Kosovo tribunal in The Hague sentences former president Hashim Thaçi to 25 years for war crimes
The Kosovo Specialist Chambers found the 58-year-old former guerrilla commander guilty of 96 wartime murders and torture, rejecting defense demands for acquittal after a three-year trial.
Verdict in The Hague
On 16 September 2026, the Kosovo Specialist Chambers in The Hague sentenced former Kosovo President Hashim Thaçi to 25 years in prison following a three-year trial. Presiding judge Charles Smith announced the first-instance verdict against the 58-year-old former political leader and commander. The international judicial panel found Thaçi guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity, specifically holding him responsible for 96 political murders, unlawful detention, persecution, and torture. The prosecution had demanded a 45-year prison sentence for Thaçi, while defense attorneys sought a full acquittal. Thaçi, who had declared himself completely innocent before the court, remained visibly composed during the reading of the sentence. The ruling can be challenged on appeal.
Scope of the charges and trial evidence
The trial, which opened in April 2023, heard testimony from nearly 300 witnesses and included 155 participating victims. Judges determined that Thaçi and three co-defendants formed the upper command tier of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) during the armed conflict between March 1998 and June 1999. In total, the court issued combined sentences exceeding 80 years across the four commanders, with terms for the three co-defendants ranging between 13 and 25 years. The court established that KLA units held hundreds of individuals in detention sites across Kosovo and northern Albania under inhumane conditions. Those targeted were political rivals, ethnic Serbs, Roma, and Kosovo Albanians accused of collaborating with Serbian security authorities.
- Yugoslav authorities shut Kosovo's regional parliament in Pristina
- Armed conflict escalates and KLA detention sites operate in Kosovo and Albania
- Kosovo declares independence and Thaçi becomes prime minister
- Kosovo Specialist Chambers established under international pressure
- Thaçi resigns as president to surrender to the court in The Hague
- Specialist Chambers open war crimes trial against Thaçi and three co-defendants
- Judges sentence Thaçi to 25 years in prison
Legal mandate and court findings
The proceedings centered on whether the KLA functioned as a loose guerrilla force or a coordinated military body with unified command structures. The judicial panel concluded that the political leadership around Thaçi held near-exclusive decision-making authority over wartime operations. Judge Smith stated during the delivery of the judgment that the tribunal evaluated individual criminal acts rather than the broad political struggle for Kosovo's independence. Smith noted that while Serbian forces had committed crimes against ethnic Albanians during the war, the court's task was strictly confined to the specific indictments brought against the defendants.
In this case, it is not about weighing the responsibility of one side against the other.
Political background and street protests
The Special Court was created in 2015 under international pressure as part of Kosovo's judicial system, but operating in the Netherlands with international prosecutors and judges for security reasons. Thaçi had served as Kosovo's first prime minister after its 2008 declaration of independence, later serving as foreign minister and president before resigning in 2020 to face the indictment. Following the delivery of the verdict, clashes broke out between Dutch police and Thaçi supporters gathered outside the court building in The Hague. In Pristina, demonstrators gathered in public spaces to express solidarity with the four convicted men. Agon Maliqi, an analyst at the Atlantic Council Europe Center, described the ruling as a tectonic event that could lead to political friction between Kosovo and Western governments.
