Only 70 people have applied this year for recognition of sexual victim status during the recent war in Kosovo. A smaller number than this is the number of men who experienced horror during that time. More than 1,400 cases have been submitted to the government committee for three years, which are evidence of war crimes. This address in most cases is the first place where victims manage to confess the crime they experienced. Due to the stigma that survivors are facing, documentation is often lacking, which is complicating the treatment of the case. In the third year of the formation of this commission, there is no large number of cases which have been submitted for treatment. The chairwoman of the Committee for the Verification of the Status of Victims of Sexual Violence, Minire Begaj says for KosovaPress that the total number of applications is over 1400 cases. "The total number of applications is 1463. During this year we had 70 applications. Of these, processed so far, we have recognized the status of 943 people. The committee eventually processed 1,290 cases. Of these cases, there are applications that were rejected; however, we recognized the status of a sexual victim to 35 men," she said. While Begaj calls for the application of all war survivors to enjoy the benefits of 230 euros, she adds that the decline in the number of applications may have been influenced by the pandemic. "We believe that during these few months, all those who have experienced sexual violence should gain strength and turn to the committee. The government and Kosovo institutions passed this law in this format because of them, in order to recognize their status," she added. Dealing with these cases is considered difficult, as victims rarely possess the necessary documentation required by the committee. "Regardless of the fact that some could not apply or report the traumatic event, most of the reasons we know are due to the mentality, due to circumstances, stigma in the family, they did not keep medical documents. Either a legal or a document they may have had at the time. Returning after 20 years is also a problem for survivors," Begaj told KosovaPress. While non-governmental organizations that are licensed for this process have criticized the committee several times for delays in dealing with these events, Begaj says that there have been cases which have been addressed for the sixth time. "We have solved over 50 percent of cases, some might have been treated five, six times, with the sole purpose of avoiding rejection. But in certain circumstances, regarding some cases, we came to the conclusion that a certain case must be rejected, because the committee failed to be convinced of all the administrative procedure that we followed," Begaj said. The deadline for submitting the request for recognition and verification of the status of a victim of sexual violence is five years from the beginning and formalization of the work of the Government Committee for the recognition and verification of the status of persons violated during the war. This committee officially started its work in February 2018.