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The body of Nazmi Rrustemi was found near the artificial lake of Badovc, near Pristina, the capital of Kosovo. (illustration image) ARMEND NIMANI / AFP

It was a seemingly villainous and unnoticed assassination that took place on December 18 in Kosovo. The body of Nazmi Rrustemi had been found at the edge of an artificial lake not far from Pristina. But an interview with the widow of the deceased makes the connection between this murder and the war crimes committed in Kosovo in the late 1990s.

With our correspondent in Belgrade , Laurent Rouy

Former forest ranger Nazmi Rrustemi, 63, was probably murdered because he knew too much about the crimes committed by the Albanian KLA guerrillas . His widow has just revealed that Rrustemi was a protected witness to the special prosecutor because of his past.

During the Kosovo war, he was imprisoned in the KLA camps, which made him a first-rate source of information for justice. This murder shows once again the ineffectiveness of the international witness protection program in Kosovo.

It is not the first time that witnesses to war crimes committed by the Albanian camp have died violently. In 2011, a prosecution witness against former minister and former warlord Fatmir Limaj was found hanged in Germany, while the trial against former Prime Minister and Commander Ramush Haradinaj ended in acquittal , due to the disappearance, death or amnesia of 12 prosecution witnesses.

Twenty years after the end of the conflict, it is almost impossible to judge the crimes of the Albanian guerrillas in Kosovo, when the subject is taboo in society. A special tribunal was established in The Hague five years ago, but has still failed to charge any suspect.