Why was the former President of Kosovo convicted by The Hague? Explained
Former Kosovo President Hashim Thaci has been sentenced to 25 years in prison by a Hague-based court for war crimes committed during the 1990s. The conviction relates to his role as a commander in the Kosovo Liberation Army during the dissolution of Yugoslavia.
Why it matters
This is a significant development in international justice and the historical accountability for the conflicts that followed the collapse of Yugoslavia.
The story so far: Hashim Thaci, the former President of Kosovo, has been sentenced to 25 years in prison after being found guilty of war crimes by a special European Union-backed court at The Hague. The trial found him guilty of crimes including murder, arbitrary detention, illegal arrests, torture etc during the Kosovo war in the late 1990s as a senior commandant of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA). Three other former KLA commanders were also sentenced for several different charges.
Thaci was a former commandant of the KLA, a militant ethnic Albanian force, formed in the early 1990s, which strove for the independence of Kosovo, composed primarily of ethnic Albanians, from Yugoslavia and Serbia.
Also covering this story
5 other newsrooms covered this event. We read each version separately.
Kosovo's former president sentenced to 25 years for war crimes
Kosovo's ex-President Thaci convicted of war crimes, sentenced to 25 years in prison
Kosovo’s former president jailed for 25 years over war crimes
Former Kosovo President Hashim Thaci faces verdict for alleged war crimes
Kosovo's ex-president Thaci jailed for 25 years for war crimes
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