Kosovo President Hashim Thaci has stepped down from office, declaring that a special court at The Hague was indicting him for war crimes.
His decision comes hours after veteran Kosovo politician Jakup Krasniqi was detained and taken to The Hague.
The Kosovo Specialist Chambers (KSC) in The Hague is examining charges that former leaders of the KLA perpetrated war crimes and crimes against humanity in the late 1990s. The charges surfaced against Thaci by the special prosecutor at The Hague were passed to a KSC judge earlier this year ahead of a possible indictment.
The prosecutor indicted the Kosovo leader of being “criminally responsible for nearly 100 murders”, torture and enforced disappearances.
Thaci said he was resigning to “defend the integrity of the state”. He has been in power in Kosovo since the end of its independence war, which cost more than 10,000 lives and only ended after a Nato air campaign.
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