Vienna, 12/04/2017
The South East Europe Media Organisation (SEEMO) expressed deep concern after it was revealed that two prominent Kosovo journalists received death threats in the past two days.
Arbana Xhara, investigative journalist and editor-in-chief of daily Zeri, received serious death threats by unknown perpetrators on 10 April. The two cross symbols with blood-like paint were initially discovered by Xhara’s husband, who noticed one of them near the entrance of their apartment, and the other in the journalist’s regular garage parking spot.
The case was reported to the police, and Arbana Xhara stated that an ongoing smear campaign against her has been going on for over a week, coming specifically from religious radicals, anonymous extremists and media outlets close to the opposition party Vetevendosje.
On 11 April, Musa Mustafa, journalist and founder of news website Infojeta.net received death threats via text messages from unknown individuals. The messages contained threats against him, his family, and the Albanian people, “if he continues to write against Serbs”. Mustafa is an ethnic Albanian and recently wrote about alleged Serbian parallel police structures in northern Kosovo, where he resides.
SEEMO is a network of editors, media executives and leading journalists in South, East and Central Europe and its press freedom work is supported by the European Centre for Press and Media Freedom (ECPMF) project, as part of a grant by the European Commission.