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Date: April 28, 2024 Sun
Time: 11:03 am
republic of kosovo
Time: 11:03 am
republic of kosovo
Results for republic of kosovo
27 total results foundAuthor: United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. Statistics and Surveys Section Title: Business, Corruption and Crime in Kosovo: The impact of bribery and other crime on private enterprise Summary: This survey of private businesses in Kosovo reveals that corruption and other forms of crime are a great hindrance to private enterprise and have a negative effect on private investment. A significant percentage of businesses pay bribes to public officials repeatedly over the course of the year. Businesses in the Manufacturing, Electricity, Gas, and Water supply sector are those most affected by bribery, followed by businesses in the Wholesale trade and Retail trade sector. The public officials with the highest risk of bribery in interactions with businesses are customs officers, officials in the tax/revenue administration and municipal or provincial officers. While indicators of corruption perceptions are undoubtedly useful for raising awareness, this survey measures the actual experience of corruption and crime through representative sample surveys of businesses in order to provide a more realistic, evidence-based assessment of corruption and crime affecting the business sector. In so doing it focuses on the extent and pattern of bribery by businesses from five different sectors (accounting for over 79.7 per cent of all businesses in Kosovo) in their frequent interactions with the public administration. According to the survey, of all the businesses that had contact with a public official in the 12 months prior to the survey 3.2 per cent paid a bribe to a public official. The average prevalence of business bribery in Kosovo is lower than the share of ordinary Kosovar citizens (11.1 per cent) who experienced the same in UNODC's 2011 general population survey. The examination of the experience of businesses that pay bribes to public officials underlines the fact that corruption plays a role in the daily business of many companies. Bribe-paying businesses pay an average of 7.7 bribes per year, or about one bribe almost every seven weeks. The prevalence of bribery is substantially higher among medium and large (over 50 employees) businesses than among businesses of other sizes. A substantial share of all the bribes paid to public officials by businesses in Kosovo are paid in cash (59.2 per cent), followed by the provision of food and drink in exchange for an illicit "favour" by the public official (58.4 per cent) and other goods or advantages (12.1 per cent). When bribes are paid in cash, the mean amount paid per bribe is 844 Euro, or the equivalent of 1,787 EUR-PPP. As for which party actually broaches the subject of kickbacks, in about 38 per cent of all bribery cases the payment of a bribe is offered by a representative of the business without a prior request being made, whereas in around half (50.1 per cent) of cases payment is either explicitly (13.3 per cent) or implicitly (30.3 per cent) requested by the public official. In a further 6.5 per cent of cases, bribes are paid after a third-party request. The most common purposes for paying bribes cited by businesses is to "speed up business-related procedures" (28.4 per cent of all bribes), "receiving better treatment or information" (14.7 per cent) and "making the finalization of a procedure possible" (13.1 per cent). At the same time, almost a quarter (23.9 per cent) of bribes paid serve for no specific immediate purpose for the businesses paying them, suggesting that these are "sweeteners" given to public officials to "groom" them for future interactions in the interest of the company. As little as 3.7 per cent of bribes paid by businesses are reported to official authorities, mostly to the police, which suggests that businesses in Kosovo often feel obliged to participate in bribery. This is also reflected in the main reasons cited for not reporting bribery: "pointless to report it as nobody would care" (28.2 per cent), "fear of reprisal" (19.2 per cent) and "the payment or gift was given as a sign of gratitude" (19.4 per cent). Bribery in the private sector not only comprises bribes paid by businesses to public officials, it also takes place between businesses themselves in order to secure business transactions. Though lower than the prevalence of bribery between the private and public sector, at 0.6 per cent the prevalence of business-to-business bribery indicates that the practice does exist in Kosovo. This type of corruption is not to be confused with normal marketing or public relations activities, in that it specifically aims, through illegal means, to breach the integrity of the bribe-taker in exchange for a bribe. None of the businesses in the survey reported such business-to business bribery incidents to relevant authorities. Some 3.3 per cent of business representatives decided not to make a major investment in the 12 months prior to the survey due to the fear of having to pay bribes to obtain requisite services or permits, thus the impact of bribery on business activity can be substantial. The consequences of other more conventional crimes on a business's property and economic activities can also be considerable, both in terms of direct costs stemming from physical damage and indirect costs in the form of insurance premiums, security expenditure and lost investment opportunities. For instance, around one in ten businesses (10.1 per cent) in Kosovo fall victim to burglary in various different guises in a year and such businesses are victimized an average of 1.9 times in that time period. Annual prevalence rates for fraud (8 per cent) and vandalism (3.2 per cent) in the private sector are also significant, as are the average number of times businesses affected fall victim to those crimes (5.3 and 1.3, respectively). Moreover, over the past 12 months some 0.4 per cent of all businesses in Kosovo fell victim to extortion, a crime that can be linked to organized criminal groups. In marked contrast to corruption, a larger share of conventional crimes (on average, 59.3 per cent for five crime types) is reported to the police by businesses in Kosovo. While the majority of business representatives (70.5 per cent) consider that the crime risk for their company has remained stable in comparison to the previous 12 months, almost one in ten (9.8 per cent) think it is on the increase and 16.2 per cent on the decrease. The fear of crime plays a very important role in the decision-making process of business leaders when it comes to making major investments. Although there are some differences by economic sector, on average 9.1 per cent of entrepreneurs in Kosovo state that they did not make a major investment in the previous 12 months due to the fear of crime. Yet while about four fifths (80.4 per cent) of businesses in Kosovo use at least one protective security system against crime, only one third (33.5 per cent) have any kind of insurance against the economic cost of crime. Together corruption and other forms of crime place a considerable burden on economic development in Kosovo. Putting in place more and better targeted measures for protecting businesses against crimes, as well as for preventing corruption (such as effective internal compliance measures and other policies concerning corruption) could make that burden considerably lighter. Details: Vienna: UNODC, 2013. 76p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed December 5, 2013 at: http://www.unodc.org/documents/data-and-analysis/statistics/corruption/Kosovo_Business_corruption_report_EN.pdf Year: 2013 Country: Republic of Kosovo Keywords: Bribery Shelf Number: 131751 |
Author: Fajardo, Teresa Title: The EU's promotion of environmental protection through criminal law in Kosovo: A Case Study on the Protection of the Environment through Criminal Law in Kosovo Summary: After the declaration of independence in 2008, Kosovo has sought to reach EU legal thresholds of environmental protection. It has adopted a wide environmental legal framework that however is suffering from important problems of enforcement and compliance. The weak implementation is considered to be at the root of illegal practices that are openly carried on in most of the territory of Kosovo: illegal logging, illegal hunting, illegal waste management, illegal building, destruction of cultural heritage of minorities, etc. In Kosovo, types of conduct that damage the environment can be sanctioned by administrative or criminal rules and proceedings. There is not a general environmental law but several fragmented administrative laws covering different sectors. The Criminal Code introduces a chapter on crimes against nature that responds to the Kosovo context. The Environmental Inspectorate is the institution adopting administrative sanctions and initiating criminal procedures. Details: Granada: University of Granada, 2015. 59p. Source: Internet Resource: A study compiled as part of the EFFACE project. Accessed August 21, 2015 at: http://efface.eu/sites/default/files/EFFACE_The%20EUs%20promotion%20of%20environmental%20protection%20in%20Kosovo_revised.pdf Year: 2015 Country: Republic of Kosovo Keywords: Environmental Law Shelf Number: 136521 |
Author: Speckhard, Anne Title: Drivers of Radicalization and Violent Extremism in Kosovo: Women's Roles in Supporting, Preventing & Fighting Violent Extremism Summary: Since the start of the Syrian conflict in 2011, estimates are that upwards of 38,000 foreign fighters have joined Sunni militant groups, such as ISIS and al-Qaeda, in Iraq and Syria. As of mid-October 2016, the Balkan country of Kosovo had 316 confirmed cases of individuals who have traveled since 2012 to Syria and Iraq, with some joining ISIS. In fact, Kosovo has the unique distinction of having the highest per capita number of citizens of any country in wider Europe who left for Syria and Iraq since 2011. Forty-four women and 29 children from Kosovo are also believed to have traveled to the conflict zones in Iraq and Syria. While many other radicalizing factors and vulnerabilities exist in Kosovo, the long-term psychological legacy of the Kosovo war in the late 90s remains the most salient radicalizing factor in recent years. The findings in this report also serves to raise further awareness of women's roles in both propagating and countering violent extremism in Kosovo. Despite being portrayed as traditional wives obedient to their husbands and without much personal agency on their movement into joining a terrorist group in Iraq and Syria, this research revealed instances of women willing to defy cultural norms and embrace the adventurous path to extremism and violence, including spiritual and materialistic rewards promised in Syria and Iraq. This report is divided into three sections. The first section consists of an examination of drivers or radicalization, including radicalization leading to violent extremism, in Kosovo. The second section introduces a discussion on Kosovar women's specific vulnerabilities and roles in violent extremism. The last sections offer specific policy recommendations. Details: Washington, DC: International Center for the Study of Violent Extremism, 2017. 44p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed April 17, 2017 at: https://georgetown.academia.edu/AnneSpeckhard Year: 2017 Country: Republic of Kosovo Keywords: Extremist Groups Shelf Number: 144984 |
Author: Kosovo Centre for Security Studies Title: Strategy on prevention of violent extremism and radicalization leading to terrorism from 2015 to 2020 Summary: Violent extremism and radicalism leading to terrorism emerged as global, regional and national threat in a new form during the XXI century. The nature of such threat continues to evolve in the globalized world. Extremisms and terrorism have found ways to exploit rapid changes over the recent years, whereby persons and capital can move across the borders with much more ease, and ideas may be exchanged immediately via internet. Therefore, due to globalism, a crisis which in the past was a local crisis, such as internal wars, poverty, unemployment, social instability, and low education level, are now transformed into international security risks. Therefore, weaknesses in these areas represent opportunities for extremists to spread their views, recruit members and supporters, and spread their war against secular states into new battlefields. Kosovo during the recent years is facing similar threat as majority of European countries, in particularly the radicalization of the youth, who are recruited to take part in sectarian and religious conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere. The main risk that Kosovo faces is the return of such fighters with radical beliefs and with an interest to harm Kosovo as a state with a multi-ethnic and multi-religious society and with a secular government. As seen in various examples in Europe, radicalized individuals may perform acts of extreme violence even against the people and the government of their own country; therefore we cannot exclude the risk that Kosovo may be a target of such terrorist attack. Also the national radical extremist groups of Albanian and Serbian origin that oppose the existing boundaries and government may be a potential source of terrorist activity. Government of the Republic of Kosovo is responsible for ensuring the protection and security of its inhabitants, together with the protection of their rights to freedom of opinion and religion. In this regard, the Government is determined to draft a strategy that will address, in a responsible manner, the security risk posed by radicalization and extremism, while observing the rights guaranteed by the Constitution of the Republic of Kosovo, which determines that "no one shall be discriminated against on grounds of race, colour, gender, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, relation to any community, property, economic and social condition, sexual orientation, birth, disability or other personal status". As a member of the family of democratic countries, the Republic of Kosovo is aware of its role and responsibilities towards regional and global security. The successful fulfilment of such responsibilities requires a comprehensive strategic platform that takes into account the transnational challenges of violent radicalism and extremism that lead to terrorism, and the important role of regional cooperation in addressing such threat. Strategic objectives determined under this strategic document aims to address the push and pull factors that influence the radicalization of the population, with special emphasis on the youth. Through achieving four strategic objectives: Early identification - of causes, factors and target groups; Prevention - of violent extremism and radicalization; Intervention - with the purpose of preventing the threat arising from violent radicalism; and De-radicalization and reintegration - of radicalized persons, and specific objectives/measures contained thereof, the Government of the Republic of Kosovo aims to prevent and reduce the risk of violent radicalism and extremism The Action Plan, which is part of this strategy, through its strategic objectives and specific activities aims, inter alia, to increase the awareness among institutions and the citizens regarding the risks posed by violent radicalism and extremism. In addition to raising awareness, specific actions in addressing such push and pull factors are included within strategic and specific factors of this strategy. The implementation of such strategic objectives and specific measures shall be conducted in line with European and global initiatives for combating violent extremism and radicalism. The Government of the Republic of Kosovo is committed through this Strategy to contribute to the implementation of the conclusions from the Washington Summit on the war against violent extremism. The Summit concluded that it is necessary to join and coordinate efforts in preventing extremism and to safeguard religious tolerance worldwide, particularly in the countries affected by violent extremism. Furthermore, during this year, the Council of Europe adopted the Action Plan 2015-2017 on fighting violent extremism and radicalization leading to terrorism, which contains two objectives and a number of activities in this regard. Prevention and the combat of violent extremism shall contribute in the integration process of Republic of Kosovo into Euro-Atlantic mechanisms; therefore the implementation of this strategy shall be one of the key priorities of the Republic of Kosovo during the medium-term period. Details: Prishtina: The Centre, 2015. 32p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed May 8, 2017 at: http://www.qkss.org/repository/docs/STRATEGY_ON_PREVENTION_OF_VIOLENT_EXTREMISM_AND_RADICALISATION_LEADING_TO_TERRORISM_2015-2020.pdf Year: 2015 Country: Republic of Kosovo Keywords: De-radicalization Shelf Number: 145351 |
Author: Shtuni, Adrian Title: Dynamics of Radicalization and Violent Extremism in Kosovo Summary: What started in 2011 as a popular uprising against the Syrian regime escalated in the five years that followed into an intractable sectarian war that has engulfed both Syria and Iraq, drawn in a suite of regional actors and world powers, and attracted an unprecedented number of volunteer combatants from more than a hundred countries. Although so-called foreign fighters have been a common feature of conflicts in Afghanistan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Chechnya and Dagestan, Iraq, and most recently in Ukraine, their flow to Syria and Iraq is the largest influx of its kind in recent history. More than 36,500 individuals, including at least 6,600 from Western countries, are estimated to have traveled to the conflict theater since 2012, mostly to join designated terrorist organizations operating in the region. Not long after the bloody secessionist wars that brought about the disintegration of Yugoslavia in the 1990s, the Western Balkans became a prime source of foreign fighters for the Syrian conflict. More than a thousand nationals of Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia are estimated to have traveled to the battlefields of Syria and Iraq since 2012. The significance of this number becomes apparent in the context of the combined population across these small countries of less than nineteen million. Rates of mobilization relative to the population size - particularly in Kosovo but also in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Macedonia - are far higher than in western European countries most afflicted by the phenomenon. Now that the flow of those traveling to the conflict theater has subsided - for a variety of reasons - and about 37 percent of all Kosovan nationals estimated to have traveled to Syria and Iraq have returned home, the task of understanding the dynamics of their radicalization has become even more critical. This is not only in regard to managing the security challenge associated with their return but also to adopting effective strategies for their rehabilitation and reintegration into society. This report explores the dynamics of radicalization and violent extremism in Kosovo, focusing on the flow of foreign fighters as the most prominent symptom of a multifaceted religious militancy problem facing the country. It is important to emphasize from the outset that though the number of foreign fighters in itself represents a quasi-insignificant minority of the Kosovan society, it also constitutes merely a fraction of an extensive network of like-minded militants, supporters, and enablers who not only openly share the same ideology but are also actively engaged in its dissemination and recruitment efforts through physical and virtual social networks. This report shines some light on that less well-understood part of the supply chain of violent extremism. Details: Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace, 2016. 16p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed June 10, 2017 at: https://www.usip.org/sites/default/files/SR397-Dynamics-of-Radicalization-and-Violent-Extremism-in-Kosovo.pdf Year: 2016 Country: Republic of Kosovo Keywords: Foreign Fighters Shelf Number: 146019 |