Tuesday November 18, 2014 – Kosovo Law Institute (KLI) expresses concern about the continuous failure of the Kosovo Prosecutorial Council (KPC) and Chief prosecutors of Basic Prosecutions (BP) and Special Prosecution of the Republic of Kosovo (SPRK) to held responsible all law violators within the prosecutorial system, that have failed to meet legal obligations, dragging solving of corruption cases.
KLI since entering into force (November 4 2013) of the Action Plan for increasing of efficiency of the prosecutorial system in fighting corruption monitors and evaluates the implementation of this plan. While monitoring, KLI has found that a large number of cases are not registered in the database – Tracking Mechanism, created especially for characteristic criminal offences, where enters also cases of corruption. Failing regarding the registration of corruption cases has found it KPC itself, through the Unit for the Prosecution Performance Review, creating (February 2014) Commission for the Oversight and Verification of corruption cases in the prosecutor. Work results of this commission, brought to light great irresponsibility of a chain of officials in the prosecutor, by prosecutors till to the support staff officials, who had not respected the rules of the Tracking Mechanism for the registration of corruption cases in the database.
These founding’s and recommendations of the Commission, were approved at the KPC meeting, held on February 25 2014, where the decision was issued with no: 45-2014, through which all Chief prosecutors are obligated to take disciplinary measures to the persons that have failed to respect rules for the registration of corruption cases in the Tracking Mechanism. Despite numerous violations that were identified by the Commission and the final decision of the KPC to take measures against responsible persons, Chief Prosecutors did not take any disciplinary action against any prosecutor and employee. Seeing the Chief Prosecutors reluctance to punish their officials, KPC on the meeting held on April 25, 2014 has taken the decision that Chief Prosecutors of the BP and SPRK to report regarding the implementation of decision no: 45-2014 dated February 25 2014. KPC through this decision has required direct responsibility from the Chief Prosecutors for not punishing prosecutors and their officials for not registering cases of corruption. In this regard, has failed to prosecute the prosecutors in charge also the Office of Disciplinary Counsel (ODC), which should investigate violations, based on the findings of the report of KPC to hold responsible prosecutors that have made violations. ODC has initiated 44 investigation cases for corruption cases published in the KLI reports, which encourages investigators of this institution to do their work independently, but asks not to be amnestied without investigating violations of prosecutors evidenced also by KPC.
KLI estimates that this culture of impunity proves that for a complete failure of the prosecutorial system, amnestying persons that are responsible for the identified violations. KLI expresses double concern for the Chief Prosecutors, which have not implemented the decision of the highest authority in the prosecutorial system, KPC, but also expresses big concern for no implementation of the decision by KPC, to punish Chief Prosecutors, in case they do not punish prosecutors and their employees for the evidenced violations.
This reaction is a continuation of the KLI reactions to the KPC, which is failing to address the most important issues about the implementation of its decisions related to fighting corruption in Kosovo.