Sonmez is suspected of having performed in Kosovo several dozen operations as part of an international ring of human organ smugglers. Among the suspects is also a former senior official of the Kosovo Health Ministry and an Israeli citizen.

A judge of the European Union rule of law mission in Kosovo (EULEX), Jonathan Ratel, said earlier this month that poor people, brought to Kosovo from abroad, were given promises that they would receive money for their organs which were later sold on the black market and transplanted to rich patients.

On January 7, Ratel interviewed in Pristina seven people from Kosovo accused of being a part of an international ring of human organ smugglers, saying at the time that Sonmez was the key surgeon in operations that were performed at the private clinic "Medikus" in Pristina.

The media in Pristina say the judge has one more week to decide if the charges are founded so that a trial could start.

Ratel said last month that organs were taken from poor people from Russia, Moldova, Kazakhstan and Turkey, and were then sold on the black market and transplanted to rich patients from Canada, Germany, Poland and Israel, who paid for the transplants up to 90,000 euros. The indictment charges seven Kosovars of recruiting 20 people from Moldova, Kazakhstan, Russia and Turkey.

The indictees and their attorneys have dismissed the charges as groundless.

An attorney for the main Kosovo indictee, urologist Lufti Dervishi, said there was an attempt to link this case with the report by Dick Marty, rapporteur of the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly, which he said had nothing to do with the case.

Marty's report in December 2010 caused outrage in Kosovo due to allegations that senior officers of the former Kosovo Liberation Army, led by resigned Prime Minister Hashim Thaci, had been involved in illegal organ trading.