13 Oct 14 The EU’s former chief war crimes investigator Clint Williamson has joined the Washington-based think-tank established by former Republican presidential candidate John McCain. Marija Ristic BIRN Belgrade Williamson, who ended his three-year mandate as chief prosecutor of the EU Special Investigative Task Force in charge of probing war crime allegations against Kosovo Liberation Army, has been appointed senior director for law and national security at the McCain Institute for International Leadership. The Washington-based Institute was established by US senator McCain, who ran again

10 Oct 14 A group of doctors has been arrested on suspicion of abusing their positions to divert patients from the state health system to the private sector in return for bribes. Nektar Zogjani BIRN Pristina Kosovo police detained nine doctors and three other health officials on Thursday, suspected of abusing their positions to send business to private hospitals in return for cash. They are suspected of signing deals with private hospitals to send patients for treatment there when public hospitals had the capacity to do the same treatments for free. “The defendants enabled the private hos

09 Oct 14 Ombudsman says head of state violated the constitution by extending the terms of international judges without going to parliament. By Valerie Hopkins and Jeta Xharra BIRN Pristina When President Atifete Jahjaga issued a decree on August 31, “confirming the extension” of the mandates of three international judges on the Constitutional Court of Kosovo, she seemed to avert a serious institutional crisis at a time when Kosovo already faced a political crisis over the formation of a new government. Since the court has issued two important rulings during the summer about the political c

09 Oct 14 A Kosovo official said no bodies were found near the town of Gjakove/Djakovica, where it was suspected that Serb prisoners killed by guerrillas during the 1990s war could be buried. BIRN Belgrade, Pristina The head of the Kosovo government's missing persons commission, Prenk Gjetaj, said that investigators had failed to find any human remains at the site in the village of Piskota, near Gjakove/Djakovica. "The search of the terrain was finished yesterday at the site of the suspected mass grave.

09 Oct 14 The latest EU progress report said that Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro and Serbia are still making unacceptably slow progress in prosecuting war crimes. Marija Ristic BIRN Belgrade The report published by the European Commission on Wednesday, examining the progress made by the western Balkan states towards the EU, said that the rule of law remains the most problematic issue in all four countries, while not enough is being done to prosecute perpetrators of crimes from the 1990s conflicts. A lack of political will to prosecute high-level officials was also named as a ser

08 Oct 14 Most Balkan countries have made some progress on their EU path, but key areas of concern remain organised crime, corruption, the rule of law, the courts, politicized state administrations - and giving a free media room to breathe. BIRN Brussels, Belgrade, Sarajevo, Podgorica Presenting the annual Enlargement Package in Brussels on Wednesday, Commissioner Stefan Fule said EU enlargement policy was delivering concrete results through reforms that gradually transform Balkan countries. “Five years ago, we set out to strengthen the credibility and the transformative power of enlargemen

08 Oct 14 Another witness in the trial of the Kosovo Liberation Army’s ‘Drenica Group’ cell, accused of assaulting wartime prisoners, has denied an earlier statement he made that incriminated the defendants. BIRN Mitrovica A protected witness at the trial of the seven former fighters told the court in Mitrovica that he did not remember which KLA guerrillas took his brother away, despite his earlier statement that defendant Ismet Haxha was one of them. “I don’t know if I said that, but maybe I said that because people were saying so,” said the protected witness codenamed ‘O’. His disavowal

07 Oct 14 Upcoming EU Progress Reports on the Western Balkan countries will say each of the countries has much to do - though some are clearly making more progress than others. Nektar Zogjani BIRN Brussels A senior EU source said the European Commission Progress Reports for 2014 on the Western Balkans, due out on Wednesday, would mainly highlight failings in the fields of the rule of law, corruption, fundamental rights such as freedom of expression as well as threats to the independence of the media. Each of the countries concerned will have a lot of work to do in order meet the EU criteria

07 Oct 14 A witness told the trial of the Kosovo Liberation Army’s ‘Drenica Group’ cell, accused of assaulting wartime prisoners, that an EU prosecutor bribed him to falsify his statement. BIRN Mitrovica The protected witness codenamed ‘F’ on Tuesday retracted incriminating statements he made about the defendants in the high-profile trial, claiming that a former prosecutor from the EU rule-of-law mission in Kosovo (EULEX) had offered him a bribe to write false testimony in his name. Witness F told the court in Mitrovica that former EULEX prosecutor Maurizio Salustro had written what he wan

The authorities will investigate the suspected mass grave near the town of Djakovica in Kosovo where Serbs killed by guerrillas during the late 1990s war could be buried. The Serbian war crimes prosecution and the EU rule-of-law mission in Kosovo, EULEX, have information that Serbs killed by Kosovo Liberation Army fighters at a detention camp in Likovc/Likovac during the war could be buried in the suspected mass grave, the prosecution said on Monday. “The Serbian war crimes prosecution in cooperation with the war crimes investigation unit of the EULEX prosecution have information about the l