Hashim Thaçi et al.

	During the period covered by the indictment, Hashim Thaçi was allegedly the Head of the Political and Information Directorates of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA). By the end of March 1999, Thaçi was allegedly Prime Minister of the Provisional Government of Kosovo (PGoK) and KLA Commander-in-Chief.
	During the period covered by the indictment, Kadri Veseli was allegedly a member of the KLA Political Directorate and Head of the KLA intelligence services. By late March 1999, following the formation of the PGoK, he allegedly became chief of the Kosovo Intelligence Service and PGoK Minister of the Intelligence Service.
	During the period covered by the indictment, Rexhep Selimi was allegedly the Head of the KLA Operational Directorate. By at least August 1998, he was, according to the indictment, KLA Inspector General and by the end of March 1999, upon the formation of the PGoK, he became PGoK Minister of Public Order/Minister of Internal Affairs.
	During the period covered by the indictment, Jakup Krasniqi was allegedly a member of the KLA Political Directorate and the official KLA spokesperson. Later in 1998, he was allegedly officially appointed as a KLA Deputy Commander. With the establishment of the PGoK, Krasniqi, according to the indictment, became the PGoK spokesperson.

INDICTMENT HISTORY

The initial indictment against the four accused was confirmed on 26 October 2020 and made public on 5 November 2020. On 22 July 2021, the Pre-Trial Judge, in two decisions, granted in part the Defence motions and ordered the SPO to correct and amend the indictment by, inter alia, excluding the joint criminal enterprise III liability for the special intent crimes (three appeals against this decision, filed by Thaci, Selimi and Krasniqi, were dismissed  by the Court of Appeals on 22 August 2022). The SPO filed the amended indictment on 3 September 2021. On 23 December 2021, the Pre-Trial Judge granted the SPO's leave to amend the indictment in order to include a number of new allegations, namely additional detention sites in Suharekë/Suva Reka municipality, new incidents of persecution and murder in Gjilan/Gnjilane as well as new incidents of the accused's personal participation in the charged crimes. Following the dismissal of the appeals by Thaci and Veseli against this decision by the Court of Appeals Panel on 22 March 2022, the SPO filed the public redacted version of the amended indictment on 29 April 2022. On 22 July 2022, the Pre-Trial Judge granted, in part, the request by the Thaci Defence alleging defects in the latest indictment and ordered the SPO to file a further amended confirmed indictment, with additional information to the current charges, by 30 September 2022. The additional information relates to names of relevant direct perpetrators, victims and locations in the specific paragraphs of the current indictment.

On 29 September 2022, the Pre-Trial Judge granted the SPO request to withdraw the allegations of crimes in Ferizaj/Uroševac municipality from the indictment and ordered the SPO to reflect this withdrawal of charges in the further amended indictment, which was filed on 30 September 2022. A lesser redacted version of the indictment was filed on 27 February 2023. This is currently the operative indictment in this case. 

Summary of charges

The indictment states that the crimes charged were committed from at least March 1998 through September 1999 and took place in several locations across Kosovo as well as in Kukës and Cahan, in Northern Albania. They were allegedly committed by members of the KLA against hundreds of civilians and persons not taking part in hostilities. The indictment alleges that Thaçi, Veseli, Selimi and Krasniqi are individually criminally responsible, pursuant to various forms of criminal responsibility for crimes, which were committed in the context of a non-international armed conflict in Kosovo and were part of a widespread and systematic attack against persons suspected of being opposed to the KLA.

The charges are the following:

SIX COUNTS OF CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY

• Persecution (Count 1)
• Imprisonment (Count 2)
• Other inhumane acts (Count 4)
• Torture (Count 6)
• Murder (Count 8)
• Enforced disappearance of persons (Count 10)

FOUR COUNTS OF WAR CRIMES

• Illegal or arbitrary arrest and detention (Count 3)
• Cruel treatment (Count 5)
• Torture (Count 7)
• Murder (Count 9)

LINK TO THE OPERATIVE INDICTMENT

PROCEDURAL DEVELOPMENTS

• Following their arrest by the Specialist Prosecutor, Thaçi, Veseli, Selimi and Krasniqi were transferred to the Detention Facilities of the Kosovo Specialist Chambers in The Hague on 4 and 5 November 2020.

• Thaçi’s and Krasniqi’s initial appearances took place on 9 November 2020 before the Pre-Trial Judge, Nicolas Guillou. During their appearances, they pleaded not guilty to all counts of the indictment.

• On 10 and 11 November, Veseli's and Selimi's initial appearances took place, respectively. Both accused pleaded not guilty to all counts.

• On 21 April 2021, the Pre-Trial Judge granted the applications of nine victims and admitted them as victims participating in the proceedings as Group I. On 10 December 2021, 25 May 2022 and 14 December 2022, respectively, the Pre-Trial Judge admitted 11, 12 and 21 new applicants as part of the same Group. On 20 February 2023, the Trial Panel admitted 84 new applicants as part of the same Group. The next Panel’s decision on victims’ participation was on 10 March 2023, when 3 new applicants were admitted. This brought the total number of victims in this case to 140. On 21 July 2023, the Panel granted a request of the Victims’ Counsel and allowed the surviving spouse of one of the victims, who has recently passed away, to resume her action as a victim participating in these proceedings. Accordingly, the total number of victims remained 140. In its 7th decision on victims' participation on 7 September 2023, the Panel admitted one applicant as a victim (resubmitted by a person, whose application was previously denied). On 4 October 2023, following the death of one of the admitted victims, the Panel allowed three relatives to continue the participation on his/her behalf.

• On 17 December 2021, the SPO filed, as strictly confidential and ex-parte, its pre-trial brief. The corrected version of the SPO’s pre-trial brief was filed on 24 February 2022 (also as confidential). On 9 June 2023, the SPO filed a confidential lesser redacted version of its pre-trial brief. The public redacted versions of pre-trial briefs were filed on 8 November 2022 (Hashim Thaçi), 13 March 2023 (Kadri Veseli), 8 May 2023 (Selimi and Krasniqi) and on 3 April 2023 (SPO).

• On 10 May 2022, during their further appearances, all four accused pleaded not guilty to the new charges in the amended indictment, filed on 29 April 2022. 

• On 30 November 2022, the Pre-Trial Judge notified the President that the case file will be ready for transmission to the Trial Panel on 15 December 2022. On 15 December 2022, the Pre-Trial Judge transmitted the case file to Trial Panel II.

• The trial preparation conference took place on 18 January 2023, followed by the Specialist Prosecutor's Preparation Conference on 15 February.

• The trial commenced on 3 April 2023 with the opening statements of the Specialist Prosecutor and the Victims' counsel, followed by the Defence teams on 4 and 5 April 2023.

*As of 23/04/2024

List of all hearings

Below you can find the list of all hearings in the Thaci et al. case. Please note that videos and transcripts will be added to the list as they become available.