Bekim Blakaj – documenter of war crimes

Tireless in his commitment to the documentation of war crimes, Bekim Blakaj, with the direction of the Humanitarian Law Fund, managed to memorialize and engrave in the new history of Kosovo, the number of people who were killed and those who disappeared. What the war left, Blakaj put on a white sheet that he called the "Book of Memory of Kosovo", in which the history of the victims will remain indelible. Activist, humanist and hopeful are the epithets that friends give him when they talk about him, and his unparalleled commitment to human rights, of people who are no longer

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It is almost entirely coincidental that a young man with ambitions to serve in the field of management took on unparalleled activism for human rights.

The profession he used to practice took a turning point when, as a student, during the war, Bekim Blakaj went to prison together with his roommates.

They were accused of preparing a terrorist act against the state of Serbia.

"In October 2000, I was released from prison, and I went to the Prishtina Office of the Humanitarian Law Fund, Mrs. Natasha Kandiq, I realized that she is in Pristina and I went to thank her for the help she gave us has offered, paying us lawyers and many other issues. And, during our meeting, a pretty long conversation of almost two hours, at the end of the conversation she already asked me, she said: Did you work for the Humanitarian Law Fund. I studied completely differently, I studied management, I was not a lawyer and I just didn't think too long and I said, yes!. Without knowing in detail what I have to work on", says Blakaj

Blakaj joined the Humanitarian Law Fund at the end of 2000. After a few years, he would take over his leadership in Kosovo, and for almost a quarter of a century there he would carry out the work that the institutions did.

But the burden he took on his shoulders was by no means easy.

Without experience and without prior professional training, Blakaj joined an organization with a small number of people whose insistence knew no rejection and whose persistence would overcome countless obstacles to collect facts and testimonies of those who were savagely hit by the war. .

"Even though we are one of the most damaged families in Kosovo since the last war that happened, the Fund for Humanitarian Rights has given us support, worked and documented. Thanks to their initiative and work, the people who committed this massacre were found and punished. With their work, in cooperation with us, that is, this is something they have done for us, that we cannot repay them and we will be grateful to them all our lives, for the work of the fund and personally of Bekim Blakaj ", says Betim Berisha, a member of the Berisha family in Suharekë".

Tireless in his commitment to the documentation of war crimes, Blakaj, with the direction of the Fund for Humanitarian Rights, managed to memorialize and engrave in the new history of Kosovo, the number of people who were killed and those who disappeared.

They identified the killed and classified them into civilians and uniformed. Objectively, they also divided the aspect of ethnicity.

The forcibly disappeared persons were also documented in numbers and names.

The organization he leads has recorded in detail the children who were killed. Also, they have identified the wet bodies that were never found with names and surnames.

What the war left would be placed on a white sheet that would be called the "Book of Memory of Kosovo", in which Blakaj and his staff made it possible to indelibly write the history of all the victims of the war.

The titanic effort to leave behind such a legacy was carried out with the concern that their mission would not be misunderstood by the families of the victims.

"One of the main issues has been not to raise their expectations from us in any way. We have done this work to document the victims, to publish the memory of Kosovo in a book, and we have made it clear to everyone that this is our job. We are not competent to find and clarify the fate of their loved ones and so on. We are not competent to help them in any other circumstances", says Blakaj, expressing his shyness.

In addition to creating a narrative on what happened during the war in Kosovo, the Fund also prepared a number of criminal reports that it directed to justice institutions, inside and outside the country.

"The cases where we have felt extremely good, extremely proud, are the cases when, based on the criminal reports that we have filed, trials have been initiated in Serbia and some of those responsible have been convicted. Although, we have never been satisfied with how high the punishment has been for those who are responsible", he emphasizes.

But, in view of bringing justice to the victims, Blakaj says that he is very disappointed.

"We are disappointed and demotivated very often because we ask ourselves what have we done? We have been working for almost a quarter of a century and there is no progress", he said.

However, delivery is not an option.

Overcoming challenges from professional life, according to his colleagues, has made Bekim challenge his patience.

"We have always solved problems and obstacles with understanding and he is always understandable... He is not a temperamental person, he is a calm and careful person and I think he measures his words when he is in meetings in conversations, whether with the staff or with people third", says Amera Alija, his colleague at the Humanitarian Law Fund.

Kushtrim Gara from the Governmental Commission for Enforced Disappearances appreciates the commitment that Bekimi dedicated to the documentation of transitional justice, issues that are both humane and vital for the future of society.

"We have made all the efforts in terms of data provision, data handling and addressing even with the realization of evaluative excavations, always in an effort to reflect the right of families to know the fate and location of their loved ones. And, in this inevitable effort, which is to be evaluated, the cooperation with all partners, including in this case activists, Mr. Blakaj, but also officials of the Humanitarian Law Fund. It is an effort that has happened continuously during these 24 years", says Gara.

In some cases, Blakaj's work became a reference for Kosovo institutions for excavating some locations, where bodies of persons missing in the war were suspected.

"There are also dozens of locations where some of the data were used even to initiate as a case or to complete the case that was initiated by the institutions of the Republic of Kosovo", adds Gara.

The feeling of respect for him and his work would receive the highest grade from the family members of the victims, who do not compromise in the assessment that Blakaj's virtues cannot be found in a second person.

"In my reports that I have had, it is difficult to understand whether he is an official or a friend, regardless of who he has access to. It has a property of impartiality, it means it communicates very freely, accepts criticism, gives answers, addresses issues. Bekim Blakaj for me is a worker, an activist, a humanist, a hopeful, an inspiration that anyone who may have had contact with him, I believe shares my opinion", says Lush Krasniqi that the last war in Kosovo took his two brothers and the father.

The oath from the Berisha Family, whose 49 members were killed in the war, says that where he did not find the support of the state, he relied on Blakaj.

"He is a very close, dedicated person and he has diligently done that work. He has been completely devoted to our pain and concerns. Maybe it was because at the time when I notified him I was the youngest in the to the family that we have contact with him. He constantly offered me, he was very close, he advised me about life, he was a very serious person and he always gave us motivation to live, regardless of what happened to us, provided a support that the Government is willing to give us", he declares.

The boundary between the personal and the professional in terms of digging up history has always been undone for Blakajn.

The confessions he would hear during his work, apart from not forgetting them, he would turn them into a bell for the fulfillment of an obligation: to the one who took it willingly and cannot abandon it.

"I have been confronted with extremely serious confessions, with serious experiences of the family members of the people I have interviewed. Someone who has been an eyewitness to the murder of their own family members, of their own children, this is extremely serious and is a trauma for those people, which then also passes to the one doing the interview. Respectively, it affected me, so I can never forget these stories. But as I said, I have learned to live with these stories. I can't say that I was able to take their pain, but of course I experience it like any other person, and the solidarity is created by that sympathy, empathy with the family of the victims", says Blakaj.

Lush Krasniqi, the survivor of the Meja massacre, says that if it were not for Blakaj and the commitment of the staff of the Humanitarian Law Fund, the consequences of the war, the aspect of reparations and that of transitional justice could be unknown to the families of the victims. .

"To be honest, I feel sorry for Bekimi, it hurts me. The reason is very clear, very simple, very spiritual, because living with the confessions of family members, having your own worries, having experienced them yourself is a very difficult spiritual condition. That's why it hurts me that he is in such a plow, in such a job, in such an activity, that he will surely always be stressed, bored, carrying on his shoulders, on feelings, on the soul, on his mind all these stories that are indescribable, of people who have been victimized in the last war of Kosovo. But to be a man, to be a man in the true sense, you have to suffer a lot, you have to experience a lot", he assesses.

The bitter truth is that Blakajn has often faced moral dilemmas, where for the well-being of the victims' families he would not allow himself to be carried away by feelings.

"An old gentleman from a village in the Municipality of Gjakova came to our office, he was extremely excited, it was sometime in 2002, maybe, and we realized that he had sold land, a lot of land, had given it to someone who promised that he would He took his son out of a secret camp somewhere in Montenegro. A lawyer from Gjakova brought it to me, he said he gave a lot of money and still believes that he has his son alive somewhere in Montenegro. I talked to him for a long time and he said that no one is buying my remaining land, because I would still give money", says Blakaj, continuing the story as if feeling bad at the end of it.

"I was in a position to tell him not to give because there has been so much, that is, more than two years that there is no case that someone has been found alive in any prison. So I had to tell him that his son might not be alive, don't give money. I felt very bad, because in his eyes I saw a kind of disappointment, how is it possible that I am telling him something like that about his son. He had it in his mind that he is alive somewhere for sure. But let me tell you now, "fortunately" maybe not even 6 months have passed and the remains of his son's body were identified and then he accepted the fate that he is dead", he says.

In leading the Fund for Humanitarian Law, Blakaj made good use of the profession he abandoned.

His work colleague, Amer Alija, says that his noble behavior has left no possibility or guesswork to think of escaping from this mission.

"We also have workers in the fund who have worked for more than 20 years in documenting war crimes. I, let's say with 11 years of experience, can be an average worker compared to the experience that the workers have in this organization, and of course the good behavior with the workers has influenced that the staff is not changed often", emphasizes Alija.

Blakaj has no regrets about his professional life.

Once again, if he started from the beginning, he would still choose the same.

"I am happy that I ended up in this field. I know the meaning of life", concludes Blakaj.

"This article was written in the framework of the project "Human Rightivism", which is implemented by Integra and supported by the Fund for Community Development - CDF and the Embassy of Sweden in Kosovo."

PREPARED

Marigona Brahimi