American Council for Kosovo - Organized Crime in Kosovo

Kosovo and the EU's missing millions

There's a breaking story just about to go online about the alleged serious fraud and corruption swirling around the millions the European Union pumped into Kosovo just after the war ten years ago.

Internal documents - click here for a blog world exclusive - show that at least GBP62.3 million was pretty severely compromised in two key economic projects, funded by the EU and supervised by the United Nations.

The UN Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) ran the protectorate from 1999 to 2008 following the controversial Nato intervention there.

The EU has not covered itself with glory: Kosovo has "supervised independence" (a nasty colonial oxymoron) and divided European countries have fudged its future.

As can be seen by the documents, cash and projects that should have helped the people lined the pockets of crooks, cronies and dodgy officials.

Under Kosovo's "supervised independence" it now appears that this money has disappeared raising all kinds of questions about the growing trend of having unaccountable organisations running countries.

The European Commission has been left on the sidelines.

"The Commission continues to raise these concerns with the Kosovo authorities and demand that they clarify the steps they have taken," a spokesman told me rather plaintively.

For once, the European Parliament is doing the right thing with a threat to block EU cash for the UN unless there is proper oversight and accounting for the money is spent.

"Parliament must have assurance evidence in order to be able to accept channelling about a thousand million euros on a yearly basis to international organisations," says the confidential letter to the European Commission.

The parliament's budgetary control committee is demanding that the commission halts funding to UN projects which do not hand over accounts to European auditors.

"We urge the commission in future not to finance where there is doubt regarding the existence of such structures and procedures," says the letter.

As the European Parliament notes, UN mismanagement is case of bad politics and murky accountability.

Should we be putting the destinies of regions and people in the hands of people who can not even be trusted with the simple financial administration of public money?

Kosovo�s affairs & the "Narco-statehood"

The strongest passion in the world is jealousy, but the sweetest is revenge.
An old Cossack saying

Do not envy a sinner; you don't know what disaster awaits him.
Bible

Kosovo's independence proclamation by the Albanian secessionist administration in Pristina in February 2008, follows a course that was drafted back in March 1999 when NATO started a war against the then Yugoslavia and more specifically against Serbia, who at that time composed more than 90% of Yugoslavia.

Although a decade has passed and numerous efforts have been made by the international authorities, along with a tremendous cash-flow of aid; Kosovo is viewed as a region that is under the tight grip of organized crime and corruption which spans through he entire social and political sphere.

This article examines the situation in Kosovo in relation to the dependence of the region with drug trafficking.

In Kosovo, the main managers of illicit drugs are the so-called �15 families� which represent the core power of the state, because of their financial clout and political connections. Reports by the German intelligence service in 2005, described the former Prime Minister of Kosovo Ramous Haradinaj as related �in drug trafficking, extortion and protection business�. The German authorities found �The interdependence of the political leadership in Pristina organized crime and the latter's desire to prevent the formation of a stable political climate, to constantly monitor the government�. Finally the Germans analysts warned for �serious risks from the ongoing corruption in Kosovo in relation to other Balkan countries and the security of the region�.

The EU report in 2007, underlines the �inability of local officials to put pressure on criminal organizations and the serious risk of collapse of the social system because of the crime issue�. The main reason is �The lack of political will by the leadership�, which paradoxically it is fanatically supported by most major European countries. The German report specifically mentioned the name Niam Behzloulzi, a Kosovo smuggler and number two in the hierarchy of the former UCK, and a possible explosives supplier �In London and Madrid attacks�. American journalist John Gizzi confirmed that information and added that �The origin of the ammunition of these terrorist acts was Kosovo�.

The Italian newspaper La Republica in a research on the situation in the region, states for the Kosovo criminals, of their ability to fully exploit the lack of �political culture� in the region and affect every key decision over and above the international force which does not control the situation. The current leadership under Hashim Thaci is to emerge from the unholy alliance of traffickers in the region and the UCK. Michel Koutouzis, an expert analyst on security issues in Paris has long confirmed that the Pristina government has always been � subject to the power of the Mafiosi who were the largest donors of the KLA rebels and want to keep the region in their own sphere of influence�.

The former Commander of KFOR, the Italian General Fabio Mini, said in late February 2008 in the newspaper Corriere dela Serra, that �Kosovo will become the new location for the laundering of black money coming from the East and new financial institutions will be created that will take this role �. Similar reports have been made by the Canadian General Mackenzie, who served in Bosnia as peacekeeper official and has dealt closely with the situation in the Balkans over the last decade.

Reliable and highly informed sources at the Institute for European Policy, based in Germany, in a 2007 last report, commissioned for the German Armed Forces, indicated that the three leading Kosovo politicians, Ramush Haradinaj, Hashim Thaci and Xhavit Haliti are �Persons protected by the international community although they are deeply involved in all of these affairs�. It is important to mention at this point that the former commander of UNMIK Soeren Jessen Petersen has maintained close contacts with the aforementioned politicians and the German report states that the UN contacts with Albanian politicians was part of the overall problem for the region.

Local sources, including U.S. military personnel, indicate that at least 90% of the local economy derives from criminal networks -bar Diaspora remittances- and the society is unable to adapt into the conditions of free and legal market because of the dramatic social consequences that will entail. Today, unemployment is estimated at 50% of the population which grows with 35,000 births per year, more than three times the average Western European rate. The explosive mixture of crime, lack of employment opportunities and a significant youth segment in comparison with the total population is a ticking bomb that will explode in the not-so-distant future.

A very important report of the United Nations in 2006 in collaboration with the Ministries of Foreign Affairs of Britain, Netherlands, USA and Sweden revealed that �The people of Kosovo find as main threats to themselves corruption and organized crime� as well as the very likely possibility of a �Full seizure of the state institutions by criminals�.

Moreover an issue directly associated with the European security architecture is the strong collaboration between Turkish, Kosovo and Middle Eastern narcotics smugglers. Already in 2000, according to Interpol Kosovo criminals, money laundered their illicit profits of 2 billion Euros through more than 200 banks. The current data show much higher earnings and this without considering the investments in the building sector, the purchase of shares and other activities.

Marko Nicovic, the former Chief of Police in Belgrade and a recognized Balkan crime analyst notes that �About 500 Kosovo Albanians assume transport of 20 kilos of heroin across to Europe, while another 5,000 Albanians deal with lesser quantities�. In a Pan-European level perhaps two-thirds of the heroin sold in the streets it is being distributed by Albanian criminal syndicates which are mostly established in Kosovo.

Further another crucial element is the existence of a strong Albanian-American lobby in the U.S. East Coast which is interlinked with the still powerful American-Italian Mafia and quite a few mainstream politicians and bureaucrats. This lobby is also a small part of the wider nexus between Pakistan-Saudi Arabia-Turkey business lobbies n Washington that have managed to pursue high politics mainly in the Pentagon and the State Department through the use of retired American Generals and diplomats, attaining great influence even at the expense of the national interests of the USA.

In addition, the American continent presents another point of interest and this is the dimension of Colombia. For the past five years the Kosovo Albanians have taken over much of the cocaine imports to Europe and have forged ties with the Colombian cartels. This trend will strengthen as it appears because of the internal infight within the Kalabrian N' Dragheta groups.

The attitude of the international community and particularly the U.S. in all these developments has caused widespread criticism. According to the U.S. law, "US Foreign Assistance Act of 1961", aid is prohibited to any country or organization that it is involved in drug trafficking. It is noteworthy to emphasize the involvement of the DEA at this point. Until March 1999 it followed a clear-cut policy of repression against the Kosovo related drug crime, but a month before the NATO bombing it pulled down from its own website references connected to Kosovo.

According to Alain Labrousse, a former director of the International narcotics Observatory, �The DEA was found at a very difficult position at this point�. In fact the anti-drug policy was subject to political machinations and that was a significant blow towards any combat of organized crime in the Balkans.

The smuggling of weapons from Kosovo is still a dangerous phenomenon that involves other countries. Part of the surplus of weapons and explosives when the 1999 UCK fighting stopped, found their way to Chechnya through Turkey with the help of the Islamic organization Kvadrat, which maintained bases in Bosnia. There are also quite a few sources that point out towards weapons smuggling from Kosovo to Iraq in order to arm Iraqi guerillas after 2003.

Also, the attack on the American Embassy in Athens-Greece on 12/01/07, had a Kosovo connection, since Greek Police circles and journalists at that time, confirmed to the press that the RPG that hit the target was originally from the triangle Pristina-Kukes-Tetovo. Finally, the attack in London in July 2005 with semtex explosives was according to many sources attributed to Kosovo weapons smugglers that sold these types of plastic explosives. There are similar references for the Madrid bombings as well and in both cases the role of Bosnia is highlighted also.

The direct relationship between the Kosovo Mafia and Islamic terrorism was made explicitly visible in September 2006 when the Pakistani national Arfan Qadeer Bhatti, was arrested in Oslo-Norway trying to blow up the Israeli and the American Embassies there. He had visited several times Pristina and met with Princ Dobrosi, a well connected on political terms drug merchant in Kosovo. The American analyst on terrorism and author, Burr, described that NATO forces in Afghanistan have retrieved Taliban satellite phones in hideouts inside mountain caves. After technical examination it was revealed that those Afghani fighters had called repeatedly numbers in Kosovo over the past few years.

The authoritative analyst on security Michel Chossudovsky says that �Drenica-Group founded by Thaci controls about 10-15% of all criminal activities in the country�. References have been made in previous years by the media and organizations like Heritage Foundation, Christian Science Monitor, Washington Times, and BBC. In fact there has been such a detailed account of the role of the Kosovo mafia in the transnational organized crime, that it is incomprehensible that decisive action has not been taken yet to counter this "asymmetrical threat".

The main assumption that can be concluded is that Kosovo is in a very delicate position regarding its role as a European crime hub and that the efforts of the international community over the past decade have been on the wrong direction. Gradually it is becoming more evident that the declaration of independence does not serve the interests of the majority of the UN member states and another resolution is needed before Kosovo becomes a failed "Non-state".

Dissident factions 'have built up massive arsenal'

Fears that groups are equipped to carry out another Omagh style attack are heightened

Dissident republican groups who carried out recent murders in Northern Ireland have built up an extensive supply of weapons from eastern Europe, according to the intelligence services. It is now feared their capability to make large bombs, similar to the one that killed 29 people in Omagh in 1998, has been underestimated.

Senior figures in the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) and garda headquarters now fear that the Continuity IRA (CIRA), the Real IRA (RIRA) and Oglaigh na hEireann (ONH), a faction of the RIRA, have the means to mount a sustained terrorist campaign.

The weapons include AK-47 assault rifles, machine-guns and small arms. The groups, which murdered two British soldiers and a police officer two weeks ago, also have access to plastic explosives.

Of the three groups, ONH poses the most significant threat, according to the intelligence services. "It has at least one active service unit which is capable of constructing large car bombs," said one security source. "It is better organised than previously thought and is structured to avoid infiltration by informers."

The RIRA is believed to have built up a sizable arsenal since 2006 and is continuing to source weapons. It has bought guns from dealers in Tirana, the Albanian capital.

Crime and Security, the garda's spying agency, believes the weapons, purchased for as little as $5 (�3.50) each, were smuggled in small quantities over the past three years. Gardai believe some weapons were stolen from the Albanian defence forces but others were obtained from former members of the Kosovo Liberation Army.

ONH is understood to possess a similar array of weapons, including rocket-launchers and AK-47s. These are thought to be held in arms dumps in Armagh, Tyrone, north Dublin, Meath and Louth. It also retains some arms imported from the Balkans in 2000.

Like the RIRA, ONH has imported several consignments of weapons thought to have been obtained through contacts in Amsterdam.

The CIRA has not organised any significant arms smuggling, according to security sources, but it has a "limited" military capability.

"RIRA and ONH are buying weapons, sometimes two pieces at a time, through third parties," said a security source. "While they haven't hundreds of guns, they have enough to sustain a terrorist campaign for the foreseeable future."

Ex-IRA man is gun suspect

A former IRA bomb-maker is among the suspects for the murder of Liam Murray, the mechanic found shot dead at his home in Rathfarnham in south Dublin on Friday morning.

The 42-year-old was in a long-running dispute with the former terrorist over a business deal, according to gardai. The suspect was released from prison under the Good Friday agreement, having been sentenced by a British court for taking part in a bombing campaign.

Gardai are also looking at whether Murray died as the result of a pub brawl. He had been in several bar fights in recent weeks.

Gardai suspect he was shot in his bed by a hitman, possibly while he slept. A source said: "Murders don't get more professional and cold-blooded than that."

Switzerland: Ethnic Albanians keep a grip on heroin supply

Ethnic Albanian criminal gangs continue to pose a serious security threat, dominating the transit and supply of heroin to Switzerland, warns a federal police expert.

Three members of the same Kosovo family are currently on trial in Switzerland accused of operating one of Europe's largest heroin wholesale operations.

Prosecutors say the 69-year-old father and his two sons, aged 42 and 28, used their base in the southeast European country to import 1.5 tons of heroin from Turkey for sale elsewhere.

"[The clan] has been one of the principle suppliers of heroin in western Europe since the middle of the 90s," the prosecution claimed. The defendants deny all charges.

They went on trial in Switzerland because the brothers lived and worked there. A verdict by the Federal Penal Court in Bellinzona is expected at the end of October.

According to Roger Flury, an illegal drugs expert at the Federal Police Office, the seizure was very significant, even though it was split between different countries.

"1,500 kg - that's between 25 to 50 percent of what people consume in Switzerland in one year," he told swissinfo.

Significant threat

In its 2007 internal security report published in July the federal police said that "criminal organizations from southeastern Europe" played a "significant role" in Switzerland.

These internationally interlinked groups were involved in numerous criminal activities including drug and human trafficking, migrant smuggling, extortion, prostitution and money laundering, it stated.

According to the Vienna-based United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Switzerland has historically been singled out as one of the countries most affected by ethnic Albanian heroin trafficking, due to the large expatriate population.

There were an estimated 94,000 Albanian-speakers in Switzerland in 2000. In the late 1990s, Albanians were blamed for trafficking some 70 to 90 percent of Switzerland's heroin supply into the country.

"The influence of ethnic Albanian criminal groups is still very strong, especially in the heroin market, and it's not abating," said Flury. "The vast majority of heroin sold in Switzerland still transits via ethnic Albanian groups."

Other criminal groups involved in the trade in Switzerland are from Turkey, Croatia, Serbia West Africa and Iraq, he added.

But Theodore Leggett, author of a UNODC report entitled "Crime and its impact on the Balkans," felt the importance of ethnic Albanian criminal gangs was waning.

"They had a period of unprecedented access to European markets in the 1990s and early 2000s and took advantage of that, and others took advantage of them, but stopping speedboat traffic to Italy had a big effect. I don't think they're competitive [in the] long term," he told swissinfo.

Ethnic Albanian criminal gangs built up a reputation as effective traffickers as they were violent and clannish with a language nobody else could understand and had an honor code similar to the Sicilian mafia, explained Leggett.

"But I don't think this makes for a very competitive drug trafficking group in the long term, as violence attracts unwanted attention. What tends to happen with these Albanian crime groups is that they build up to a certain level, then they shoot each other over an honor issue, which undermines their place in the market."

Balkan route

Southeastern Europe lies along the most conventional route - the so-called Balkan route - between the supplier of some 82 percent of the world's heroin, Afghanistan, and its most lucrative consumer market, western Europe.

Today the Balkan route has split in three � a northern path (Afghanistan-Pakistan/Iran-Turkey-Bulgaria-Romania-Hungary), a central, original path (Afghanistan-Pakistan/Iran-Turkey-Bulgaria-Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia/Serbia-Bosnia and Herzegovina-Croatia-Slovenia-Italy) and a southern route (Afghanistan-Pakistan/Iran-Turkey-Bulgaria-Macedonia-Kosovo-Albania-Italy).

It is estimated that about 100 tonnes of heroin crosses southeastern Europe every year on its way to western Europe, of which 85 tons eventually makes it to the consumer, a flow estimated at US$25-30 billion, says UNODC.

Switzerland has a small domestic market. It's not a traditional redistribution point, like the Netherlands, but more a transit country, with traffickers taking advantage of the land and air connections.

"The Swiss police are quite good in stopping the stuff and make a lot of seizures, but it continues to be a place that a lot of traffickers favor," said Leggett.

Despite a stabilization in the world drugs market, in June the UN sounded the alarm about the recent surge in drug supply from Afghanistan, which may drive addiction rates up.

"We don't know exactly where this surge in heroin supply is headed. There's a belief that it's being stockpiled � getting banked," said Leggett.

But according to the Swiss police, Switzerland is already feeling this increase. Consumption is stable in Switzerland, but with decreasing prices and increasing purity levels, which are worrying indicators," confirmed Flury.

In 2007 seizures of heroin by Swiss police rose to 300kg from 230kg in 2006.

The Slow Birth of a Nation

Two months after Kosovo declared independence, thousands of foreign experts are ready to descend on its capital to shape Europe's youngest republic into a constitutional state -- although its status is still disputed. Soon the EU will take over, and its team can expect a country ruled by corruption and organized crime.

It's 8 p.m., and Joachim R�cker, the highest-ranking representative of the United Nations in Pristina, is heading out for a bite to eat. Past Bill Clinton Boulevard, past three mosques, R�cker's Japanese jeep zigzags through the darkened city. His Albanian bodyguards, speaking English, constantly rattle off the vehicle's coordinates into their radio.

But where, exactly, is R�cker? What country is he in?

According to international law, Pristina, the capital of Kosovo, still belongs to Serbian territory. R�cker's boss at UN headquarters in New York, Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, has not said anything new to the contrary. Under UN Resolution 1244, adopted in 1999, Kosovo was placed under an interim UN administration, after enduring a 16-month war that claimed about 10,000 lives. The resolution makes no mention of Kosovo's right to secede from Serbia.

On the other hand, Kosovo unilaterally declared independence on Feb. 17. More than three dozen countries worldwide -- including the United States and Germany -- have recognized the tiny republic, whose population is 90 percent ethnic Albanian. There are now signs with the words "Republic of Kosovo" along the southern border and Kosovar customs officers at the Pristina airport.

But in the north and in the Serbian enclaves south of the Ibar River, separate elections will probably take place on May 11 -- for the Serbian parliament in Belgrade and for the local Serb government. Here, in the shadow of medieval monasteries, time seems to stand still. The Serbian dinar is the standard currency here, and wages, food and political directives come straight from Belgrade.

Kosovo's situation is complex. Two countries claim a territory that is about one and a half times the size of the US state Rhode Island (and has about the same population density). In the middle, acting as a UN referee in a diplomatic minefield, sits Joachim R�cker, 56, the former mayor of the small southwestern German city of Sindelfingen. At the request of the UN Secretary General and in response to pressure from Russia, R�cker is expected to continue behaving as if nothing had happened, as if Serbia's national borders had remained unchanged.

He's returning from a reception held by the newly appointed German ambassador in Pristina. Strictly speaking, according to diplomatic protocol, R�cker had no business there -- as the supreme UN administrator in Serbia's southwestern province. But he calls Kosovo's hermaphroditic condition "cohabitation," and manages to find complicated language to describe the future of this torn region.

In June, administrative duties are expected to change hands from the UN to the European Union, which plans to send 2,200 judges, prosecutors, police officers and customs officials to Pristina. But without the approval of the Russians and the Chinese in the Security Council, the UN will hardly be able to slip quietly out of Kosovo. Instead, says R�cker, it will have to maintain its presence, and its mission, "while keeping its status neutral." The UN will have to "reconfigure" itself and emphasize the "discontinuity" between the EU and UN mandates.

The UN will stay in Kosovo, in other words, and discreetly phase out its presence, hoping for a change of course in Moscow, Beijing and Belgrade -- so that the skirmishes over Europe's youngest state don't turn into a full-blown war.

For now, at least, life is still relatively good in Pristina. The penne arrabiata and chocolate tarts at "Il Passatore," an Italian trattoria, are exceptional. R�cker seems pleased as he leaves the restaurant.

Elephants at the Watering Hole

The UN's Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) is the largest show of strength in the history of the world body. R�cker has led it since 2006. The multinational administrators oversee everything -- government, police, judiciary, customs, the economy. The goal of the now nine-year operation is to transform Yugoslavia's former poorhouse into a home for more than two million people that deserves to be called a constitutional state.

The UN has the active support of the EU, NATO and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), each represented by its own substantial battalion in Kosovo, as well as several hundred non-governmental organizations. Like elephants at a watering hole, the giants of the global peacemaking trade huddle in this disputed corner of Europe and naturally step, now and then, all over each other's toes.

Kosovo's foreign rulers -- especially the French, Americans and Germans -- are wrestling for billions in reconstruction contracts, for key positions in the new government and for influence over the Kosovar parties and clan leaders. The region is awash with intelligence agents and soldiers of fortune, idealists and professional adventurers. This constellation could, of course, hinder the planned birth of democracy here, rather than help it.

The UN has spent an estimated �33 billion ($53 billion) for its mission in Kosovo since 1999, when a NATO bombing campaign drove out former Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic's murderous troops. This corresponds to �1,750 ($2,800) per capita, annually -- or 160 times the average yearly per capita aid for all developing countries combined.

Nevertheless, UNMIK isn't wanted by everyone here. The streets to UNMIK headquarters in Pristina have been known to be blocked by protest banners reading: "No access. Criminal zone." Stickers are affixed to some traffic lights in the city, displaying "No to EUMIK" when the lights are red and "Independence" when they turn green. At the Strip Depot caf�, a philosopher called Shkelzen Maliqi, surrounded by disciples lounging on couches, jokes: "Kosovo is a bastard country. You fathered it, and now it's your job to care for it."

Officially, close to half of Kosovo's residents live on less than �3 ($4.80) a day. Kosovo's per capita gross national product is lower than that of North Korea or Papua New Guinea. It has one of the worst balances of trade worldwide and Europe's highest fertility rate. Youth unemployment hovers at 75 percent.

But as long as Albania's young people, equipped with their bulky sunglasses and tiny mobile phones, can camp out in all of Pristina's caf�s before the third call of the muezzin, poverty alone won't explain the local population's growing discomfort with the international presence. Studies by scientists, intelligence services and EU panels seek to examine the deeper-seated reasons for this phenomenon.

These Kosovo analysts have one thing in common: They paint a picture of a clan-based society in which a handful of criminal leaders controls the population -- and are tolerated by bureaucrats from Europe and the rest of the world, who have come here under the guise of enlightening the Kosovars.

'Leading Political and Criminal Figures'

The international community and its representatives in Kosovo bear a significant share of responsibility for the alarming proliferation of Mafia-like structures in Kosovo. As a result of their open support for leading political and criminal figures, they have harmed the credibility of international institutions in numerous ways. (From a study by the Institute for European Politics in Berlin, completed for the German military, the Bundeswehr, in 2007)

UN special envoy R�cker wants nothing to do with "leading political and criminal figures," at least not as long as they've been convicted by a court of law. But not one of the former heroes of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) guerilla force -- who liberated Kosovo in their battle with Serbian troops -- has so far been sentenced. Now they control Kosovo's politics and economy.

Ramush Haradinaj is a former KLA commander who later became prime minister of UN-administered Kosovo. His indictment in The Hague consisted of 37 charges, including murder, torture, rape and the expulsion of Serbs, Albanians and gypsies in the weeks following the end of the war in 1999. Carla Del Ponte, former chief prosecutor of the UN War Crimes Tribunal, called him a "gangster in uniform." He returned to Kosovo this spring, after his acquittal on April 3.

Haradinaj received a hero's welcome, complete with pistol shots and motorcades through a sea of Albanian flags. But there was also an announcement from UNMIK referring to reservations from The Hague: "The court was under the strong impression that witnesses in this trial did not feel safe."

Steven Schook, R�cker's American deputy at UNMIK's fortress-like headquarters in Pristina, was already out of office by then. The former American brigadier general said he left because he loved his job too much, but that wasn't the real reason. It also wasn't because of his supposed weakness for beautiful Kosovar women, or because he considered it useful to "get drunk with Ramush Haradinaj once a week," as described in a German situation analysis.

No, Steven Schook's contract was officially "not extended" after the UN's Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS) investigated his administration and looked into (unproven) reports that the American had revealed the whereabouts of a man who had testified against Haradinaj. The man was living under a UN witness protection program.

Even before that, though, Schook's boss at UNMIK -- R�cker -- had given Haradinaj an exceptional private audience before his departure to a prison cell in The Hague. R�cker still insists this treatment was justified for a political alpha dog. "It's a completely normal order of business for a former prime minister and party chairman to pay me a visit before embarking on a longer journey."

As a result of his suspended sentence, Haradinaj's "longer journey" ended up being shorter than expected. During the trial he was even permitted to run as a candidate in the elections for the Kosovar parliament -- with UNMIK's blessing. Because of Haradinaj's background, this attracted attention far beyond the borders of his native region.

Wanting to be Boss

The family clan structure in the Decani region from which Haradinaj derives his power is involved in a wide range of criminal, political and military activities that greatly influence the security situation throughout Kosovo. The group consists of about 100 members, and deals in the drug and weapons smuggling business, as well as in the illegal trade in dutiable goods. (From a 2005 report by the Bundesnachrichtendienst, Germany's foreign intelligence agency)

These charges weren't brought up in The Hague. But now that Haradinaj, dressed in a suit and tie, has returned to the political arena, he can call for new elections and consider himself officially confirmed as the guiding figure of an independent Kosovo. The need for politicians with an untarnished name in Kosovo has grown considerably -- because according to a study completed last year, "mafia boss" is the most commonly cited dream profession among children in and around Pristina.

More Greed Than Pioneer Spirit

It's estimated that 20 percent of Kosovars are illiterate, while more than 90 percent have a minimal education. The consequences of Serbian colonial policy under Milosevic have left their mark. Kosovo's three-percent economic growth is insufficient to provide adequate employment for the new crop of young people entering the labor market every year.

According to economist Muhamet Mustafa of the Riinvest Institute for Development Research in Pristina, the black market economy is responsible for 30 to 40 percent of Kosovo's gross national product. The path up the economic ladder is as good as blocked for the country's youngest and most hopeful.

"We must keep our best people in the country, but we lack young elites," says Harvard graduate Shpend Ahmeti, who heads the Institute for Advance Studies (GAP) and plans to establish an academy for future business leaders. Kosovo's main export is still scrap metal, but Ahmeti mentions what politicians intend to ask for at an upcoming international donors' conference -- a subway in the small industrial city of Ferizaj, for �36 million ($58 million), and an opera house dedicated to the now-deceased former president, Ibrahim Rugova, for �25 million ($40 million).

What embitters the idealists among international aid workers and democratic lone wolves among Kosovo's ethnic Albanians is that the UN mission tends to encourage greed, rather than a pioneering spirit. "Ninety percent of the people here come for the money," says a police official with the UN's organized crime division in Pristina. "The motivation (among UN workers) is moderate, people are constantly rotated, and we don't get the really good ones, anyway." Tours of duty in Kosovo, he says, are detrimental to careers at home.

Ten-Figure Sums and No Electricity

The UN mission is variously described as anything from a "paper tiger" to a "bureaucratic monster" to a "colonial administration," while much of its international personnel has the reputation of being in Kosovo either to pursue an adventure or for personal enrichment (From a 2007 study completed for the Bundeswehr) In the upper management echelons at UNMIK, in the Kosovar government and in international consortiums, ten-figure sums of money are thrown around. For the planned Kosovo C brown coal heating power plant, a bidding war has reached �4 billion ($6.4 billion). The new plant is needed because the existing sections of the power plant, despite �1 billion ($1.6 billion) in investments in the power grid, can't deliver enough energy. Daily power outages last up to eight hours. Many people use diesel generators. But who's responsible for this electricity fiasco? Ethem �eku is CEO of the current electricity monopoly. He's also the cousin of former Prime Minister Agim �eku and has close ties to UNMIK Director R�cker. �eku has also served as chairman of the steering committee in the race for the new �4 billion project. One of his former colleagues is part of the favored consortium, while other companies bidding on the power plant project include German energy giants EnBW and RWE.

�eku and his lot, together with UNMIK leaders, form "a sort of Cosa Nostra for Kosovo," says Avni Zogiani, who heads the anti-corruption NGO called �OHU! ("Wake Up!"), despite risks to life and limb. He has received threats because he prepares dossiers on the sins of members of parliament, and because he, to the dissatisfaction of Western ambassadors of democracy, utters sentences like: "So far, UNMIK has worked primarily with criminals and made deals with the devil, merely for the sake of stability in the country." Zogiani's claim, says UNMIK Director R�cker, "does not coincide with reality."

In early April, Zogiani's organization filed a complaint with the special prosecutor in Pristina alleging favoritism within Kosovo's privatization agency. The accused is 39-year-old Hashim Tha�i, who, as one of the KLA commanders in the guerilla war against the Serbian army, was known by his combat name, "Snake." He is now Kosovo's prime minister.

Will his past matter? German author J�rgen Roth cites a 2005 intelligence study (from the Bundesnachrichtendienst) which asserts that as far back as 1999, at the time of the Serb-Albanian peace negotiations, Tha�i controlled "a criminal network active throughout Kosovo." According to the report, he is also suspected of having hired a "professional killer." Tha�i himself has declined to comment on these accusations. The prime minister is busy with governing and dealing with his party, the PDK. Tha�i -- with the support of Germany's left-leaning Friedrich Ebert Foundation -- is trying to establish the PDK within Europe's spectrum of leftist parties, where his old comrade-in-arms and former Prime Minister Agim �eku also wants to build ties.

Women and Heroin

It is assumed that a corporate structure of organized crime and corruption is behind every political party in Kosovo. (The UN's Directorate of Organized Crime)

The UN special investigators for organized crime work in a dilapidated collection of trailers on the edge of Kosovo Field (Kosovo Polje), the historic site of the 1389 Battle of Kosovo between Serbs and the Ottoman Empire. Rain echoes on the corrugated metal roofs of the trailers while the officials inside drink thin coffee. Their weary faces reflect doubt in the purpose of their assignment.

We are fighting with wooden swords against an extremely well-armed opponent," says one of the investigators, who prefers to remain anonymous. "In 2005 and 2006, when the first locals were admitted into the Kosovo police, we suddenly found not a single gram of heroin. Our undercover investigators and informants disappeared. We know literally nothing since then."

According to law enforcement agencies, Kosovo is the most important interim destination for opiates and heroin coming from Afghanistan . It is believed that up to four or five tons of heroin are brought across Kosovo's borders every month. The drug then reaches the EU countries through Albanian distribution rings. (Rastislav B�chora, Notes from Southeastern Europe, 2008)

The central Balkans' drug smuggling route, under observation of international police since 1999, runs through Kosovo. According to Europol, ethnic Albanian organized crime groups now control 80 percent of heroin smuggling in some northern European countries, and 40 percent in Western Europe. Officials at UNMIK in Pristina are familiar with the reports, as well as the warnings of a "further aggravation of the security situation" -- now that the tiny republic's independence facilitates access to government business for the ruling clans.

But nothing is happening. The multinational apparatus is too large, too out of control and too involved with itself. The daily bureaucracy of compiling organizational charges, sending progress reports (known as "okay reporting") to New York, and preparing proof of activity, keeps people busy.

The UNMIK list of Kosovar brothels and bars suspected of promoting or tolerating illegal prostitution -- which are off-limits for UNMIK staff -- includes 138 establishments of various calibers. "Dodana," a dimly lit bar in the divided city of Mitrovica, sits just outside the French Kosovo Force (KFOR) barracks. It's not on the UNMIK list and, at first glance, doesn't seem to have any prostitutes, either. But the owner is a KLA veteran who did time in a German prison near Stuttgart for drug trafficking, and it doesn't take long for him to change his mind and say: "Come back tomorrow, and then you can get what you want."

At the Buze Ibrit across the Ibar River, Fatmiri, who leases the establishment, offers his rooms for �5 ($8) for two-hour "relaxation" periods. Turkish, Albanian and Moldovan women are available in the bars further east along the river.

Bajram Rexhepi has himself driven past the Buze Ibrit in a Jeep every day. He's a slim, gray-haired man who carries a Croatian nine-millimeter pistol concealed in his suit jacket. He knew Mitrovica as a coal-mining town, before there were KFOR troops, UNMIK police and the attendant brothels. He's a former prime minister of Kosovo and the town's current mayor.

To be more precise, he's the mayor of South Mitrovica, the Albanian section. But his villa is across the river, on the city's Serbian side. This puts it in the future Serbian special administrative zone. But somehow the powerful Rexhepi has managed to have his house -- surrounded by Serbian neighborhoods and with a panoramic view -- assigned to the Albanian south.

Rexhepi trained as a surgeon. He served as a doctor at the front during the guerilla war, and as personal doctor of KLA co-founder Adem Jashari until Jashari was murdered. After the war Rexhepi went into politics. As prime minister he gained particular respect by denouncing the anti-Serb pogroms in March 2004 which killed 19 people, injured thousands and destroyed or damaged monasteries, churches and cultural sites.

The Serbian Orthodox cemetery in South Mitrovica, which is now cut off from the Serbian neighborhoods, is still seen as a memorial. Its chapel was desecrated, gravestones were disturbed and cow manure and bits of clothing scattered among the graves. But violence tends to be the exception now, says Rexhepi calmly, pointing to nearby Serbian houses. "Those people over there," he says, "want to create parallel structures."

The Multiethnic Future

A multiethnic Kosovo does not exist, except in the written pronouncements of the international community. (From a study by the International Commission on the Balkans)

Students at the technical university in North Mitrovica wear T-shirts reading "Kosovo is Serbia." The administration of Kosovo's recalcitrant north, funded by Belgrade, now resides in a small, cobalt blue house along the river. North Mitrovica is a planet with its own orbit, a collection of drab neighborhoods with apartment buildings dating back to the days of former Yugoslav dictator Josip Tito. It has shop-window portraits of Russian President Vladimir Putin and perhaps 30,000 Serbian residents, who are being used as spearheads in the struggle over Kosovo's future.

Those who work in North Mitrovica's hospital, court system, schools and university are paid two to three times the standard salary, as compensation for living here. By simply persevering, the idea is, they embody Belgrade's legal claim to Kosovo. The leader of Serbia's Radical Party, Tomislav Nikolic, is greeted like the Orthodox Messiah in North Mitrovica, with bread, salt and folk dancing. He can except to capture 70 percent of the vote in this neighborhood.

Experts from the Institute for European Politics consider the dreams of a multiethnic Kosovo a "grotesque denial of reality in the international community," triggered by a "politically mandated pressure to succeed." It is not difficult to reconstruct the source of this pressure.

Washington's influence has been decisive, from the NATO attack on Serbian targets in 1999 to its leadership role in the peace negotiations in Rambouillet, France, and the road map for Kosovo's declaration of independence. "The Spaniards didn't want a decision before March 2008, because of their upcoming elections, but the Americans wanted February," says a UNMIK employee. "So February 17 it was."

The resolute phrase "no way" -- spoken into a mobile phone by an official at the American diplomatic mission in Pristina -- which barely prevented Kosovar Prime Minister Tha�i from declaring independence two days early (from an American perspective), is now one of the most colorful myths surrounding the establishment of the young republic. The Americans have reaped the rewards of their commitment to Kosovo: the Camp Bondsteel military base, arms deliveries for the future Kosovo army and a loyal community of fans among the Albanian majority.

And the Europeans? Javier Solana, the EU's chief diplomat and a dedicated supporter of trans-Atlantic cooperation, did not attract much attention with his moderate appeals during the gallop to Kosovo's independence. EU Commission President Jos� Manuel Barroso is already suggesting that Kosovo could be offered "EU prospects." UNMIK Director R�cker takes it a step further, when he says: "I see both Kosovo and Serbia a members of the EU in 10 years."

What steps need to be taken before that can happen? A few bastions would have to be worn down and bridges built.

The Serbs, in their blossoming, rural landscape in the north, bordering on the wild Sandzak region, and with their fields, pastures and beehives, would have to learn to find a common language with the Albanians in the south, in their sprawling settlements of unfinished buildings and streets littered with garbage.

The old and new residents of Prizren, at the center of the Kosovo controversy, a medieval residence of Serbian kings and the birthplace of dreams of a greater Albania, will have to find ways to reconcile once again. They will have to clear occupied houses, repair desecrated mosques and churches, and allow justice to prevail.

There are currently 38,000 pending lawsuits for the restitution of property in Kosovo -- mostly fields and meadows. EU experts expect to encounter 180,000 court cases that have not been processed yet. Among 40,000 criminal cases still pending, 700 are classified as "top priority," because they lead directly into the heart of the clan system.

It is that system, and not the people, which is still the source of power in Europe's youngest republic.