PRISTINA: In Kosovo, one of the few places under direct UN control, peacekeepers can hold people for months without giving them even the possibility to challenge their detention in court. “This is, as far as I understand, a violation of human rights,” said Christer Karphammar, a former international judge who has worked in post-war Kosovo.

But the NATO-led Kosovo Force (KFOR) argues it has the power under its UN mandate to detain those it sees as a threat to peace — if it believes the under-developed Yugoslav province’s fledgling justice system is not up to dealing with them.

The argument, which pits human rights campaigners and legal experts against NATO, highlights different views about the state of efforts to establish the rule of law in Kosovo. KFOR is clearly at pains not to criticise the UN’s work in building a justice system. But its stance makes equally clear that its officers do yet not have full confidence in that system.

Legal experts have also been critical of aspects of the system in the past, expressing doubts particularly about whether local judges in the post-war period could set aside ethnic bias. They say there are now international judges and prosecutors in Kosovo so that the courts should be able to handle even the most sensitive cases objectively.

Peacekeepers detained hundreds of people in the middle of last year after stepping up patrols of the border with Macedonia to cut off support from Kosovo for ethnic Albanian guerrillas during a February-August rebellion in the neighbouring country. Most were later released or handed over to UN police.

Lawyer Hazer Susuri said KFOR had not provided any specific reason for the continued detention, except for alleged involvement with armed groups in the border region.—Reuters