Even more serious are the suspicions that witnesses were instructed precisely how to testify against Hashim Thaçi and KLA leaders. In one case, the witness was asked to admit that the KLA had ordered him to kill Adem Salihaj, who was deputy prime minister and a friend of Serbian agent Nazim Bllaca, in exchange for 45,000 euros.
"This is a witness statement that was taken from a person named Ajriz Zeqiraj, Adem Salihaj told me that he would give me 15 thousand euros more, that is, 45 thousand euros if I would make a written statement and with my signature and do it by recording a CD with me speaking on that CD. I asked him what I should say then he explained to me that he wanted me to give a statement where I would claim that I was paid to kill Adem Salihaj. Have you heard witnesses that there were people who had offered bribes for false testimony regarding crimes against LDK members?"
"It's a farce, it's staged, they should definitely be released, they are very vile, they were trained in Serbia then went there, they give irrelevant statements," said Adem Kadriaj, a KLA veteran.
Documents from international organizations have also been manipulated in the process. Such is the case of a witness in The Hague, whose scheme was unraveled by the defense lawyer. This witness wrote a report on behalf of Human Rights Watch that the KLA killed civilians in September 1998. But at the end of his testimony, he admits that he got the data from Serbia and never went to Kosovo himself.
- What evidence did you have that a murder by the KLA occurred in September 1998?
- These were the claims at the time.
- Are these claims from Serbs or not?
- Yes, correct.
- You recycled Serbian propaganda, didn't you?
- It should have been written differently.
- But did you receive these claims from the Serbian side?
- Yes, that's right, we received this information from the Serbian government from official sources.
- And you never visited the country?
- We tried to visit him.
- But you didn't visit it?
- We were denied permission.
- From the Serbs?
- Exactly.
- When you say murder of September 1998, are you aware that no one in that indictment was killed in 1998?
- Yes, that was poorly worded.
'There have been moments when the OSCE missions, the information and reports they have provided, have been misused. There have been cases when the OSCE rapporteur has included news or information from Serbian TV in the report and the prosecution has taken Serbian RTV news as granted,' said Skënder Musa, a lawyer accredited in The Hague.
One of the prosecution witnesses at the hearing testified that he had spied on KLA soldiers. He had even opened fire to kill them. Although he was stopped by them, he was not only not executed but is now appearing in court against them. On the other hand, the list of witnesses also includes people with precedents, wanted by Interpol, but also those who have testified in the past in Milosevic's trial.
While I was checking the forest at the point called Uji I bij, I heard the cutting of wood. When I went there to the fountain at Uji I bij, 4 people came out of the forest from a road and they had automatic weapons. They approached me, tied my hands and eyes and took me away.
Prosecutor : What did they do with your weapon? They took my official weapon and kept it with them, I had tried to shoot at the KLA.
Prosecutor: Before you were arrested on August 2, you told Serbian authorities that sand was being trucked out so that Kosovo Albanians could build dams. You're right.
During the hearings, the prosecution witnesses have given ridiculous testimonies which, it is clear, cannot have legal value nor contribute to this judicial process. A court established for war crimes, but takes into consideration some ordinary evidence for unverified conflicts, but ordinary... Even if they existed, they cannot be part of this file.
"The KLA was like saying shepherds. I finished a sermon, because I am a master of wood, a sermon for a wooden mosque, I am a master and I am a master with quality. Nezir Mazreku is our cousin and he was the chairman of Milosevic's socialist party, in Opterushe he served as chairman and even if you look at him, you can take him as an alleged collaborator and he has nothing to do with a collaborator, like an unmarried girl telling her mother, mother, mother, son, tell so-and-so a whore, she didn't tell me. The bad shepherd has taken the sheep to the pits of the uk.
"He has a few skills, so he took me and brought me here often to go out and do... with honor, I'll tell you. I've never had anyone kiss my hand, women kiss my hand, I'm bored."
Prosecutor: Enough, enough.
The prosecutor tries to stop the ridiculous statements. But it doesn't end there. Ordinary confessions have no limits...
"Yes, they are talking about two wooden horses, I stole them in the mountains, I cut the saw off the horse once and I loaded it with wood, they didn't have a harness, they didn't want me like dawn, they didn't have me dressed, they thought I was a poor walker, they didn't have anything anyone wanted. They milked the land like a donkey, they stole the cows in the municipality of Kacanik, they lost the cows without any marks. They also stole my donkey and a cow."
"This court deals with those people that someone has infiltrated in Kosovo. This court is very harmful to us. Hashim Thaçi is not being punished there, nor Kadri Veseli, nor Jakup Krasniqi, nor Rexhep Selimi, nor Salih Mustafa nor Pjetër Shala, the KLA is being punished there, the state of Kosovo is being punished there. The indictment is a joint criminal organization. This is the biggest fatality that has happened in Albanian history," said Hysni Gucati, Organization of War Veterans, KLA
"The Serbian courts in Kosovo acted similarly at that time," said Hysni Gucati, of the KLA War Veterans Organization.