The Kosovo Specialist Chambers (KSC), a court established in 2017 as a means of trying war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Kosovo from 1998-2000, announced Monday that Albanian authorities have arrested Dritan Goxhaj for impeding the administration of justice. Goxhaj previously served as a Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) fighter.

Albanian authorities arrested Goxhaj under a KSC-issued warrant in relation to “offences against the administration of justice involving intimidation and obstructing official persons in performing official duties.” Goxhaj’s lawyer told the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network that KSC issued the warrant because of an article Goxhaj authored. Allegedly, in the article, Goxhaj revealed the identities of five protected witnesses in a separate KSC case for former KLA officer Sali Mustafa.

Goxhaj is currently detained in Albania, with the KSC seeking his extradition to their detention facilities in the Hague.

The KSC has struggled to protect the identities of witnesses throughout its existence, which is one of the reasons why the international court is based in the Hague and not Kosovo. Cases have been impacted by witness intimidation in the past. For example, in 2021, the KSC jailed two senior members of the KLA War Veterans Association for obstructing justice and intimidating witnesses.

The KSC’s past prosecutions include the former Prime Minister of the Provisional Government of Kosovo Hashim Thaçi and the former commander of a KLA guerrilla unit Salih Mustafa.