'I like your style!'
Hashim Thaçi is identified as the boss of a network that began operating criminal rackets in the run-up to the 1998-99 Kosovo war, and has held powerful sway over the country's government since.
The report of the two-year inquiry, which cites FBI and other intelligence sources, has been obtained by the Guardian. It names Thaçi as having over the last decade exerted "violent control" over the heroin trade. Figures from Thaçi's inner circle are also accused of taking captives across the border into Albania after the war, where a number of Serbs are said to have been murdered for their kidneys, which were sold on the black market.
Legal proceedings began in a Pristina district court today into a case of alleged organ trafficking discovered by police in 2008. That case - in which organs are said to have been taken from impoverished victims at a clinic known as Medicus - is said by the report to be linked to Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) organ harvesting in 2000. It comes at a crucial period for Kosovo, which on Sunday held its first elections since declaring independence from Serbia in 2008. Thaçi claimed victory in the election and has been seeking to form a coalition with opposition parties.
Comment: You can read Marty's full report here.
Thaçi is still the heroin/organ don he was 10 and 15 years ago, and he's still the 'democratically-elected leader of the democratically-carved-out-of-Serbia statelet of Kosovo' (which is effectively a lawless province of Albania)... and will soon become an EU country, where it can join Eurocrats in lecturing others on their wayward morals...