Statement by Prime Minister Edi Rama

I am on my way to The Hague, where after some time since our previous meeting I will meet the Commander of the Kosovo Liberation Army, the President of the Republic of Kosovo, who was taken from his office and has now been held hostage for years in a cell of so called international justice, to the great shame of all those who sponsor that kind of justice, where violations of standards, violations of human rights, and violations of all norms of due legal process are in fact the only norm that has characterized this farce. We have a democratically elected president, together with three fellow fighters who held some of the most important responsibilities in the Republic of Kosovo, kept locked up and isolated, even though they have not been convicted.

Now that the presentation of the prosecution’s pseudo evidence has ended, and the parade of ridiculous witnesses brought into the courtroom by the prosecution has also ended, as well as the very serious testimonies of the defense witnesses, the decision is awaited.

I wish, I hope, I pray that the coming year will be the year when the curtain finally falls on this absurd theater of international justice and when Hashim Thaçi and his three fellow fighters are released from their brutal isolation.

I wish and hope that the democratic countries sponsoring this court will reflect on the low standards, on the level far below the red lines of democratic justice, of everything that for years has been happening to people whose only fault is that they rebelled against a satrap regime, whose only fault is that they took up arms to defend their freedom, to defend their human dignity, to defend their undeniable right to live as equal human beings on this land under the same sun, and not as a social group violated because of its ethnicity under a dictatorship.

This is the truth, and no one can damage this truth, let alone the absurd gavel of an international justice system which, in this case, has completely disgraced itself, as we would say plainly in Albanian.

I very much want to believe that in the end justice will prevail. There are not two or three versions of justice here. There is only one justice, eternally sanctified by the blood of heroes and martyrs, by the indescribable pain of mothers, sisters, wives, and daughters who were raped and mutilated during one of the darkest periods for Europe itself, in the heart of Europe.

On the other hand, I am very pleased to say that last night we concluded an EU Western Balkans summit that was encouraging and successful, certainly for Albania, but also for Kosovo, since we are on this topic. In all fairness, I want to say that the President of Kosovo truly shone. She shone with convincing words, but also as the result of persistent work and good coordination that we have carried out in recent weeks. Without wanting to take any credit here, this has led to finally unblocking all those funds that had been frozen for some time by the EU.

Albania is in conditions such as we have never been before. We are maximally respected, maximally appreciated, and maximally welcomed in the temple of European politics in Brussels. My stance there has been exactly as you know it, and the way I have upheld that stance has been exactly as you know it: direct, straightforward. As I have told and continue to tell my friends and colleagues in the EU, I say what I think, and then I do what they say, in the sense that we do our homework properly, because we know very well that through that homework we will become part of the EU.

At the same time, we speak openly, directly, face to face, without any complexes, as equals among equals, and this has increased our value, I would say, at these tables.

I emphasized that the opening of all chapters is an encouragement for us. I reiterated the necessity for the Commission and the EU to stand by the agreement to close negotiations by 2027. I reiterated my view that politically our accession, and that of the other Western Balkan countries, must be accelerated. I assured them that we will continue modernizing reforms and continue our efforts in tackling the problems they are particularly keen and accustomed to summarizing under the fight against organized crime and corruption. But it is not only that. It is much more than that, much more complex than that. And I am extremely pleased to tell you that once again, without modesty, I honored you.