PRISTINA, Kosovo (AP) — Kosovo's lawmakers on Monday unanimously condemned recent war crimes verdicts by a European Union-backed court against four of its wartime rebel leaders, a rare act of unity in a Balkan country locked in a political crisis.
All 99 lawmakers present at the Parliament session approved a declaration that expressed concern over the convictions and urged authorities to act in what it described as defense of Kosovo's legacy of the 1998-99 war for independence from Serbia.
Earlier this month, a court in The Hague, Netherlands found former Kosovo President Hashim Thaci and three other former Kosovo Liberation Army commanders guilty of war crimes and sentenced them to between 13 and 25 years in prison.
Kosovo has criticized the verdicts as unjust, maintaining that the Kosovo Liberation Army, or KLA, which Thaci had led before entering politics, fought against Serbian oppression. Both residents and politicians fear the court ruling would tarnish the struggle.
The parliamentary declaration called for a “joint state strategy” to coordinate legal, institutional and diplomatic actions to “protect and affirm the full historical truth about the just war for Kosovo’s freedom and liberation.”
Kosovo's acting President Albulena Haxhiu read out the declaration in the parliament.
More than 13,000 people died during the conflict, which ended after a NATO bombing forced Serbia to pull out of Kosovo, at the time a Serbian province. Kosovo declared independence in 2008, which Serbia still does not recognize.
Since the verdicts were handed down, thousands have rallied against them throughout Kosovo, adding pressure on the government of Prime Minister Albin Kurti who has faced a prolonged political crisis after a failure to elect a president.
Kurti now faces a new, Oct. 6 deadline for the political parties to agree on who should be the next president. Otherwise, early elections would have to be held — the third in a year.
Some opposition parties have conditioned their agreement on who should be president with a new law that would seek to limit the scope of the Specialist Chamber at The Hague that tried Thaci, Kadri Veseli, Jakup Krasniqi and Rexhep Selimi.
Kurti has yet to respond to that demand. His government has promised support for the four in their appeals process.
The Netherlands-based court was established by Kosovo in 2015 with EU backing.
Kosovo has been told it must mend ties with Serbia if it wants to join the EU. An EU-mediated dialogue, however, has been stalled as tensions between former war foes continue to simmer.
FILE - Former Kosovo president Hashim Thaci, top left, appears before the Kosovo Tribunal as he defends himself against charges including murder, torture and persecution allegedly committed during his country's war for independence from Serbia in the Hague, on April 3, 2023. (Koen van Weel/Pool via AP, File)
FILE - Hashim Thaci, head of the Kosovo Albanian negotiation team and head of the Kosovo Liberation Army political directorate, center, addresses a press conference in a secret location in central Kosovo, Saturday, March 13, 1999. (AP Photo/Visar Kryeziu, File)
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia’s round-the-clock bombardment of targets in Ukraine killed at least seven people and wounded more than 50 others, officials said Monday.
Moscow’s forces pounded apartment buildings, offices, data centers and a building of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine in downtown Kyiv.
The ceaseless Russian drone attacks on cities and towns aim to wear down Ukraine’s resistance and cripple the Ukrainian economy.
The attacks followed a week of diplomatic efforts at the United Nations to get traction for negotiations on ending Moscow’s invasion that began 4½ years ago.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov indicated Monday that the chances of making speedy headway on forging a peace settlement were bleak after recent Ukrainian attacks, including during recent parliamentary elections in Russia.
“Ukraine will have to pay a price for the actions that have taken place in recent months,” Peskov told reporters. “That is happening right now.”
Russian drone attacks on the Kyiv region killed four people and wounded eight, officials said.
A woman was killed in a Russian strike on Kyiv’s Shevchenkivskyi district on Monday afternoon, the Kyiv city military administration said. The strike hit the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, the latest cultural landmark in the capital to be damaged.
Russian forces also hit a pharmaceutical company and gas stations in Kyiv.
One drone struck an office center in central Dnipro during working hours Monday, killing three people and wounding at least 12, local authorities said.
A Russian strike on a nine-story apartment building in the northeastern city of Kharkiv wounded 43 people, including 11 children, Mayor Ihor Terekhov said.
Four people, including two teenage girls, were hurt when a Russian drone struck a residential area in northern Ukraine’s Chernihiv region on Sunday evening, said Viacheslav Chaus, head of the regional military administration.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said its forces struck two data centers in Kyiv, as well as gas stations in the Ukrainian capital. A distribution hub belonging to the Nova Poshta postal service was struck in the southern city of Odesa, it said.
The Russian military also hit a cargo ship in the Black Sea and another one in the Ukrainian port of Chornomorsk, the ministry said. The strikes aim to curb Ukraine’s grain exports, though they may also create food shortages in countries that rely on Ukrainian imports.
The Russian aerial attacks regularly hit civilian areas. Moscow claims it targets only military-related sites.
Battlefield positions have changed little since last year, in part because swarms of drones severely restrict troop movements, but Kyiv’s forces launched a recent offensive, code-named Operation Vivaldi, on part of the 1,250-kilometer (800-mile) front line.
Ukraine’s Third Army Corps said Monday it had recaptured another 51 square kilometers (20 square miles) from the Russians, bringing the total to 176 square kilometers (68 square miles) since the offensive began several months ago.
The corps said that in order to break through Russian defenses, it converted Soviet-era BTR-60 armored personnel carriers into kamikaze vehicles that blew up the strongest Russian fortifications. The operation has also used ground robots to attack Russian positions.
The claimed breakthroughs came in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine, which the bigger Russian army has been trying in vain to conquer.
Russian officials made no immediate comment on the Ukrainian claim.
Russia’s Defense Ministry, meanwhile, said Russian troops captured the villages of Novovodiane in the Donetsk region and Ulanove in the northern Sumy region.
It was not possible to independently verify the claims.
Zelenskyy said long-range strikes on Russian soil hit two defense plants in the Tula and Voronezh regions and oil facilities in the Krasnodar region, all in southern and western Russia.
Ukraine's long-range drones have repeatedly targeted Russian fuel depots and industrial plants that are a mainstay of Moscow’s economy and war effort.
Ukrainian drone attacks overnight started fires at three infrastructure facilities in Russia’s Krasnodar region, local emergency officials said Monday, without identifying the locations.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said air defenses downed 254 Ukrainian drones overnight.
Hatton reported from Lisbon, Portugal.
Follow the AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine
A man evacuates a burning building using a rescue ladder from the National Academy of Sciences building damaged after a Russian drone strike in the center of Kyiv, Ukraine, Monday, Sept. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Dan Bashakov)
Rescue workers put out a fire at the National Academy of Sciences building damaged after a Russian drone strike in the center of Kyiv, Ukraine, Monday, Sept. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Dan Bashakov)
Rescue workers put out a fire at the National Academy of Sciences building damaged after a Russian drone strike in the center of Kyiv, Ukraine, Monday, Sept. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Dan Bashakov)
Paramedics evacuate an injured woman into an ambulance in front of the National Academy of Sciences building damaged after a Russian drone strike in the center of Kyiv, Ukraine, Monday, Sept. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Dan Bashakov)
Rescue workers put out a fire at the National Academy of Sciences building damaged after a Russian drone strike in the center of Kyiv, Ukraine, Monday, Sept. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Dan Bashakov)
A man walks at the central market damaged in a Russian strike on Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, on Saturday, Sept.26, 2026. (AP Photo/Kateryna Klochko)
