MOSCOW, January 23 (RIA Novosti) – The investigation into alleged organ theft during the Kosovo conflict has stalled because of the EU’s unhelpful position, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Wednesday.
“The EU has taken over the investigation: It is marking time. It is quietly being scaled down,” he said without elaborating.
Moscow backs Serbia’s call for an international investigation, and Belgrade has a right to raise the issue at the UN Security Council, he stressed.
It is alleged that organs were harvested from live prisoners captured by members of the Kosovo Liberation Army.
These allegations were given further publicity when former chief prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) Carla Del Ponte featured them in her 2008 book.
UN war crimes prosecutors investigated the case three times (in 2002, in 2003 and in 2004) but failed to find evidence that it deemed concrete proof of this criminal activity.
Serbia’s War Crimes Prosecutor’s Office is running its own investigation into the allegations.
Swiss Prosecutor Dick Marty’s 2010 report claimed to have found “credible indications” of organ trafficking activity stretching back a decade. The Council of Europe endorsed Marty’s report in January 2011, and called for a full investigation.
However numerous members of the European Parliament (MEPs) have voiced doubts over the report, highlighting a lack of “any evidence” concerning these particular allegations.