In closing statements at the high-profile trial in Kosovo, the defence insisted that the kidney transplants at the Medicus clinic had no connection to people-trafficking as the indictment claims.

In its closing statements on Tuesday, the defence told Pristina Basic Court that the prosecution could not prove that the Medicus clinic owner, Lutfi Dervishi, was involved in organised crime in connection with people-trafficking.

At the retrial of three Kosovo men accused of trafficking in human organs, a nurse who worked at the Medicus clinic near Pristina denied a statement she signed ten years ago about the removal of patients’ kidneys.

Mendehie Hajdari, who used to work as a nurse at the Medicus clinic until the day investigators closed it down in 2008 over the allegations of organ trafficking, appeared at Pristina Basic Court on Wednesday but retracted her previous statement to police.