EU prosecutor readies for Kosovo organ harvesting probe

(PRISTINA) - The EU prosecutor probing a Council of Europe report that links prime minister Hashim Thaci to organ trafficking has started gathering data to initiate his own investigation, a statement said Friday.

The prosecutor John Clint Williamson said the "initial phase" of his probe was to secure data "from a number of institutional sources, to analyse the information, and to initiate its own investigative activities," the EU rule of law mission (EULEX) said in a statement.

"Williamson emphasized that this will be a complex investigation and will take time to complete," said the statement, issued after his three-day visit to Kosovo.

EULEX in June set up a task force to start a preliminary investigation into the report by the Council of Europe.

The task force is composed of prosecutors and investigators and led by US prosecutor Williamson, who is based in Brussels for the probe.

The Council of Europe report said that Thaci headed a Kosovo guerrilla faction which controlled secret detention centres in Albania where the organ trafficking allegedly took place in the aftermath of the 1998-99 war between the Kosovo Liberation Army guerrilla and Serbian forces.

The war ended after a NATO air campaign ousted Milosevic's forces from the territory paving the way for the establishment of UN administration over Kosovo.

EULEX was launched in Kosovo only months after it declared independence from Serbia in February 2008.

It is mandated to oversee and strengthen the rule of law area and can take over cases deemed too sensitive for the local judiciary.