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EX KOSOVO ALBANIAN PARAMILITARY HARADINAJ APPREHENDED IN FRANCE

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PARIS, PRISTINA, 04. JAN. 2017 -The French police arrested ex Kosovo Albanian paramilitary UCK chief Ramush Haradinaj, actually president of the Alliance for the Future of Kosovo party, based on an international wanted list issued by Serbia. The Haradinaj family confirmed that he was arrested for Kosovo tv RTK, while media in Pristina reported that the French authorities had notified Pristina about his being taken into custody. Serbia issued the wanted list for Haradinaj in 2006, on suspicion of war crimes. This is not the first time that the former Prime Minister and former KLA commander has been arrested based on Serbian warrant. In 2015, he was arrested in Slovenia, also on Serbian allegations that he committed war crimes during the 1998-99 war.
The Serbian war crimes prosecution was investigating Haradinaj in three cases, accusing him of the killing of at least 60 people.
Earlier, the Hague war crimes tribunal, ICTY, acquiited him of committing war crimes during the conflict.The UN-backed court rejected allegations that he was part of a joint criminal enterprise to establish KLA control in western Kosovo through detention camps, and that he and others were responsible for the torture and killing of Serbs and Albanians who were believed to have collaborated with Serbs. Kosovo Foreign Ministry said in a statement that Haradinaj “was stopped by French authorities based on an arrest warrant issued by Serbia in 2004 which for us is unacceptable.” The ministry said it was doing everything possible to secure his release, which it expected to happen. French border police arrested him upon his arrival at Basel-Mulhouse airport in eastern France on a flight from Pristina, the sources said.A French judiciary source said that investigators would on Thursday begin looking into whether there were reasons not to execute the extradition request, especially in the case that it had been issued for political reasons. They would look at whether he had already been tried before the U.N. court on the same charges as those the arrest warrant had been issued on, the source added. According to the Reuters News Agency, Kosovo and France enjoy good diplomatic relations and Paris remains one of the biggest supporters of Kosovo.


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