Surlic: Special commissions would need to gather evidence to verify the reported amount of war damage

Stefan Surlic, an assistant professor at the Faculty of Political Sciences in Belgrade, says that the war damage census in Kosovo, which was conducted as part of the population census, was a populist measure because those who were surveyed had complete freedom to determine the amount of damage, which raises doubts about the accuracy of the data.

According to the data from the Kosovo Statistical Agency, the reported war damage in households that stated they suffered damage amounts to more than five billion euros. Surlic emphasizes that all those who have dealt with confronting the past and transitional justice stated both before and during the census that there were no adequate conditions to discuss the incurred war damage.

"We cannot consider citizens to be experts on the real market value of any damaged property. I see all of this as a clear populist measure to reach the infamous figure of five billion euros and present it as another argument in negotiations in the context of a demand for war reparations from Belgrade. Albin Kurti has mentioned such a request several times, but I believe it will not receive international support nor the backing of expert bodies dealing with this issue. To actually verify this figure, special commissions would have to conduct the census again and interview and gather evidence from everyone who stated they suffered any kind of damage during the war," Surlic says.