Opinion: Europe is to Blame For Balkan Asylum Crisis October 14 - 27, 2011 Issue No. 73 www.prishtinainsight.com Price € 1 NEWS No Justice Kosovo Hails for Kosovo Promise of Woman EU Visa Talks Forced to > page 3 NEWS Abort Baby Dino the Painter – The Man Who Sold Six years after her parents-in-law allegedly Kosovo forced her to abort her first baby, and then took her second one from her, M B blames police, the courts and social workers for ignoring her plight. See Page 5 Kosovo Factory Sale > page 7 NEIGHBOURHOOD Albania Struggles Broke Privatization Law To Curb Sex- A once flourishing car parts factory in Prishtina appears to have been sold at a bargain price to people under a fraud Selective Abortions investigation – violating the country’s law on privatization. > page 11 September 2010 took place three on whether to hold a full trial or - nearly three months after EULEX By Prishtina Insight months after police from the EU drop the case until October 27. police opened its investigation into INSIDE PRISHTINA rule of law mission, EULEX, raided Real estate experts meanwhile Devolli and its owners. osovo’s Privatization Devolli Group offices as part of one have told Prishtina Insight that the EU police raided Devolli offices Indian Spices Up Agency, PAK, broke two key of the highest profile anti-corrup- site alone of the factory - which on July 15, 2010, with an authoriza- Krules in the sale of the state- tion investigation staged in Kosovo. was sold for 2 million euro - was tion provided by a EULEX judge Prishtina owned Suspension Factory to The raid formed part of a probe worth more than twice that and under the supervision of the Devolli Group, one of Kosovo’s into an allegedly corrupt mobile amount. Kosovo Special Prosecutor. biggest and most influential firms, > page 19 Prishtina Insight can reveal. phone contract between the Devolli The privatised company was reg- The Devolli Group’s owners and According to PAK rules, the Group and Post Telecommunic - istered under the Devolli Group at the director, Bojku, are suspected agency cannot sell state assets to ations of Kosovo, PTK. the Business Registration Agency of negotiating “harmful con- individuals under criminal investi- Devolli’s owners, brothers at the Ministry of Trade and tracts” with the PTK, which led to gation - and a minimum of three Blerim and Shkelqim Devolli, and Industry in May 2011, after PAK the launch of Kosovo’s third Kosovo’s only English-language bidders must take part in the the company director, Ismet Bojku, gave the group the go-ahead to buy mobile phone operator, Z Mobile, newspaper is available: process. were due to appear in court on the firm in October 2010. which Devolli owns. But the sale of the factory on the Thursday on fraud charges. The PAK accepted an offer of 2 mil- Delivered to outskirts of Prishtina in judge has now postponed a decision lion euro - the only offer submitted continues page 2 Your Door Mineral Looters Destroying Toxic Toys on Sale From Newsstands Kosovo’s Rivers in Kosovo across Kosovo The Drini i Bardhe, Kosovo’s longest Importers and shop owners in Kosovo Sent To river, is being destroyed through the wide- are mostly ignorant of the EU’s warning Your Inbox spread, illegal exploitation of its bed for system for dangerous products and some quartz and gravel. are even unworried that they are selling While this activity has not been licensed dangerous toys to children. From by the authorities, the operators continue Prishtina Insight tested a number of our partners to act with virtual... children’s toys bought... news page 6 feature page 15 see page 16 for more info is supported by: 2 October 14 - 27 news Kosovo Factory Sale Broke Privatization Law from page 1 chase of the factory, or on whether PAK should have stopped In July a EULEX prosecutor the sale as a result of the ongoing filed an indictment against the investigation. “You should con- Devolli brothers, Bojku and the tact the company lawyer,” Bojku PTK head, Shyqyri Haxhaj, seek- said. ing 20 years’ imprisonment. We were not able to contact the This is one of the highest pro- company’s legal representative, file corruption cases to have Valon Basha. reached the courts in Kosovo. However, the Devolli Group’s Former Kosovo MP Driton Tali, lawyers did send Prishtina who sat as an independent until Insight a letter this week main- last December’s general election, taining that PAK rules ban only estimates that the contract that individuals under investigation the PTK signed with Devolli from taking part in a privatisa- Group has lost the PTK and the tion – not companies, and that the taxpayer revenue worth 250 mil- factory in question was pur- The Devolli brothers leaving court yesterday. lion euros. chased by the Devolli Group. Prishtina Insight that the final The 920 remaining employees officer, Valon Basha, marketing This week, Croatia Telecom, According to a close reading of sale price for the firm was well insist that the land alone is worth manager Fjolla Rexha, Burim one of the potential bidders for the rules, however, PAK defines a below what might have been far more than the 2 million euro Alija and Nita Krasniqi - also the purchase of the PTK, said person to include “natural per- expected. price tag. They are claiming own- employees of the telephone com- they were reviewing their partici- sons, unincorporated associa- Based on the factory’s location ership of more than seven pany - as the “authorised per- pation in the sale as result of the tions or corporate bodies”. at the crossroads of a series of hectares of land, the last part of sons” for the Headquarters. court case. The company lawyers also said major roads, and on its size, the the former factory that has not Official business records, In the document describing the the firm had not broken the law, a site alone could have fetched 5.1 been privatised. which we again consulted this rules of the tender for the sale of claim which Prishtina Insight is million euro on the open market, Bojku of the Devolli Group week, showed that just Basha the New Enterprise Suspension not making at Devolli. Halil Sulejmani, owner of the says he has met the workers sev- remained as an “authorised per- Factory, obtained by Prishtina Ylli Kaloshi, PAK spokesper- Visi real estate agency, estimated. eral times. “Their arguments son” for the Headquarters firm. Insight, Article 3 “prohibits par- son, said the Interior Ministry “The buyer bought it [the site] about the value of the company Milot Gjikollli, Z-Mobile’s man- ticipation in a bid to acquire a vets the backgrounds of all bid- at a very low price because the are mere nostalgia,” he said. “It's ager, told Prishtina Insight that social enterprise of any persons ders in privatizations and if the real price [of such a site] in the much better to invest as little as he did not believe his four col- convicted of a crime committed data do not reveal criminal proce- market is much higher,” he said. two euro and revitalize an enter- leagues had bought the since June 1990 or who are subject dures that are ongoing, they give Albulena Azemi, from Zogu real prise than for it to remain in Headquarters. He did not offer to criminal proceedings”. the sale a green light. estate, also said the land ruins,” he said. any additional explanation as to It adds: “Any bid submitted by a “In this case it was not proven appeared to have been sold for However, it is not yet clear what why they were listed as managers. person not eligible to bid will be that there were criminal proceed- well below its true value. Devolli intends to do with the Concern over the sale of the disqualified automatically, ings against the bidder, so PAK In its heyday in the 197s and site. factory is not new. In June 2010 a regardless of whether such a bid continued with the sale,” Kaloshi 1980s, the suspension parts facto- At the same the factory was pri- report by Kosovo’s Auditor is in accordance with the set said. ry produced 3 million items a vatised, PAK also sold the facto- General uncovered irregularities terms and conditions specified in Kaloshi added that even after a month for blue chip automobile ry’s adjacent Administration in relation to the sale of the facto- these Rules of Tendering.” bidder is declared successful, firms such as VW and Peugeot. Headquarters for 5.1 million ry in terms of how the sale was PAK rules on privatisation were PAK may not authorize the sale if The factory was the only one in euro. advertised. issued following adoption of a any court decision is pending the Balkans to produce suspen- The Administration The report noticed a difference Law on the Privatisation Agency against him or them. “In this sion for cars such as Golfs, Headquarters, which is regis- in the size of the land on offer in of Kosovo in 2008. case, there was no prohibition by Peugeots and Zastavas. tered as a separate business, is the public announcement and the Under this legislation, the the court,” he added. It then employed about 1,700 now owned, according to official amount listed in brochures pro- board of PAK is required to “set He declined to address the workers and - unusually for records, by Euro-Nex, owned by vided to bidders. out transparent and uniformly question of why PAK had not Kosovo - did not rely state subsi- Elvis Goga, who appears to have “Different land surfaces for applied rules governing the bid- stopped the sale when only one dies.