Serb Policemen Plead Not Guilty to Kosovo War Crimes

Former policemen Zlatan Krstic and Destan Shabanaj pleaded not guilty at Pristina Basic Court on Monday, insisting that they were not guilty of committing war crimes against civilians in March 1999.

Kosovo's Special Prosecution has alleged that the two men "grossly violated the rules of international humanitarian law against civilians and property".

It alleges that Krstic was directly involved in an attack on ethnic Albanians in the village of Nerodime e Eperme/Donje Nerodimlje in the Ferizaj/Urosevac municipality on March 26, 1999.

The attack was followed by torture, destruction of property, expulsions and abductions of 19 members of a local ethnic Albanian family, according to the charges. Four members of the family were killed.

The prosecution also alleges that on April 1, 1999, while on duty as a police inspector and armed with automatic weapons, Shabanaj ordered the bodies of the four victims, plus a fifth person, to be buried in violation of international humanitarian law.

It claims that Shabanaj gave the order with "the intent of desecrating, humiliating and subjecting the lifeless bodies to demeaning treatment".