Today, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Justice, prof. Dr. Hajredin Kuçi hosted a delegation of the International Committee of the Red Cross Office in Prishtina, headed by Lina Millner. At this meeting were present the Chair of the Intergovernmental Commission for Missing Persons, Prenkë Gjetaj.

In the meeting was discussed on some of the key issues that challenge the process of clarifying the fate of missing persons. On this occasion, Minister Kuçi reiterated his support and the need to engage directly in the process as well as his commitment in driving this process until every missing person is found.

Minister Kuçi urged all parties involved in the process to make a concrete plan with tasks and set deadlines within which these tasks must be fulfilled. He explained that such a concrete plan would help pushing the issue forward until finding each missing person in the last war, no matter their nationality. Furthermore, Minister Kuçi emphasized that it is essential that cooperation between the two sides in the interstate working group is continuous and serves as a forum for the exchange of information from both sides.

The International Red Cross Committee, the Intergovernmental Commission for Missing Persons and Minister Kuçi emphasized that the current problems which mainly challenge and slow down this process, primarily deal with the lack of new information, which is closely linked to the non-providing of information from Serbia. 

Minister Kuçi added that what would help even more this process would be the full engagement of municipal officers for missing persons in each municipality. While recalling that these officials have started work on some of the municipalities in Kosovo, but the same cooperation is not found in all the municipalities. Therefore, he invited other actors who are responsible for this, to engage in this process and engage more in the employment and functioning of municipal officials on missing persons, because their proximity to citizens in each municipality would easier lead towards obtaining new information and thus clarifying the fate of missing persons.

Minister Kuçi reiterated that this issue has already been raised in the dialogue between Kosovo and Serbia, and will be discussed in more detail in the next rounds. However, Minister Kuçi emphasized that although this issue will be discussed at the Prime Ministers level, it is extremely important that it remains more a humanitarian than a political issue. Therefore, despite the discussions on the political level, the interest of both sides in finding missing persons should be the main driver of cooperation at the technical level.