Drecun: Pristina unprepared to confront its crimes, looking to Croatia to defend the “four”

Military and political analyst and former chairman of the Serbian Parliament's Committee on Defense and Internal Affairs Milovan Drecun told Kosovo Online that, following the first-instance guilty verdict against former KLA leaders, representatives of Albanian parties in Kosovo are showing an unwillingness to confront the crimes committed by the KLA “not in their name, but together with them”.

Drecun pointed out that Pristina has already allocated nearly 40 million euros from the budget for the defense of the KLA “four” and is now planning another 100 million euros for the appeals process, thereby to some extent following the example of Croatia during the trial of three generals before the Hague Tribunal.

Ante Gotovina, Mladen Markac, and Ivan Cermak were convicted of war crimes at first instance and subsequently acquitted on appeal.

“They are waging a terrible extremist campaign full of Greater Albanian nationalism, the spread of hatred and denial of the crimes committed by the KLA. They do not accept the verdict of the Specialist Chambers, which were established by a decision of the parliament in Pristina. They are showing a complete unwillingness to confront the crimes committed by the terrorist KLA, not in their name, but together with them,” Drecun stressed.

According to him, for them, the killing of Serbs, innocent people, is a struggle for freedom. He also recalled that Croatia had enormous Western support, just as Kosovo does, and is now facing “irrefutable facts that the entire story is the result of a joint criminal enterprise”.

“Whether they are prepared to do anything else, such as amend the Law on the Specialist Chambers, or exert pressure so that the appeals process results in an acquittal, remains to be seen,” he said.

Drecun also stressed that the protests by KLA supporters are defending the narrative of an alleged “pure, heroic liberation war and the narrative of a heroic KLA”, but that the verdict, although a first-instance one, undermines such claims.

“They always use the method of putting pressure on the international community. Through mass rallies filled with brutal extremist energy, they show that they are prepared to cause serious incidents and endanger the Serbian people in Kosovo and Metohija if the second-instance verdict is not an acquittal,” Drecun warned.

He added that this is a message to the West, but also to those who will decide on the appeals.

“Everything has been seen before, and everything so far has produced the results the Albanians expected, but now for the first time they have encountered something that represents a different situation,” Drecun concluded.