The former boss of the Albanian opposition leader has “categorically” denied the suggestions that Lulzim Basha might have been involved in investigations during his time with the UN Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK), 2001-2002.
“I am reluctant to enter into the political fray in Albania but suggestions that Luli Basha was involved in the investigation of organ trafficking allegations are just categorically untrue,” John Clint Williamson stated in an interview with Albanian ORA News TV on Saturday.
Williamson headed what was practically Kosovo’s ministry of justice in his position as Director of Justice in the UNMIK, from October 2001 until November 2002. Basha worked as his special assistant and legal officer during this time.
Basha worked as a legal officer for UNMIK from 2000 to 2004, and for about a year before that as operations officer for the Tirana Office of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY).
Williamson was a prosecutor with the ICTY from 1994 to 2001. He drafted the indictment against Slobodan Milosevic and other Serbian officials in 1999.
The American official worked for UNMIK in 2001 and 2002, after which he left Kosovo.
In 2011, the EU appointed him as special prosecutor to examine the allegations in the Council of Europe Dick Marty Report about war crimes committed by members of the Kosovo Liberation Army during and the aftermath of the Kosovo war.
In his report three years later, in 2014 Williamson concluded that there were grounds for part of the Marty Report allegations. Together with Marty’s report, Williamson’s report was the basis for the creation of the Kosovo war crimes tribunal in The Hague.
Williamson also excluded Basha’s involvement with his 2014 report, during which time he was the mayor of Tirana: “When I was in Tirana for meetings, I met with him, I think I had dinner with him, but as friends, as former colleagues. He was not involved in any way, he did not have a role at that time, or had anything to do with what we were doing in terms of the investigation. He was not involved either as foreign minister in any sort of judiciary role.”
Asked on the ruling Socialist Party allegation that Basha may have kept video recordings of a massacre in Kosovo away from investigations, Williamson said:
“I haven’t seen that allegation, this is the first time I hear it. I find it very hard to believe.
These cases were investigated by ICTY when I was there, the massacres at Krusha were included in the indictment that I drafted against Slobodan Milosevic in 1999 and other Serbian officials, so those crimes were thoroughly investigated.
This is the very first time I’ve ever heard of any allegations that something was covered up relative to those cases; that was a core part to that indictment.”
