Thaci: Man of war and peace

This is how the prestigious American newspaper New York Times makes a description of the 45-year-old Prime Minister of Kosovo in an article dedicated to him.

“In June he agreed to put in place a landmark power-sharing agreement with Serbia that is being hailed in Europe and the United States as a triumph of peace and reconciliation in the region after the Balkan wars of the 1990s, in which about 120,000 people died, more than 10,000 of them in Kosovo.”

“Mr. Thaci is being hailed in Washington and Brussels as the Gerry Adams of the Balkans, his country on the road toward Europe, his name even invoked, however improbably, as a possible Nobel Peace Prize candidate”, the article continues.

The United States prestigious newspaper refers to the most important moments of Thaci’s life, such as the childhood, the resistance against the Serbs and his decision to join the KLA.

“An athletic and lanky man with a vise-grip handshake, Mr. Thaci, the seventh of nine children, comes from a family of farmers in the Drenica region of Kosovo, the heartland of Albanian resistance to the Serbs.”

“He later went underground to join the Kosovo Liberation Army. While some, like Kosovo’s first president, Ibrahim Rugova, favored Gandhian passive resistance, Mr. Thaci was a forceful advocate of armed struggle. “The Serbian regime would not be pacified by smiles and hugs,” he said, according to NYT.

“At the NATO-sponsored peace talks in Rambouillet, France, early in 1999, Mr. Thaci made a strong impression on Madeleine K. Albright, the United States secretary of state. He proved to be a pragmatist, signing a compromise deal that fell short of guaranteeing Kosovo’s independence. The talks eventually collapsed when Belgrade refused to withdraw all of its military forces, prompting NATO’s bombing campaign”, the article continues

“Yet the past keeps coming back to haunt him. In 2010, a Council of Europe report accused Mr. Thaci of having led a “mafialike” group that smuggled weapons, heroin and human organs during the war and its aftermath. Mr. Thaci has rejected those accusations as well, and the Kosovo government at the time called them “despicable.” In August 2011, the European Union set up a special task force to investigate the veracity of organ-trafficking claims, including whether or not Mr. Thaci was involved. It has not yet delivered its findings”, says the prestigious NYT.

According to the article, “when Thaci was asked about the accusations, including that Kosovar Albanians kidnapped Serbs during the war and harvested their kidneys at a secret “yellow house” in Albania, Mr. Thaci transformed his grin into a grimace.

“Something like that never happened; we have nothing to hide,” he said. “The earlier the issue is clear, the better it is for Kosovo. It is really a very heavy burden for us, and we believe in truth and justice,” he said.

The article says that Mr.Thaci said his wartime experience had taught him to keep his patience during six months of 12-hour-a-day talks this year when he faced his former foe, Prime Minister Ivica Dacic of Serbia. Mr. Dacic was the wartime spokesman of the former Serbian strongman Slobodan Milosevic, whose forces had tried, without success, to hunt down and kill Mr. Thaci.

“It wasn’t easy to sit opposite one another at the table, two former sworn enemies,” Mr. Thaci said for NYT, recalling his first awkward handshake with Mr. Dacic. But he said pragmatism had ultimately prevailed. Being celebrated at home as a former soldier also helped.

“Although he has been widely credited with shepherding Kosovo toward independence — Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. has called him the “George Washington of Kosovo” — his government has also faced repeated accusations of rampant corruption. In May, he suffered another blow when a European Union court here ordered the arrest of seven former K.L.A. commanders accused of war crimes, including two former close aides”, says the article of NYT.

Mr. Thaci insists that he and his fellow soldiers were freedom fighters. He quoted the lyrics of a favorite Sting song he said he had listened to as a young guerrilla leader.

“Duhet më shumë se uniforma për të krijuar një burrë, është më shumë se liçensa për armën. Perballuni me armiqtë, shmangini kur mundeni. Një zotëri do të ecë, nuk do t’ia mbathë kurrë”.

“Takes more than combat gear to make a man. Takes more than a license for a gun. Confront your enemies, avoid them when you can. A gentleman will walk but never run”, the NYT article concludes.

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