Kosovo Convicts Two Serb Policemen of War Crimes

Pristina Basic Court on Tuesday sentenced former police officer Zlatan Krstic to 14-and-a-half years in prison and former police inspector Destan Shabanaj to seven years for their roles in a deadly attack on Kosovo Albanian civilians during the war.

Krstic was found guilty of being directly being involved the attack in the village of Nerodime e Eperme/Gornje Nerodimlje in the Ferizaj/Urosevac municipality on March 26, 1999.

According to the charges, the attack was followed by torture, destruction of property, expulsions and abductions of 19 members of a local ethnic Albanian family. Four members of the family were killed.

On April 1, 1999, while on duty as a police inspector and armed with automatic weapons, Shabanaj ordered the bodies of the four victims, plus a fifth person, to be buried in violation of international humanitarian law.

The indictment said that Shabanaj gave the order with "the intent of desecrating, humiliating and subjecting the lifeless bodies to demeaning treatment".

This was a first-instance verdict and both men have the right to appeal. Shabanaj's lawyer Mentor Neziri said that his client will contest the court's decision.

Neziri described the decision as "unfair, unreasonable, and unfounded … because in all the main trial sessions there was no witness who testified to the incriminating actions presented by the prosecution in its indictment".

According to Neziri, his client in fact "committed very humanitarian actions because the same as a member of the Serbian police at that time … participated and made possible their [victims] burial and identification", without violating international law as charged.