What, precisely, is on trial in The Hague?
The prosecution does not criminalise the KLA or Kosovo's independence struggle. It asks whether Hashim Thaçi bears personal responsibility for crimes allegedly committed during wartime.
That question has lingered over Kosovo since the first indictments were announced by the Kosovo Specialist Chambers. It has divided families, fractured political discourse and fuelled a debate that too often mistakes emotion for law. For many Kosovars, the prosecution of Hashim Thaçi is inseparable from the story of the Kosovo Liberation Army, the armed struggle that emerged after nearly a decade of systematic repression under Serbian rule. To others, the proceedings represent an overdue attempt to establish whether crimes were committed against civilians by individuals who, despite fighting for a cause widely regarded as just, remained bound by the laws of war.
These are not the same question.
Whether Kosovo’s war for liberation was legitimate is one matter. Whether individual members of the KLA committed crimes during that conflict, and whether particular commanders bear criminal responsibility for those crimes, is another entirely. International humanitarian law has long drawn a del…
