during the trial that Arsic committed any crime. They further point out that the indictment against him was filed only three days after he submitted a lawsuit seeking the return of property that had allegedly been illegally sold, which, they claim, indicates that the case was nothing more than “an attempt to cover up theft and grant amnesty to those who seized Serbian property.” They add that, unfortunately, this is not the first such case before Pristina’s judiciary.

“This kind of violence against law and justice has become commonplace in self-proclaimed ‘Kosovo,’ and society there will not be democratic as long as such pseudo-legal practices are permitted and tolerated,” the statement added.

The Office also emphasized that “fabricated proceedings” for alleged war crimes against people of Serbian nationality are not only a blatant example of violations of individual human rights, but, as they note, part of an organized campaign to intimidate Serbs as a collective. The motives and drivers of such a campaign, they claim, are both criminal in nature and rooted in chauvinistic hatred toward an entire people.

Dusko Arsic from Maticane near Pristina was sentenced in a retrial before the Special Department of the Basic Court in Pristina to 13 years in prison for an alleged war crime committed in 1999 in the village of Butovac.

This is the third war crimes verdict this year.

Previously, on February 2, Muhamed Alidemaj was sentenced to 13 years in prison, and on February 3, Srdjan Lazovic was sentenced to twelve and a half years.