Kosovo's Svecla Convicted Over 2018 Tear Gas Attack

The Basic Court in Pristina issued a first instance verdict today, September 8, 2026, against Xhelal Svecla, Kosovo’s acting Interior Minister. The court gave him a one year suspended prison sentence, with a one year probation period, for throwing tear gas in the Kosovo Assembly back in 2018. Under the ruling, Svecla will not serve the sentence unless he commits a new criminal offense within the next twelve months.

The legal classification of the offense is the use of a weapon or a dangerous device. The incident behind the verdict took place on March 21, 2018, during an Assembly session on ratifying a border demarcation agreement with Montenegro. According to the indictment, Svecla, then an opposition lawmaker with Vetevendosje, repeatedly set off and threw canisters of tear gas into the chamber. Those present had to leave the room, and the session was suspended.

The court had already established guilt earlier, on September 2, and postponed the sentencing to a separate hearing held today. When guilt was determined, the legal classification of the offense was changed from paragraph 2 to paragraph 1 of the same article. On the second count in the original indictment, obstructing an official in the performance of official duties, the court issued a dismissal due to the statute of limitations on the prosecution.

Why the case was separated

Prosecutors had sought a two year prison term for Svecla along with a 3,000 euro fine. According to sources, the defense did not present its own sentencing proposal during the proceedings, arguing that the defendant did not admit guilt. Svecla was absent both from the September 2 ruling on guilt and from today’s hearing on the sentence.

His case was split off from the joint proceeding on January 16, 2026, after he failed to appear at a hearing, citing that he was abroad. In the joint case, brought under the same indictment tied to Vetevendosje’s opposition era, the defendants who appeared before the court prior to that separation also included Fitore Pacoli-Dalipi, now Minister of Environment, Spatial Planning and Infrastructure in the caretaker government, along with Salih Zyba and Drita Millaku.

Here, two outlets’ reports diverge on one detail. Kosovo Online names Avni Namani as the prosecutor who addressed the evidence in closing arguments, while N1 identifies Valdrin Krasniqi as the prosecutor who proposed the two year term and 3,000 euro fine. Which of the two actually handled the case cannot be established with certainty from the available sources.

Under one of those two versions, the prosecutor said the evidence presented at trial confirmed that Svecla had set off a tear gas canister and thrown it into the Assembly chamber.

Svecla did not admit guilt, and in his closing statement he stood by the political explanation for his 2018 actions.

“Demarcation was a mistake then, and it remains a mistake today,” he said, adding that his goal had been to block ratification of the agreement with Montenegro.

Laur Prenaj, Svecla’s lawyer, has announced an appeal against the verdict. The same defense lawyer described it as unusual, after the September 2 ruling on guilt, that the court issued its decision on guilt and its decision on sentencing separately.

Same period, different outcomes

Svecla’s case is not the only one from that wave. Kosovo’s courts have this year ruled on several proceedings stemming from 2015 to 2018, when officials of the then opposition Vetevendosje used tear gas and other forms of obstruction to try to block the Assembly from functioning, in protest against the agreement on the Association of Serb-majority municipalities and the demarcation deal with Montenegro. On August 28, Glauk Konjufca was acquitted for a second time on a charge of using a weapon or dangerous device, over throwing tear gas at a 2016 session of the Assembly Presidency. His first acquittal, from February 2024, had been overturned, but the retrial also ended in acquittal. In March this year, the case against Albulena Haxhiu, Donika Kadaj-Bujupi, Pal Lekaj and Besa Baftiu also ended in acquittal.

Svecla’s case is therefore the first in this series to end in a conviction rather than an acquittal, even though the sentence handed down is suspended. The former opposition figures from that period have since taken on senior institutional roles, Svecla among them, now running the Interior Ministry in an acting capacity.

Srpske vesti has previously reported on another trial in Pristina, in the Tonic case, in which a witness described a beating with batons. As far as we know, this is the first time we have reported on the conviction of a sitting Kosovo government member under an indictment from his time in opposition.

The case now moves to the appellate court, and no date has yet been set for a ruling on Prenaj’s appeal.