[9] Ramush Haradinaj was born on July 3, 1968, as the second of nine children in the village of Gllogjan, near Deçan, in Kosovo, which was then part of SFR Yugoslavia.

[12] Haradinaj also earned a master's degree in business from the American University in Kosovo, which is associated with the Rochester Institute of Technology in New York.

[12] As the Soviet Union dealt with new internal challenges, movements for independence began to form among many of the ethnicities of the Balkans and other states.

[13] According to media outlets, he organized the smuggle of arms into Kosovo; in one of those operations he was ambushed by border patrols, during which he was wounded and his brother Luan was killed.

According to the ICTY indictment against Fatmir Limaj, Haradin Bala and Isak Musliu, between 28 February and 5 March, Serb forces launched an offensive against KLA-held villages of Likošane, Cirez, and Prekaze.

[20] After successfully repelling the Serbian attack, Haradinaj gained a leadership position in the KLA in Western Kosovo.

[20][21] As war broke out in Western Kosovo during the spring of 1998, Serbian and Albanian families fled the area for fear of getting caught up in the intense hostilities breaking out.

With support from the former communist leader Mahmut Bakalli, Haradinaj founded the Alliance for the Future of Kosovo (AAK) on 29 April 2000.

Haradinaj appeared to form a close and productive working relationship with Ibrahim Rugova and other senior figures in the LDK.

In February 2009 the Ugandan Muslim rebel group Allied Democratic Forces asked Haradinaj to mediate peace talks with the central government in Kampala.

Haradinaj served 100 days as prime minister in 2005 before being indicted for war crimes by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), at The Hague.

When the ICTY indictment was issued in March 2005, Haradinaj chose to step down immediately from his position as prime minister.

The following day he travelled voluntarily to The Hague where he submitted himself to the custody of the court and remained for two months until he was granted provisional release pending trial.

[29] This step was unprecedented in the history of international criminal law and seen as a reflection of the fact that Mr. Haradinaj voluntarily submitted himself to the court.

At a news conference he urged the public to remain calm and was steadfast in his belief that the trial would result in a full acquittal.

"[33] The trial, which was enforced by Carla Del Ponte,[34] began on 5 March 2007 and Haradinaj's defence team was led by Ben Emmerson QC, an international human rights lawyer, who had supporting counsel in Rodney Dixon, also of Matrix Chambers of London.

Another, Shefqet Kabashi, refused to testify citing the prosecution's failure to live up to the conditions set for his testimony.

The judges addressed the atmosphere of intimidation that surrounded the trial directly and noted: "the Chamber encountered significant difficulties in securing the testimony of a large number of these witnesses.

In this regard, the Chamber gained a strong impression that the trial was being held in an atmosphere where witnesses felt unsafe, due to a number of factors set out in the Judgement.

The ICTY spokeswoman in Serbia, Nerma Jelačić, stated that these allegations were untrue and served only to politicize the work of the court.

"[51] The governments of both Albania and Kosovo have demanded a public inquiry into the behavior of the Chief Prosecutor, Carla Del Ponte, over her conduct in bringing this indictment forward.

[52] Geoffrey Nice, the ICTY prosecutor in the Milošević case, wrote in a column in Koha Ditore that at least three experienced prosecution lawyers advised Del Ponte against indicting Ramush Haradinaj since it could not be proved he was guilty.

[51] Sir Geoffrey Nice QC commented that the pressure to bring the case against Ramush Haradinaj stemmed from the lead Prosecutor at the time, Carla Del Ponte and he speculated that she wanted to use the indictment against Haradinaj as a "coin" to trade with Belgrade in order to convince the Serbian Government to hand over its high-profile war criminal fugitives, Radovan Karadžić and Ratko Mladić.

[51] On 25 April 2008, the ICTY officially opened indictments against Astrit Haraqija and his councilor Bajrush Morina for contempt of court in Haradinaj's case.

[59] Serbian authorities urged France to extradite Haradinaj urgently, citing that he "personally took part in the torture, murder, and rape of civilians".

The director of the Serbian Office for Kosovo and Metohija, Marko Đurić, said that he was "surprised that Serbia is criticized for something while a criminal like this is free".

He added that: "Serbia is sending out a warning that it does not accept fake justice, according to which killings and crimes are allowed if they're in the interest of great powers.

Serbian Justice Minister, Nela Kuburović, said that: "The entire international community is under an obligation to prosecute war crimes suspects.

[66][65] Albanian PM Edi Rama and Haradinaj had a clash in late 2019 due to different views on the Mini-Schengen initiative.

[77] List of state visits made by Haradinaj during his term as prime minister: In spring 2000, Ramush Haradinaj was involved in a fist fight with Russian soldiers at a KFOR checkpoint, and later that year was involved in a shootout in Strellc with members of the Musaj family (members of the FARK), which was covered up by US officials of Camp Bondsteel.