UNMIK/PR/671
PRESS RELEASE- 19 Dec. 2001

Supreme Court Releases Nis Bus Bomb Suspects

PRISTINA -  A panel of three international judges in the Kosovo Supreme Court has ordered the release of Avdi Behluli, Jusuf Veliu and Cele Gashi, detained since the attack on a public bus in February in Podujevo, which resulted in the deaths of 11 Kosovo Serbs. The Supreme Court yesterday rejected the petition for further detention, and as a consequence the three suspects were released today.

The three Kosovo Albanian suspects had been detained most recently by an order of a Detention Review Commission, a special panel of international judges from outside Kosovo, which met on 19 and 20 September to decide whether detention based on the SRSG's Executive Orders was justified. That panel ordered the three men detained for an additional three months, until 19 December. Previously, the three men had been held for several months by Executive Orders signed by the SRSG.

According to UNMIK Regulation 2001/18, which established the Detention Review Commission in order to review extra-judicial detentions by Executive Order, the decision of the Commission on 20 September was to be treated as a decision of the Supreme Court. Accordingly under the applicable law any further detention would have to be ordered on petition by the Supreme Court.

The Detention Review Commission found that the detention of the three suspects based on executive orders was justified and that there were "reasonable grounds to suspect that each of the detained persons had committed a criminal act and that circumstances existed which suggested the strong possibility of flight…" According to Regulation 2001/18, those findings would constitute grounds for further detention and on this basis the Commission authorized further detention until 19 December 2001.

In considering the detention of the three suspects in September, the Detention Review Commission had taken into account information that could not be released in court. As the latest detention period for the three remaining suspects expires today, the public prosecutor filed a petition with the Supreme Court for further detention.

Florim Ejupi, the main suspect in the terrorist attack, escaped from jail in Camp Bondsteel in May 2001.