EULEX chiefs "associate with mobsters"

SARAJEVO -- Suspended prosecutor of the EU rule of law mission in Kosovo, EULEX, Maria Bamieh says she is under investigation "instead of EULEX".

EULEX chiefs "associate with mobsters"

SARAJEVO -- Suspended prosecutor of the EU rule of law mission in Kosovo, EULEX, Maria Bamieh says she is under investigation "instead of EULEX".

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Bamieh says she is under investigation "instead of EULEX, having tried to correct the errors in this mission withing the EULEX institutions."

"I publicly spoke only when I exhausted all options," she told the Sarajevo daily Dnevni Avaz.

She expressed disappointment that it was her now under investigation - "although she sought her claims to be investigated" and pointed out that leaders of the EU mission "associate with mobsters and powerful politicians in Kosovo, with whom they also dine."

She named head of the Special Prosecution Jonathan Ratel, "who was not interested in investigating financial crimes and completely destroyed this investigative unit of EULEX."

"Since he suspended me, no one in EULEX is any longer dealing with financial crime," said Bamieh.

She claims to have been pointing out to numerous irregularities in the work of the mission, that she received some intercepted conversations confirming her suspicions, and that the head of the Legal Department should have investigated the activities of prosecutor Jaroslava Novotna and judge Francesco Flori, "but it never happened."

Bamieh also said that she came across evidence that criminals gave money to Flori to release them in the "Clinton Cafe" bombing case - "but EULEX did not want to investigate even that."

She added that confidential reports went into the hands of Flori, "but also into the hands of some criminals while investigations against them were under way," and asked "how this was possible."