Kosovar doctors' convictions for organ trafficking confirmed

By Fatos Bytyci

PRISTINA (Reuters) – Two Kosovo doctors were convicted for the second time on Thursday for their involvement in an organ trafficking ring that carried out illegal kidney transplants at a clinic near the capital Pristina.

The defendants were convicted in 2013, but a higher court ordered a retrial in 2016.

The director of the Medicus clinic, urologist Lutfi Dervishi, had his sentence reduced from six months to seven and a half years. Anesthesiologist Sokol Hajdini had his sentence reduced from three to one year.

Dervishi's son Arban, who was imprisoned for seven years, could not be included in the retrial because he is in hiding.

Judge Franciska Fiser said the defendants recruited at least seven donors through internet advertisements “and operated on them at the Medicus clinic with the aim of obtaining their organs, their kidneys, for exploitation purposes.”

Fiser is a member of the European Union's EULEX police and justice mission, which since 2008 has helped develop Kosovo's justice system by handling sensitive cases such as war crimes, organised crime and corruption.

Donors from Turkey and poor regions of the former Soviet Union were promised 10,000 to 12,000 euros for their kidneys, while recipients, mainly Israelis, paid 70,000 to 110,000 euros for the organs.

The organs case is the most high-profile case handled by EULEX, whose mission ends in June. Independent justice monitors fear that local judges may seek to retry some sensitive cases.

(Reporting by Fatos Bytyci; editing by Kevin Liffey)