For war crimes, the "George Washington of Kosovo" is put on trial.

Hashim Thaci and three other ethnic Albanian separatist leaders face an EU tribunal in The Hague. Thaci and three other KLA leaders were charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity for their actions during the 1998-99 insurgency against Serbia, which NATO eventually launched an air war to support. Prosecutors of the Kosovo Specialist Chambers Court charged Thaci, Kadri Veseli, Rexhep Selimi, and former KLA spokesman Jakup Krasniqi with murder, torture, forced disappearances, persecution and cruel treatment of ethnic Albanians, Roma and Serbs, for the purpose of gaining control over the province. The indictment alleges that at least 407 people were abducted and extrajudicially imprisoned, and at least 100 of them were murdered, between January 1, 1998 and December 31, 2000. NATO launched a 78-day air war on behalf of the KLA in March 1999.

Thaci, 54, repeated his plea from 2020 when he was detained. The indictment against the leader of the Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK) and the first prime minister of the self-proclaimed independent government, Thaci, has been criticized for being part of a “joint criminal enterprise” to take over Kosovo. The indictment specifically charges Thaci and others with being part of a “joint criminal enterprise” to take over Kosovo, which was first used by the ad-hoc tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s to go after the Serb military and political leadership. Thousands of ethnic Albanians rallied in Kosovo over the weekend to protest the trial, and several dozen protested outside the court in the Netherlands. The indictment specifically charges Thaci and others with being part of a “joint criminal enterprise” to take over Kosovo, which was first used by the ad-hoc tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s, to go after the Serb military and political leadership.