The head of the Kosovo Anti-Corruption Agency, Hasan Preteni said today that corruption is one of the major concerns in Kosovo. According to Preteni, in the Anti-Corruption Agency report to be published in March, Kosovo scores 3.3 out of 10 in fighting corruption, same as the Dominican Republic and Ethiopia, and is one of the countries where corruption is not being efficiently tackled.
The United States Ambassador in Kosovo, Greg Delawie, said today in Pristina that he does not plan to apologize for his statements condemning the use of violence and in support of democracy. Delawie, who is attending a round-table on the fight against corruption, also said: “I am glad I live in a country such as Kosovo where freedom of speech is guaranteed by the Constitution. I won’t apologize for supporting justice and I will never support the use of teargas and violence in Kosovo.
The Kosovo Democratic Institute (KDI) organized a regional conference to discuss institutional mechanisms in the fight against corruption. Visar Sutaj, representative of KDI, said the purpose of this discussion is to find ways to combat this phenomenon. Furthermore, he said there is a lack of political will to fight corruption in Kosovo. According to him, the Anti-Corruption Agency has not delivered any results in fighting corruption.
At a meeting on a new law on strategic investment in Kosovo, participants blamed corruption, weak rule of law and the ongoing political crisis for the poor rate of foreign investment.
http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/kosovo-s-image-scares-investors-away--01-28-2016
In an end-of-year press conference, the Kosovo Democratic Institute (KDI) presented its activities in 2015 and recommendations for relevant Kosovo institutions. KDI said the people of Kosovo continue to face corruption and that according to their information, the citizens have shown readiness to report such activity. In 35 cases of corruption reported during the second half of 2015, KDI said that 7 involve allegations against ministries, 6 against municipalities, 5 against judicial institutions and 4 against the Privatisation Agency of Kosovo (PAK).
The paper’s front-page editorial today notes that no one more than the ruling-coalition benefits from the teargas and the chaos that is created in the Kosovo Assembly. The paper further criticizes the government for approving the budget for next year which is the same as last year. “The government knows very well that with the adopted budget for next year, Kosovo will only manage to survive, but it wouldn’t be able to develop.
The British Ambassador to Kosovo Ruari O’Connell said that the justice system in Kosovo has failed. As an example, he mentioned the case of the former Kacanik Mayor who was given a two-year prison sentence by a Kosovo court but never served it Zharku instead fled to Sweden and was seen taking part at a recent Kosovo Government event there. O’Connell said this was shocking and that that now that Kosovo has signed the Stabilisation and Association Agreement, it is final time for Kosovo leaders to undertake an uncompromised battle against corruption.
A recent report presented by the Kosovo Justice Institute (KJI) think tank found that Kosovo institutions have failed in producing concrete results in the fight against high-level corruption. According to the KJI, there is a high number of corruption cases reported with relevant authorities but to a large degree they remain unaddressed. “The failure of the state prosecutor to act on these corruption cases has led to the truth not being determined and, as a result, the people responsible unpunished,” the report stated.
Kosovo Democratic Institute (KDI) today published the report "Assessment of National Integrity System in Kosovo", which says that corruption continues to thrive in Kosovo and Kosovo has seen minimal progress in anti-corruption efforts in the past four years. Weak institutional cooperation and gaps in implementation of the law show that there is a lack of political will and commitment to fight corruption, the report states.
The United States Ambassador to Kosovo, Greg Delawie, today during the meeting of the National Anti-Corruption Council noted that the people of Kosovo see corruption as a major obstacle, and stressed that combating corruption requires a lot of work. According to him, the US is ready to assist Kosovo in combating corruption. Kosovo’s Prime Minister, Isa Mustafa, said today that one cannot combat corruption by looking for the ‘big fish’, because according to him, big fish is anyone who committed corruption acts.