REU-Jekhipe and URYD

June 13: Commemoration of the Displaced Roma from Kosovo in the Context of Transitional Justice

The majority of Kosovar Roma today live scattered across Europe, many in France and Germany. Together with the **Union des Rroms de l’Ex-Yougoslavie en Diaspora (URYD)** and other organizations from the Kosovar Roma diaspora, the **Roma Center** held a commemorative event in the French city of Troyes on the 25th anniversary of the displacement of Roma from Kosovo.

Among the accused was the former Kosovar president **Hashim Thaçi**, who remained in office until his arrest in 2020. Until the establishment of the Special Chambers, charges against Kosovo-Albanian war criminals had almost always failed, or the accused had to be acquitted. A key reason for this was that witnesses repeatedly "disappeared." **Carla Del Ponte**, the former chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague, criticized this strongly in her autobiography *In the Name of the Prosecution*. In the cases before the Special Chambers, special attention is now being paid to the protection of witnesses. However, there have already been attempts to disclose the names of witnesses, which could have disastrous consequences—during the first trial against former and later Kosovar Prime Minister **Haradinaj**, almost all witnesses were violently killed, leading to his acquittal; a second trial against him also ended in acquittal, sparking widespread criticism. He too was held responsible for the ethnic cleansing of Roma and Serbs.

The indictments in The Hague, according to **Claude Kahn**, are part of the concept of **Transitional Justice**, which consists of five components: the right to truth; the right to reparations for victims; the right to hold perpetrators accountable and ensure victims have access to effective legal remedies; the right to memorialization, i.e., remembrance and raising public awareness of the events; and guarantees of non-recurrence.

The former special rapporteur on the promotion of truth, justice, reparation, and guarantees of non-recurrence, **Fabián Salvioli**, provided recommendations to both the Serbian and Kosovar governments on how to implement Transitional Justice processes. His report was published in 2023. There is significant room for improvement regarding the rights of the Roma from Kosovo. According to the report (and our own experiences), Kosovo itself has a purely mono-ethnic culture of remembrance among the (Kosovo-Albanian) majority population. This, along with the lack of a pluralistic debate on the war events, hinders mutual understanding and fosters social division in Kosovo.