"Only Belgrade can withdraw arrest warrant for Haradinaj"

Interpol cannot cancel the notice for Ramush Haradinaj, because it was issued on the order of the War Crime Department of the Higher Court in Belgrade.

SOURCE: B92, TANJUG, SRBIJA.GOV.RS MONDAY, DECEMBER 4, 2017 |

Ramush Haradinaj (EPA, file)
The Serbian arrest warrant is still in force, Tanjug was told at the Ministry of Justice.

The Ministry stressed that Interpol can only "obscure" the notice so that it is visible only to its members - as is now the case with Haradinaj.

However, the warrant for the arrest of the current Kosovo prime minister, who is suspected of committing the gravest war crimes, remains in force, as does an investigation against him that is ongoing, the agency was told.

Earlier, the Serbian government announced that the Ministry of the Interior will send an initiative to the Ministry of Justice and the Prosecutor's Office for War Crimes to make a joint appeal against Interpol's move, concerning Haradinaj and 17 more persons issued by Serbia for war crimes.

According to a statement by the Ministry of the Interior, the Commission for the control of international arrest warrants in Lyon adopted the appeal of UNMIK and on December 1 decided that Interpol "will no longer process these arrest warrants and will delete them from the system."

Competent officials from the Ministry of the Interior are already examining details of this decision and the Ministry will send an initiative to the Ministry of Justice and the Prosecutor's Office for War Crimes to jointly prepare Serbia's response, the government said.

Later, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Interior Nebojsa Stefanovic said that Haradinaj will be arrested in case he is available to the Serbian prosecution authorities, and that this is true because there is an arrest warrant of the Serbian court against him that is in force.

In a statement to Radio Television Serbia (RTS), Stefanovic said that Serbia will ask Interpol to review its decision, and expressed hope that Serbia will again have an active arrest warrant which will be visible in every country in the world.

The minister said that Serbia, because of all the Serbian victims and all those who were killed by the actions of Haradinaj and the crimes he committed, must not remain silent and must never turn a deaf ear to such kind of demands.

"I intend to propose to the justice minister to renew our appeal on Monday and to remind the Interpol headquarters in Lyon why the arrest warrant for Ramush Haradinaj had been issued," Stefanovic said.

According to him, in addition to all procedural reasons, the appeal will also state the real reasons why it is impossible to withdraw that arrest warrant.