Kosovo

During a joint meeting on Monday in Pristina between the governments of Kosovo and Albania, Prime Minister Edi Rama said that he will personally submit a report to the Council of Europe in Strasbourg being prepared in Albania's parliament querying the Dick Marty report and what he alleged was its Russian influence.

The pre-trial judge at the Kosovo Specialist Chambers, Nicolas Guillou, decided on Thursday that Hashim Thaci and Kadri Veseli should remain in detention ahead of their trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity allegedly committed during the 1998-99 conflict in Kosovo.

Enver Hoxhaj stops his tractor near to where a Kosovo Liberation Army guerrilla unit was based 24 years ago, during the war.

In the pastoral village of Budakova/Budakovo in Kosovo's Suhareka/Suva Reka municipality, Hoxhaj then joins some of his former guerrilla comrades in the garden of a nearby café.

The Kosovo Specialist Prosecutor's Office has added fresh war crime charges to the indictment of former Kosovo President Hashim Thaci and three other guerilla Kosovo Liberation Army leaders turned politicians who have been awaiting the trial in detention in The Hague since November 2020.

"Knowing the importance of this process, the Office of the President has begun to review and analyse in detail all the documentation received, all the facts and circumstances related to this process," Bekim Kupina, a presidential media adviser, told BIRN.

The European Union has expressed concern about the election of Blerim Isufaj as Kosovo's new Chief Prosecutor on Wednesday, and local civil society organisations have urged President Vjosa Osmani to consider the evident shortcomings of the process when she decides to decree the decision or not.

The latest round of 'technical level' dialogue between representatives of Serbia and Kosovo in Brussels on Tuesday passed off without any new information about progress made, and without the two sides' negotiators talking face to face.

Munich – President Borut Pahor took part in a panel debate on the Western Balkans at the Munich Security Conference on Sunday, arguing the EU enlargement process should be stepped up and offering the EU as the answer to all the issues troubling the region.

The director of the Office for Kosovo and Metohija, Petar Petkovi, says that the statement of Kosovo President Vjosa Osmani that Pristina has fulfilled its obligations in the agreements is absurd.

Stoltenberg said that NATO has never forced any country to join NATO, and in that sense he especially pointed out that NATO strongly supports and respects Serbia's decision not to join the Alliance.