Social Democratic Initiative

Former Kosovo President Hashim Thaci and his three co-defendants went on trial at the Kosovo Specialist Chambers on Monday morning, charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity allegedly committed between at least March 1998 and September 1999 in Kosovo and neighbouring Albania during and just after the war with Serbian forces.

Sejdi Zymeri's house in the village of Likovc/Likovac is close to where the Kosovo Liberation Army, KLA used to have its headquarters in the Drenica region, the guerrillas' wartime heartland.

The prosecution's presentation of evidence in the case against former Kosovo President Hashim Thaci and three other former senior Kosovo Liberation Army, KA guerrillas at the Kosovo Specialist Chambers in The Hague could go on for six-and-a-half years, presiding judge Charles Smith III told a case status conference at the court on Monday.

The Kosovo Specialist Chambers in The Hague has published a less redacted version of the indictment of former Kosovo President Hashim Thaci, who goes on trial with three other Kosovo Liberation Army, KLA ex-officers next month, giving more details of the war crimes and crimes against humanity charges against them.

With a fourth government in two years taking power in March, Kosovo's publicly-owned enterprises face a new round of firing and hiring.

The most senior positions in state-run firms are traditionally filled with political appointees, who invariably depart when a new government enters office.

The opposition Vetevendosje party was on course for a landslide victory in snap parliamentary elections in Kosovo on Sunday, on a day that its leader and prime ministerial candidate, Albin Kurti, described as a "bright day" when he cast his ballot at a Pristina polling centre in the morning.

"The voices of the victims are indispensable to justice."

These were the words of the president of the Kosovo Specialist Chambers, Ekaterina Trendafilova, when she called on victims of crimes allegedly committed by four former Kosovo Liberation Army guerrillas who have since become senior politicians to participate in their war crimes case at the Hague-based court.

Both the EU and the US opposed tariffs on the grounds that they are an obstacle to the resumption of Kosovo-Serbia dialogue. For the first time in decades, Kosovo found itself on the receiving end of international criticism, with the West effectively succumbing to Serbia's demand for an unconditional lifting of the tariffs as a condition to resume the dialogue.

Kosovo's largest parliamentarian party, the Vetevendosje Movement, LVV, staged a march in Pristina's main Skanderbeg Square on Friday to mark the 15th anniversary of its organisation - and the 21st anniversary of Kosovo's liberation from Serbian rule in 1999.

If Washington's threats of denying economic aid and withdrawing US troops from Kosovo and Metohija do not discipline the prime minister of interim Pristina institutions, Albin Kurti, and in case he does not suspend tariffs, it is not excluded that the United States will pull another trump card - a change of government in Pristina.