Note: Place names rendered primarily in Serbian spelling---------------------------------------------------------
"This war is not over... We need more time to clean Kosovo. We will continue killing the KLA. Then we will start on Montenegro, our next stop.
All will belong to Serbia. As for the refugees, they will never come back - eighty percent of their homes are destroyed. They are scared to death of us... We will stop when everyone in Kosovo has a Serbian name."
Unidentified member of the Serbian paramilitary group "Frenki" Quoted by Sunday Times (London), June 6 - Podgorica, Montenegro
"As we go into Kosovo now, and as the refugees return to their homeland, we must be ready for what we know will be clear evidence of appalling atrocities and unbelievable cruelties, of as yet unknown numbers of people missing, tortured and dead. It will be hard to see, and hard to believe. It will be shocking."
Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair
Article in The Times (London), June 5 - London
" 'They gathered the bodies one by one on wheelbarrows,' said Halit Elizi, a 43-year-old farmer from Kosovo. 'I saw them come one by one, although in some cases there were two in one wheelbarrow. I saw it like it was in the palm of my hand.' Elizi had stumbled upon Serb paramilitaries, dressed in civilian clothes but all with shaved heads and red bandanas, performing a gruesome, shocking task. From 400 yards, the corpses appeared to be those of a group of 30 to 50 elderly residents of the southern Kosovo village of Musutiste, who had refused to leave with their relatives when ordered out by the Serbs seven days before. 'By about 1 p.m., the bodies were piled up like a little mountain' in the dirt road between Dolloc and Musutiste in southern Kosovo, Elizi said. 'And then the Serbs poured a lot of liquid over the corpses. I suppose it was gasoline.' The fire burned for four hours, the low flames pouring off a thick black smoke. The smell was almost unbearable, Elizi said, and the noise was unforgettable. 'It
was just like wood crackling,' he said. 'I didn't imagine that human bodies would have
made the same kind of noise.' When the fire had died, about 20 paramilitaries returned to the scene. 'This time, they wore white gloves up to their shoulders,' Elizi said. The Serbs scooped the remains of the fire into white sacks and carried the sacks back to Musutiste by foot. 'I think they were collecting bones and hard objects,' Elizi said... Two weeks ago, shortly before he and his family fled to Albania, Elizi went past the site of the fire again. This time, there was no trace of the fire and although it had rained in the interim, Elizi said it would have taken months of rain to completely wash away the ash. Instead, he believes, the Serbs came back and used water from the small river that runs alongside the road to wash away the evidence. Someone would have had to do that on purpose, he said."
Newsday (New York), June 7 - Kukes, Albania
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I. WIDESPREAD BURNING OF BODIES TO ELIMINATE WAR CRIMES EVIDENCE REPORTED IN KOSOVO
*Newsday (New York) reported yesterday: "According to NATO intelligence and accounts gathered from eyewitnesses by Newsday and the International War Crimes Tribunal at The Hague, Yugoslav forces in Kosovo have routinely incinerated the bodies of ethnic Albanian civilians killed during the conflict in what the witnesses and officials say is a systematic attempt to cover up war crimes... A NATO official in Brussels said in an interview Friday that the destruction of bodies has picked up in pace in the past four weeks. 'My sense is that there is a certain amount of nervousness on
the part of the VJ Yugoslav Army and possibly the MUP special interior police about post-war problems at The Hague tribunal,' the official said.
'And therefore some of these units have tried to clean up after themselves.' But, he said, 'It is my guess that it cannot be done. It will take time, but there is plenty of evidence of what they have done, and they will be held accountable'... There [are] also second-hand stories, bolstered by reports from U.S. intelligence, that indicate that in some locations the burning of bodies may have been more organized. Several people told Newsday they have heard from witnesses that Serbs forces are
using factories for incinerating bodies en masse. One U.S. official with access to NATO intelligence said there are numerous reports of factories with machinery that surveillance from the air indicates gets extremely hot and can be used for turning anything into ash. They are functioning at a time when there are no raw materials going into the plants. He added that smoke was coming out of the chimneys, but 'we don't know what's going in.' "
* The Observer (London) reported yesterday that "Serb forces are allegedly burning the bodies of their victims to destroy evidence of atrocities in Kosovo in advance of the arrival of war crimes investigators. Witnesses have told The Observer they have seen smoke rising from the Trepca mine as Serb death squads burn hundreds of corpses. Three separate sources have identified the Trepca mine controlled by financiers close to Slobodan Milosevic as the site where the Serbs have been burning bodies at a reported rate of at least 100 a day for the past two months. The bodies arrive in lorries, are incinerated in the smelter or a makeshift charnel house and the ashes are dumped in disused shafts. A third witness reported that 700 bodies had been burnt in the past few days. The dead mainly men and boys regarded as being of 'military age' in Serb eyes have come from exhumed mass graves in the Drenica valley and newly killed ethnic Albanian prisoners at the Smrekovnica jail, the personal killing ground of a Serb po
lice chief known and feared by the refugees as 'Vukcina' or 'Wolfman'...The Trepca mine, rich in chrome, is valued at nearly ú2 billion and jointly owned by Serb and Greek interests close to Milosevic. The Serbs
have reportedly been keen to keep Trepca in the 'zone' to be controlled by Russian troops, which would mean that the Serbs would be able to keep the riches of the mine and hide the evidence of massacre."
* Yesterday's Newsday report also noted that "The Hague tribunal has collected 'many statements' from eyewitnesses now in Albania and Macedonia regarding the burning of bodies by Serbian forces. These accounts indicate patterns that suggest there may have been specific directives about how to destroy evidence, an official said. In a case cited as typical by a tribunal official, security forces shot a number of individuals in a field and buried them there. Then, five days later, a different group of soldiers came, disinterred the corpses, poured gasoline over them and
burned them. 'It was deliberate, and it was a pattern,' said a tribunal aide. He said that even if no body could be found, the tribunal could still use the evidence of fire and human remains to corroborate the 'fairly powerful' statements by witnesses."
* Albania's Ambassador to NATO, Arturo Kuko, said June 3 that "Serbian troops are also heavily engaged in deleting the tracks of their crimes and massacres in Kosovo. Yesterday morning, the Serbian army transported with trucks the corpses of 130 men they had massacred in the village of Staradan a couple of days ago, they were buried separately in the village of Rakosh." Reuters May 28 cited Kuko saying "[that] Albania has received
[new] reports of atrocities by Serb forces in Kosovo, including a mass rape, the burning alive of 20 people and a roundup of intellectuals...Ambassador Artur Kuko said Serb forces destroyed a village near Suva Reka on April 6, segregated the men from their families and took away 70 women and 115 children. 'The women were brought to a place in the village where they have been systematically raped,'' he said, declining to name the village. The women were also told they would not see their men again, he told a news briefing. Kuko said Albanian authorities did not know where the village's 100 men had been taken. In other towns, men have been killed en masse or held in concentration camps... Kuko said Serb forces had begun another act of ethnic cleansing on May 26 in Ferizaj, where more than 400 houses had been set on fire and about 20 people burned alive. A campaign of ethnic cleansing had started on the same day in Gnjilane, mostly aimed at intellectuals remaining in the city, he said. 'We don't have as yet th
e number of those who have been killed and hurt but we have indications that at least 30 Kosovo intellectuals have been arrested and we know nothing
about their whereabouts,' he said."
* US Defense Department spokesman Ken Bacon said today that "we have received some reports and we may have more information on this soon, because we're looking into it in some reports of evidence to cover up of efforts to cover up evidence of war crimes, but we're looking for more information on that."
II. MASSACRES, EXPULSIONS CONTINUE INSIDE KOSOVO DESPITE PEACE TALKS
* The United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) reported today that "[recent arrivals in Macedonia] say Serbian troops were continuing a campaign of violence in major cities in Kosovo, evicting residents from their homes at gunpoint, looting and burning houses. Villages in the Gnjilane area were reported to be empty... There were reports among refugees from Pristina, Gnjilane, Kosovska Kamenica and Pec that the number of paramilitary and police forces had even increased despite the announcement in Belgrade that as part of the peace arrangement the military and police would withdraw from Kosovo."
* The Independent (London) noted today that "a group of 14 refugees, including women, who arrived [in Albania] yesterday, confirmed there had been a massacre in the Tusus district of the Kosovo town of Prizren last week, in which they said 50 of their neighbors had been killed." UNHCR reported June 2 that "Thursday's arrivals at Morini told UNHCR that Serb forces were detaining Kosovars at police and railway station and other public buildings for two or three days to be human shields. They said some 20 civilians were detained at each police station. The refugees gave accounts of continuing atrocities committed by Serbian troops against civilians in Kosovo. In one incident at Tusus, a suburb of Prizren, 25 people were allegedly killed by Serbian police on May 26. Police reportedly entered houses at random, forced males from 12 to 90 years of age onto courtyards and executed them. One refugee said seven close friends were among those killed. The report could not be verified."
* Agence France Presse reported today: " 'The situation on the ground in Kosovo is still quite grim,' said UNHCR spokesman Kris Janowski, adding 'Refugees told stories of continued wanton violence and destruction of property by Serb forces and no early signs of a Serb pull-out.' But he said that the numbers of new refugees had progressively diminished, from 410 on Friday to slightly more than 150 on Sunday. Janowski said that Kosovars arriving from Pristina had reported arbitrary arrests, including those of ethnic Albanian women students detained in Lipljan prison, adding that many Albanian homes had been taken over by Serbs in the Kosovo capital."
* Albania's Ambassador to NATO noted June 3 that Milosevic's "troops are very busy at this moment placing mines and booby-trapping many villages and roads all over Kosovo."
* UNHCR reported May 28 that "newly arrived refugees [in Macedonia] report horrific stories about recent events in two villages in Kacanik along the Macedonian frontier. One refugee - an elderly religious leader - says he had buried three young men killed on 26 May by Serbian paramilitary troops at Nika, a village of about 800 which is now empty. He said that young men had their eyes pulled out and their ears cut off. He says he also had to bury a father and son at nearby Dubrava. A refugee woman with six young daughters and 6-day-old son born while she was hiding says her husband was taken by Serbian soldiers, together with her two brothers and three men
from neighboring Bicevac. She still does not know what happened to them."
Continued attacks on displaced within Kosovo * Human Rights Watch (New York) noted June 4 that "ethnic Albanians who remain in Kosovo are particularly vulnerable to further atrocities by withdrawing Serbian and Yugoslav forces who, according to the proposed settlement, may soon leave the province, Human Rights Watch said today. The safety of these civilians must be a priority and steps must be taken to prevent an endgame of killing and destruction."
* Associated Press Saturday cited refugee accounts that "Serb shelling had recently killed and wounded large numbers of residents and displaced people from [Shtitarice and Dolak] villages. He [a refugee] claimed the gunners had targeted civilians several times. 'We had no medicine. We could only look at the wounded,' he said. He said the two villages remained surrounded by the Serb army." NATO General Walter Jertz yesterday cited "recent reports about Serb military shelling known IDP [internally displaced person] positions in the area around Mitrovica."
* In a briefing to the United Nations Security Council on his recent 11-day "Needs Assessment Mission" to Yugoslavia, UN Under Secretary-General Sergio Vieira de Mello said "the IDPs whom the mission came across [while in Kosovo] were living in miserable conditions, often close to their homes. Those interviewed felt that Yugoslav forces would not allow their return. Others claimed that they would be harmed if they returned. AntiAlbanian and proSerb slogans painted on buildings were evident in areas abandoned by Albanians... The humanitarian needs of the internally displaced and civilian populations in Kosovo are urgent and immense. Emergency relief for the internally displaced population inside Kosovo whose total estimated number remains above half a million is urgently required."
Smrekovnica prison used for torture, filled with new prisoners
* Associated Press reported Saturday that "86 men from two [Kosovo] villages crossed into Albania after being released earlier in the day from [Smrekovnica] prison where they had been held for four days for alleged links to Kosovo guerrillas. Bedri Selmani said he and many of the others were beaten with wooden staves and kicked by Serb police as they walked toward Albania. Some of the refugees had to be helped across the border, and were treated by medical workers for severe bruises... Selmani and other refugees said the men, aged 16 to 60, had been taken from the villages of Shtitarice and Dolak, northwest of the Kosovo capital of Pristina, to the prison." The Independent (London) reported Saturday that refugees fleeing Kosovo "said that the Serbs had brought up to 800 new prisoners to the big... jail in mid-week, replacing those who had been freed and allowed to cross to Albania in over the past two weeks."
* The Associated Press report noted that "the men [released from prison] were made to sign vague confessions about being terrorists and stripped of identity documents. But all were released after four days. The interrogations at Smrekovnica have puzzled observers because the questioning apparently elicits little intelligence about the KLA and requires considerable Serb resources." However, in a May 30 report on prisoners released from the prison, the New York Times noted that "the most chilling detail is the confession many said they were forced to sign saying that they were members of the Kosovo Liberation Army....With the stroke of a pen, without having to kill anyone, the Serbs had a piece of paper giving them an excuse to expel any Kosovar Albanian with no right ever to come back. 'Now they have all these documents, but we were forced to sign,' said Shyqri Qeliku, 35, who said he was held for nearly two weeks before being released on Friday morning. 'The Serbs can use these documents to say we were all
in the KLA.' The men's accounts suggest that Serbian officials, in essence, are cycling Albanians through the prison -- and at least one other closer to Macedonia, officials from the United Nations refugee agency say -- as yet another means to purge Kosovo of ethnic Albanians. Refugee officials agree, adding that stripping them of their identification cards seemed aimed at making any return to Kosovo that much harder." UNHCR reported today that "altogether more than 2,500 detainees have been released from this prison and arrived in northern Albania over the past two weeks. Some reported that their release was to make room for new detainees."
* Citing one refugee report, the Scotsman (Edinburgh) reported June 4 that at one point inside Smrekovnica prison "around 30 Serbian boys, aged from 10-15 were brought into [a] hall and told [by the police] to beat the Albanians. [One prisoner, who had fled to the Albania] said: 'They [the boys] were a bit shy at first but when the policemen had shown them how to do it they got excited and demanded that they get their turn."
* Albania's Ambassador to NATO said June 3 that "thousands of Albanians remain in the prison of Mitrovica [assumed to be Smrekovnica prison, three miles southeast of Mitrovica], there are reports of executions in this place as well, this was confirmed by at least 162 people that crossed the Albanian border with Kosovo yesterday."
* Agence France Presse noted May 30 that "many [released prisoners] were afraid to speak to journalists, citing the case of one prisoner who had been savagely beaten in Mitrovica jail after his brother had given an interview to Albanian television on release."
* The KLA news agency Kosovapress reported May 30: "At the fast-food restaurant called Pranvera, located close to the small mosque and in front of the electrical management building of Ferizaj, is another concentration camp in which Kosovar civilians are being tortured and murdered. We have learned of the conditions inside this camp from depositions, both in writing and in interviews, from more than 200 former inmates. It is determined that this camp has been open for more than two months and that more than 3,000 civilians from Ferizaj, Kaganik, Shtime and Shterpce have been brought to the camp, including many women, children and the elderly. According to witnesses, a large number of Kosovars that entered the camp have been murdered; nobody knows how they died or who were they. The camp is directed by men from the security apparatus of the Milosevic state who have been known for years for their brutality. Nebojsha Gjorgjevic, Dragan Jashovic, Serbolub Vujovic and Radovan Klaric have been identified over and
over again by our witnesses as the ones directing the torture, humiliation and murder of innocent Kosovar civilians."
Serbian forces shell civilians in Albania and Macedonia
* The New York Times reported today that "on Saturday, Serbian soldiers stepped up their shelling of Albanian border towns, dropping at least 10 shells into the town of Krume, where hundreds of Albanian refugees from Kosovo have been living. The shelling, just before midnight, prompted a mass exodus today of scared refugees to the town of Kukes, 10 miles from the border. 'When they signed the agreement, then they started to attack even more,' said Xhevahire Rada, 49, whose roof was destroyed and who decided to leave Krume, where she was born, with two children and two relatives who are refugees from Kosovo. Bjoern Kuehne, head of the Krume office of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which monitors fighting along the border, said Serbian shells had started falling on settlements not known to harbor any K.L.A. fighters, like Golaj, Perollaj and Nikoliq, where two 14-year-old girls were wounded. Before, he said, the shelling was limited to towns like Krume, where the guerrilla army is act
ive. 'This is much more indiscriminate than anything we ever had before,' Mr. Kuehne said. 'They seem to be trying to do as much damage as possible as long as they are there.' " The Guardian (London) reported today that Kuehne "[said that] a total of 21 shells had landed around the town and its neighbouring villages, injuring two young girls. 'It is sheer luck people were not killed,' he said."
* Associated Press reported today that "more than 50 mortar rounds launched from Yugoslav territory have landed inside Macedonia during the past three days, the interior ministry said Monday. Macedonian police said at least 20 rounds exploded in the area around the border town of Jazince, 30 kilometers (20 miles) northwest of Skopje, at about 3 a.m. (0100 GMT) Monday, the ministry said in a statement. No causalities were reported. The mortar rounds damaged the walls and roofs of three houses, one vehicle and a school yard, the report said. Several rounds landed in nearby fields.
More than 30 detonations were heard Saturday around the border area of Malino. Police have located about 20 shell craters, and one round reportedly damaged the local electricity distribution system, leaving the village temporarily without power. The press service of the rebel Kosovo Liberation Army said damage in Jazince was much heavier than Macedonia reported. It said Serbs had attacked with 'heavy artillery,' destroying 'a considerable number of houses.' "
*UNHCR reported today that "around 800 people crossed into the FYR of Macedonia over the past three days amid artillery and mortar fire heard from the Kosovo side of the border... Meanwhile, around 300 people fled into Albania from Kosovo over the past three days." Associated Press reported today that "260 mostly male refugees from Kosovo arrived [today] in the border village of Odri, near Jazince. The men appeared to be in bad shape, many were without shoes, officials said. The refugees said they had been walking six days through the mountains to reach Macedonia."
III. INTERNATIONAL RESCUE COMMITTEE IN SUCCESSFUL AIR DROP TO DISPLACED IN KOSOVO
* The Guardian (London) reported June 5 that the International Rescue Committee (IRC) has now "flown three missions over Kosovo. The first, a leafleting flight, ran into anti-aircraft fire and technical problems prevented the second from dropping more than a fraction of its food rations. 'But we had a very successful drop this morning,' [IRC spokesman Mark Bartolini] said. The rations, supplied by the US government's Agency for International Development, each contain two meals, biscuits, peanut butter and jelly, sufficient for one person per day. Mr. Bartolini said the two cargo planes, with Moldovan crews, had yet to drop full loads of 4,000
rations each in the mountains of Kosovo but he hoped they could begin doing so from next Monday... Rations are being dropped as individual packets rather than parachuted in on pallets. Mr Bartolini said the airdrops would continue even when Serb troops begin retreating from Kosovo. Yugoslavia protested yesterday against humanitarian airdrops over Kosovo. 'Such air drops are risky and could cause serious incidents,' the Yugoslav foreign ministry said in a statement on Serbian state television. 'There is no reason to deliver humanitarian aid in this way, as there are no obstacles to delivering it on the basis of co-operation with our authorities and
institutions, with their consent and supervision.' "
* The Ottowa Citizen (Canada) reported June 2 that "none of the convoys which have entered Kosovo with aid packages for both Serb and ethnic Albanian people has succeeded in getting any food to the people hiding in the hills." The Guardian (London) noted May 28 that "the Red Cross, which now has a base in Pristina, Kosovo's provincial capital, has been bringing in aid by trucks, some of which have been stopped by Serbs who have stolen their supplies despite Belgrade's assurances of free passage."
* NATO spokesman Jamie Shea noted May 28 "there are 12 humanitarian convoys in Yugoslavia today. None of them, not one, to Kosovo. Secondly, there are 28 lorries being blocked by the Yugoslav Army at the boarder in Montenegro on the assumption that they don't have the right documents and a lot of the food has been directly confiscated from those lorries by the Yugoslav Army. This is a flagrant violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1239 which calls for access for the United Nations and for all other humanitarian personnel operating in Kosovo and other parts of Yugoslavia. Thirdly, we have from UN sources, from the UN Mission that was in Kosovo in the last couple of days, reports that in Urosevac aid parcels which had been sent by the UN Food Programme, World Food Programme, were on sale in a shop in Urosevac. Others are in warehouses operated by the Yugoslav Red Cross. We have no evidence that any of that food is getting to the 550,000 displaced persons inside Kosovo at the present time."
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"The mission traveled extensively for three days throughout the main road axis of Kosovo, and discovered with the exception, in particular of Pristina, where little destruction is visible and where one third of its original population is said to remain a depressing panorama of empty villages, burned houses, looted shops, wandering livestock and unattended farms. The extent of damage to and looting of private property, primarily houses, apartment buildings, shops and small businesses throughout the province and clear signs that inhabitants had fled on very short notice, probably in terror, was the most disturbing finding. In some areas approximately 80% of homes had been burnt. Two separate incidents of houseburning witnessed by the mission in areas where no fighting was occurring, undermined official explanations that most damage had been caused in firefights between Yugoslav forces and the KLA. In one town visited, Kosovska Mitrovica, where large sections of the town had been burnt and looted, the head o
f the regional government in reply to my question as to what the police forces had done to prevent organized antiAlbanian vandalism admitted that the police had targeted most ethnic Albanianowned property to prevent their homes and shops from being used by KLA sympathizers... Even allowing for spontaneous, uncontrolled brutality, the Team collected indisputable evidence of organized, wellplanned violence against civilians, aimed at displacing and permanently deporting them, which calls for urgent independent investigation."
United Nations Under-SecretaryGeneral Sergio Vieira de Mello From briefing to the U.N. Security Council on his recent 11-day "Needs
Assessment Mission", June 3 - Geneva
