I reacted strongly to the judgment against the former KLA leaders. In the video I call it an injustice, compare prison terms and argue that the appeal process matters. That is my reaction and my position; it is not a substitute for the court’s findings.

The central numerical comparison deserves to be checkable. The figures 109 years and 107 years can be reconstructed from the selected defendants below. But their sum cannot, by itself, establish proportionality, collective guilt or the correctness of a judgment.

This article records the position checked on 23 September 2026. It concerns named people and specified cases, not a legal verdict on entire peoples.

Start with the four sentences

The Kosovo Specialist Chambers’ official case record reports that on 16 September 2026, the Trial Panel convicted Hashim Thaçi, Kadri Veseli, Rexhep Selimi and Jakup Krasniqi of war crimes involving arbitrary detention, cruel treatment, torture and murder. The sentences were 25, 18, 13 and 25 years respectively. These are trial-level sentences. Official case status.

DefendantSentence usedStage
Hashim Thaçi25 yearsTrial judgment, 2026
Kadri Veseli18 yearsTrial judgment, 2026
Rexhep Selimi13 yearsTrial judgment, 2026
Jakup Krasniqi25 yearsTrial judgment, 2026
Salih Mustafa15 yearsNew sentence, 2024
Pjetër Shala13 yearsAppeal judgment, 2025

The first four add to 81 years. Adding Mustafa’s 15-year sentence and Shala’s 13-year appeal sentence gives 109. Their individual case histories are available from the KSC: Mustafa and Shala. This deliberately makes visible that the selection mixes procedural stages.

Reconstruct the 107-year side too

The comparison on the other side uses these six named Serbian/Yugoslav officials, rather than “all sentences for Serbia.” Five are documented in the ICTY’s Šainović and others case sheet; Đorđević’s term is in the appeal judgment summary.

DefendantSentence used
Nikola Šainović18 years
Nebojša Pavković22 years
Vladimir Lazarević14 years
Sreten Lukić20 years
Dragoljub Ojdanić15 years
Vlastimir Đorđević18 years

18 + 22 + 14 + 20 + 15 + 18 = 107.

Selected sentence totals. Six selected ICTY defendants: 107 years; Six selected KSC defendants: 109 years
Mixed procedural stages. Totals do not measure legal proportionality.

The difference between these selected totals is two years, or about 1.9% of 107. Each group has six people. The arithmetic mean is 18.17 versus 17.83 years, a difference of one-third of a year. These are descriptive calculations, not estimates of actual time remaining in custody or a ranking of the harm committed.

Where the comparison stops working

The totals are striking. They also erase exactly the details a legal comparison needs: the offences proved against each person, the form of responsibility, aggravating and mitigating circumstances, and what changed on appeal.

A sentence total is not an exchange rate for victims or for a country’s suffering. Nor should trial sentences on one side silently be presented as though they have the same procedural status as appeal outcomes on the other.

The wider wartime casualty, displacement, damage and force-size figures mentioned in the clip require separate datasets and definitions. They are not used as denominators here. Dividing years by a national death toll would not establish an individual’s responsibility or an appropriate sentence.

What a fair comparison must retain. The person: Individual responsibility, not nationality.. The case: The offences and facts proved in that proceeding.. The stage: Trial, appeal and later sentencing decisions.. The reasons: Aggravating and mitigating factors, not only years.
An editorial guide to the limits of the two totals.

For me, the stronger question is which specific finding or sentencing principle should be challenged, and on what evidence. That is harder work than comparing two bars. It is also the work a serious argument deserves.

Why I mention an appeal

The example in the video is Ante Gotovina. The ICTY Appeals Chamber reversed his convictions and entered acquittals in its 16 November 2012 judgment. That is a documented outcome in a different case, not a prediction of the outcome here. Official appeal judgment.

I want scrutiny and a fair appeal process. Recognising the victims’ suffering does not require abandoning that demand. Demanding scrutiny does not require pretending the convictions were never entered.

The same discipline matters when discussing public safety or education: a number should clarify the argument, not replace the evidence.

If I ask for justice, I also have to ask my own argument to withstand scrutiny.

Sources and calculation notes