NEW YORK - A memorandum of the Yugoslav government on the implementation of
Resolution 1244, on the anniversary of its adoption, points to assessments
about the failure of the KFOR and UNMIK missions so far and the demand that
from Kosovo and Metohija be withdrawn those forces that are directly
responsible for the systematic violation of the Resolution.

The document was delivered Wednesday evening to Security Council chairman,
French Ambassador Jean-David Levite, and to U.N. Secretary General Kofi
Annan accompanied by a letter of the Yugoslav head of mission to the U.N.,
Ambassador Vladislav Jovanovic.

The memorandum, just as previous similar documents of the Yugoslav
government, will be published as an official document of the Security
Council.

Following is the text of the memorandum of the Yugoslav government on the
implementation of Security Council Resolution 1244 (1999) from June 10,
1999;

I. FAILURE OF THE INTERNATIONAL MISSION UNDER THE AUSPICES OF THE UNITED
NATIONS IN KOSOVO AND METOHIJA

1. Sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia over Kosovo and Metohija are inviolable and final: Security
Council resolution 1244 (1999), the Military Technical Agreement and the
Chernomyrdin-Ahtisaari document have unambiguously reaffirmed the
sovereignty and territorial integrity of the FR of Yugoslavia in Kosovo and
Metohija (preambular para 10; Annex 2, para 8).

The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the Republic of Serbia have carried
out all their obligations under Security Council resolution 1244 (1999) and
the Military Technical Agreement.

2. Systematic non-implementation and flagrant violation of Security Council
resolution 1244 (1999) and the Military-Technical Agreement by KFOR and
UNMIK: In the past year of their mandate in the southern Serbian Province,
KFOR and UNMIK have consciously avoided to implement Security Council
resolution 1244 (1999) and the Military Technical Agreement or have
deliberately and grossly breached them, in violation of the sovereignty and
territorial integrity of the FR of Yugoslavia and the Republic of Serbia.
They have thus discredited themselves as impartial and well-meaning
international trouble shooters having the mandate of the world Organization.
Such an attitude on the part of KFOR and UNMIK, as well as the Security
Council of the United Nations, as the body with primary responsibility for a
consistent implementation of its resolution 1244 and related documents, are
the underlying cause of the dramatic deterioration of the security and
overall situation in the Province, which is now much worse than it was prior
to the NATO armed aggression against the FR of Yugoslavia.

KFOR and UNMIK have not fulfilled any of the provisions of the Resolution
and the Military Technical Agreement-

- Those relating to full and strict respect for the sovereignty and
territorial integrity of the Republic of Serbia and the FR of Yugoslavia
(preambular para 10, and para 8 of Annex 2 of the resolution) that are
systematically and deliberately violated by UNMIK's Head B. Kouchner and
other representatives of UNMIK and KFOR. By their decisions which
systematically undermine the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the FR
of Yugoslavia and the Republic of Serbia, KFOR and UNMIK are acting
complicit with the Albanian separatists and terrorists in their efforts to
ensure preconditions for separating Kosovo and Metohija from the unified
constitutional-legal, monetary-financial, economic, educational, judicial
and other systems of the FR of Yugoslavia and the Republic of Serbia. They
are thus directly encouraging and helping the achievement of the separatist
aspirations of Albanian terrorists and their political leaders and working
against the goals of peace, stability and development in the region.

Placing the UN Mission in Kosovo and Metohija at the service of Albanian
separatist-terrorist forces, with the aim of destroying the State
sovereignty of a UN Member State, constitutes a dangerous precedent in the
practice of UN peace-keeping operations that negates the essential values of
the fundamental principles of the Charter of the United Nations and goes
against UN peace missions as such.

- The basic human rights of Serbs, Muslims, Roma, Goranci, Turks, Egyptians
and other non- Albanian population have been violated on a massive scale
(operative para 11j). The fundamental human right of these people, i.e. the
right to life, has been threatened since the deployment of the international
mission.

- The terrorist so-called "Kosovo Liberation Army" and other armed Albanian
gangs have not been demilitarized, disarmed or disbanded (operative para
9b).

- Personal and property safety as well as equality and a safe environment
for all inhabitants, as an essential precondition for a safe return of
refugees and displaced persons, and an unimpeded delivery of humanitarian
assistance (operative para 9c), have not been ensured.

- The laws and other regulations of the Republic of Serbia and the FR of
Yugoslavia have not been respected; there is no public order and peace
(operative para 9d) or free movement of the population.

- The return of members of VJ and MUP to Kosovo and Metohija has been
prevented without any basis (operative para 4, paras 6 and 10 of Annex 2 of
the resolution and para 4 of the Military Technical Agreement).

- International borders of the FR of Yugoslavia to Albania and Macedonia
have neither been guarded nor secured (operative para 9g). KFOR and UNMIK
have allowed unhindered and illegal entry into Kosovo and Metohija of more
than 250,000 people, who are not citizens of the FR of Yugoslavia, mainly
terrorists and other Albanian armed gangs of criminals.

The Province has been turned into Europe's centre of terrorism, organized
international crime, trafficking in drugs and arms, illicit trade in women
and children, "money laundering", etc.

- Systematic violation of Security Council resolution 1244 has prevented the
initiation of a political process to settle the status of the Province
within the Republic of Serbia and the FR of Yugoslavia (operative para 11a).

- In violation of their obligation to respect the sovereignty and
territorial integrity of the FR of Yugoslavia and the Republic of Serbia,
KFOR and UNMIK have continuously refused to cooperate with the competent
authorities of the FR of Yugoslavia in the discharge of the UN peace-keeping
mission in its territory. Consequently, they are directly feeding Albanian
separatist ambitions in Kosovo and Metohija, in direct contravention of the
crucial provisions and the main goal of Security Council resolution 1244 and
the related documents.

3. Total fiasco of the international presence under UN auspices in Kosovo
and Metohija: Continuing deterioration of the overall situation in the
Province is along the lines of efforts to cause artificially a prolonged
destabilization in the region, with a view to finding justification for NATO
to stay in the region and to revive its prestige and authority that have
been seriously eroded by its illegal aggression against the FR of
Yugoslavia. Continued manipulations with very malicious statements by KFOR
and UNMIK officials about alleged success of the international mission in
the Province, despite being proven unequivocally wrong by the disastrous
situation on the ground, bear witness to it.

The overall track record of the discharge of the one-year mandate of the
international security (KFOR) and civil (UNMIK) presences in Kosovo and
Metohija, under UN auspices, as set out in Security Council resolution 1244
(1999), is disastrous in all its aspects.

II. SYSTEMATIC VIOLATION OF THE SOVEREIGNTY AND TERRITORIAL INTEGRITY OF THE
FR OF YUGOSLAVIA AND THE MANDATE OF THE SECURITY COUNCIL OF THE UNITED
NATIONS

1. Decisions of UNMIK and K:Regulations of the Special Representative of the
United Nations Secretary-General and Head of UNMIK B. Kouchner have no
grounding in the resolution and are aimed at severing all links between
Kosovo and Metohija and the Republic of Serbia and the FR of Yugoslavia,
i.e. fully separating the Province from the constitutional, legal, economic,
monetary, financial, banking, customs, visa, administrative and other
systems of the FR of Yugoslavia and the Republic of Serbia.

Regulations and decisions of the Head of UNMIK, B. Kouchner, undermine
systematically and directly the State sovereignty of the FR of Yugoslavia
and the Republic of Serbia in Kosovo and Metohija, the basic principle
guaranteed by Security Council resolution 1244 (1999), and decry the legal
basis and prerogatives of statehood of the State of Serbia and the FR of
Yugoslavia in that southern Serbian province, as an integral part of the
Republic of Serbia and the FR of Yugoslavia.

- The so-called Interim Administration Council, a de facto Provincial
"Government", composed of Albanians, mostly from the ranks of the terrorist
so-called Kosovo Liberation Army and Albanian separatist political parties,
is an illegal political creation aimed at legalizing ethnic supremacy of
Albanians, with a view to carving out an ethnically pure Kosovo and
Metohija.

The repeated attempts of the Special Representative to include in that body
the Serbs, chosen by himself according to his own criteria mostly for
offices of peripheral political importance and influence, are part and
parcel of the same overall strategy of the Special Representative to
legalize the status quo at the expense of the interests of Serbs and other
non-Albanians.

- The decision of UNMIK on an alleged transformation of the terrorist
so-called Kosovo Liberation Army into a supposedly civilian organization,
the Kosovo Protection Corps (KPC), is illegal having no grounding in
Security Council resolution 1244 (1999) and the related documents and taking
into account that the Security Council was not consulted on its adoption.

It has been proved beyond doubt that the Kosovo Protection Corps is a
military/terrorist formation and one of the principal generators of the
worsening of the situation and the crisis in the Province. Evidence of it
being the report submitted by the UNMIK Human Rights Unit of 29 February
2000, which has been deliberately hidden from the eyes of the international
public, so as to hoodwink it and mislead it into believing in an alleged
success of the international presence in Kosovo and Metohija, under United
Nations auspices.

- Issuance of identification documents: UNMIK has no authority to issue
identification documents to Yugoslav citizens from Kosovo and Metohija.
Consequently, the so-called Kouchner's passports and other personal
documents constitute an act of the most flagrant violation of the provisions
of Security Council resolution 1244 and of the principles of the Charter of
the United Nations relating to the respect for the sovereignty and
territorial integrity of the FR of Yugoslavia. Such acts are legally null
and void and are absolutely unacceptable from the point of view of the
Charter of the United Nations and international law.

Allowing foreign citizens to enter the FR of Yugoslavia via border crossings
temporarily controlled by UNMIK and KFOR, without a proper Yugoslav visa, is
incompatible with international law and the practice of UN peace missions.

The Government of the FR of Yugoslavia has most strongly protested against
such acts aimed at disrupting the uniform regime of identification documents
for Yugoslav citizens and called on all States and international
organizations not to accept, in accordance with international law, documents
illegally issued by UNMIK.

- Functioning of the judiciary: Security Council resolution 1244 (1999)
envisages that the judicial system in Kosovo and Metohija operates in line
with the Yugoslav legislation and within the judicial system of the Republic
of Serbia and the FR of Yugoslavia.

Through an illegitimate and illegal regulation, the Special Representative
has established judicial organs in Kosovo and Metohija which conduct
criminal proceedings without honouring the Yugoslav laws in force and
violating the basic principles of criminal law set forth in international
conventions.

Particularly unacceptable and unbecoming of a United Nations mission is the
practice of double standards applied to the detriment of Serbs and
Montenegrins in cases of arrest, institution and conduct of investigation,
detention, determination of the right to defence, use of the mother tongue,
etc.

466 Serbs are currently being detained in prisons. They have been arrested
only on the ground of information provided by the Albanians, most frequently
the members of the terrorist so-called Kosovo Liberation Army.

2. Construction of foreign military bases and foreign (NATO/KFOR) military
exercises: The Government of the FR of Yugoslavia has most vigorously
opposed the construction of military bases and the conduct of military
exercises by foreign armies in a part of its sovereign territory without its
approval. This is the most flagrant violation of its sovereignty and of the
provisions of Security Council resolution 1244 (1999) as well as of the laws
in force in the Republic of Serbia and the FR of Yugoslavia. This is further
inconsistent with the character and spirit of peace missions under the
auspices of the United Nations and sets a dangerous precedent, contrary to
the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

3. Visits by foreign officials and "representation" of some foreign
countries without the consent of the competent authorities of the FR of
Yugoslavia: They constitute the most flagrant form of violation of the
principles of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the FR of
Yugoslavia, in gross breach of the principles of the Charter of the United
Nations, provisions of the Vienna Conventions on diplomatic and consular
relations, the Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the United
Nations as well as of prevalent international practice.

Accordingly, the illegal practice put in place by UNMIK of giving "approval"
for the establishment of para-diplomatic missions of foreign States in
Kosovo and Metohija and for the construction of "cultural centres" of some
States, such as Saudi Arabia's, in any part of the single Yugoslav
territory, without an explicit agreement of the competent authorities of the
FR of Yugoslavia, is totally unacceptable.

The Government of the FR of Yugoslavia most strongly condemns the recent
illegal visit to the southern Serbian Province of the President of the
Republic of Albania, Rexhep Meidani, as well as his meetings with UNMIK and
KFOR officials. This undisguised provocation against the FR of Yugoslavia
and an act of the most flagrant violation of the State sovereignty and
territorial integrity of the FR of Yugoslavia is in the function of a direct
support to Albanian separatists and terrorists in Kosovo and Metohija.

4. Disrespect for the State symbols of the FR of Yugoslavia: The fact that
the symbols of the State of the FR of Yugoslavia, primarily its flag, are
not displayed at its international border crossings with Albania and
Macedonia and that other border signs have been removed constitutes a gross
violation of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the FR of
Yugoslavia.

5. Invalidity of KFOR and UNMIK decisions: The FR of Yugoslavia considers
null and void and without any legal effect and as non-binding on itself and
its authorities the conduct and decisions of KFOR and UNMIK, particularly
those of Special Representative of the United Nations Secretary-General and
Head of UNMIK B. Kouchner, which disregard or violate the principles of
sovereignty and territorial integrity of the FR of Yugoslavia, as well as
all measures, acts and omissions of acts which are contrary to Security
Council resolution 1244 (1999) or the Military Technical Agreement or
represent an attempt at their revision.

The Government of the FR of Yugoslavia has never ceded, nor does it intend
to do so, the sovereignty over any part of its territory and rejects most
strongly the tactics of deception and the diversion of attention from the
alliance of UNMIK and KFOR with the terrorist so-called Kosovo Liberation
Army. In particular, it repudiates all acts carried out along the line of
fait accompli.

6. UNMIK's and KFOR's non-cooperation with the competent authorities of the
FR of Yugoslavia and the Republic of Serbia: Persistently refusing to
cooperate with the relevant authorities in the FR of Yugoslavia and the
Republic of Serbia, KFOR and UNMIK have grossly violated the obligation to
respect the State sovereignty and territorial integrity of the FR of
Yugoslavia and the Republic of Serbia.

Primary responsibility for such conduct on the part of KFOR and UNMIK lies
with the United Nations which has refused to sign with the Government of the
FR of Yugoslavia, as the host, a comprehensive agreement on the status of
the peace mission. In this context, it is completely unacceptable and
inappropriate to a peace mission under United Nations auspices that a
delegation of the Security Council of the United Nations avoid contact with
the Government of the country which it visited and which invited it.

III. MASSIVE VIOLATIONS OF HUMAN RIGHTS

1. Responsibility of KFOR and UNMIK: The sole responsibility for massive
violation of human rights in the Province, for lawlessness, chaos and
breaches of the provisions of Security Council resolution 1244 (1999)
relating to the preservation of the multi-ethnic, multi-religious and
multi-cultural character of the Province is borne by KFOR and UNMIK which
have become directly accessory to ethnic cleansing and genocide.

2. Terror and violence: Albanian terror and violence, the ethnic cleansing
of, and genocide against, non-Albanians, primarily Serbs and Montenegrins,
but also the Roma, Muslims, Turks, Goranci and other non-Albanians, the
destruction of their homes, usurpation and destruction of private and State
property and rampant crime and chaos in Kosovo and Metohija continue
unabated despite the presence of about 50,000 well-armed members of KFOR and
UNMIK policemen.

An average ten people are killed or abducted in terrorist attacks in the
Province every day. KFOR and UNMIK have thus become complicit in the most
serious crimes against Serbs and other non- Albanian population and bear the
greatest responsibility for the lack of minimum security for Serbs and
non-Albanians in the Province.

Verbal support for the multi-ethnic, multi-confessional and multi-cultural
Kosovo and Metohija is a mere exercise in hypocrisy by KFOR and UNMIK,
taking into account that due to their non-implementation and gross violation
of Security Council resolution 1244 (1999), the former composition of the
population has been forcibly altered.

- Ethnic cleansing: Since the deployment of KFOR and UNMIK, more than
360,000 Serbs, Montenegrins, Roma, Muslims, Turks, Goranci and other
non-Albanians, accounting for two thirds of the entire non-Albanian
population of Kosovo and Metohija, have been forcibly driven out of the
Province. However, systematic ethnic cleansing continues while KFOR and
UNMIK are doing nothing to prevent it.

Ethnic cleansing of Serbs and Montenegrins has already been completed in
most of Kosovo and Metohija. Therefore, Albanian terrorists are now
concentrating, with an overt assistance and support of KFOR and UNMIK, their
attacks on the few remaining Serb enclaves, primarily on Kosovska Mitrovica
and some Serb villages completely surrounded by Albanians.

Unwillingness of KFOR and UNMIK to put a stop to it and cynical insistence,
at the same time, on the establishment of multi-ethnic communities at any
cost, particularly the so-called security zones, in the remaining Serb
enclaves testify to the direct collusion between Albanian terrorists and
international forces in Kosovo and Metohija in the process of ethnic
cleansing of the Province of its non-Albanians, the Serbs in particular.

On the other hand, there is no mention of Pristina, for instance, which had
a population of 40,000 Serbs and Montenegrins, of whom less than 100
remained after KFOR and UNMIK were deployed. Illustrative in this respect is
the fact that of the former 25,000 school and university students in
Pristina only 35 are now attending classes outside Pristina in the village
of Laplje Selo.

KFOR and UNMIK have done nothing to restore the former multi-ethnic
structures in Prizren, Pec, Orahovac, Djakovica, Glogovac and many other
towns and villages of Kosovo and Metohija. On the contrary, by publicly
denying the existence of conditions for it, the responsible officials of the
United Nations, KFOR and UNMIK are, in effect, discouraging Serbs to return
in large numbers to their ancestral homes and directly contribute to
reinforcing the mono-ethnicity of the Province.

Similarly, a perfidious policy of constant demonization of Serbs aimed at
justifying the real intentions of Albanian separatists and terrorists is
another attempt by KFOR and UNMIK to cover up their own complicity in the
process of systematic ethnic cleansing of everything of non-Albanian,
especially Serbian provenance, in the Province.

Albanians themselves, loyal citizens of the Republic of Serbia and the FR of
Yugoslavia who refuse to toe the line, are increasingly being targeted by
Albanian terrorists and criminals.

During the month of May Albanian terrorists carried out a number of attacks
on Croats living in the village of Janjevo, which has been virtually emptied
under pressure from the terrorist so-called Kosovo Liberation Army. (Of its
1,500 Croat inhabitants about 350 remained behind.)

- Terrorism: 4,878 terrorist attacks (4,590 against Serbs and Montenegrins)
were carried out in the period from 10 June 1999 through 31 May 2000. In the
same period 1,027 persons (902 Serbs and Montenegrins) were killed; 955 (898
Serbs and Montenegrins) were wounded and 945 (869 Serbs and Montenegrins)
were abducted and missing. More than 50,000 homes, mostly those belonging to

Serbs, Montenegrins and Roma, were destroyed, burned down or severely
damaged.

- New forms of ethnic cleansing and other serious crimes against Serbs: KFOR
members have continued their practice of harassing Serbs. The latest
examples thereof being the incident where KFOR armoured personnel carriers
and dogs were used against local Serbs in the village of Babin Most,
municipality of Obilic (on 31 May). They protested over the brutal murder of
Milutin Trajkovic.

- "Labour" camps and prisons for Serbs: KFOR and UNMIK have done nothing to
help with the release of Serb civilians, who have been detained by the
terrorist so-called Kosovo Liberation Army in the "labour camps" in Kosovo
and Metohija, which are under strict control and to which not even ICRC
representatives have access. Furthermore, KFOR and UNMIK as well as other
international humanitarian organizations have not made any effort to have
several hundred Serbs abducted in Kosovo and Metohija and now detained in
the Republic of Albania, set free.

Even though this is the most inhuman violation of individual human rights
and fundamental freedoms, of which it is fully aware, the International
Force in Kosovo and Metohija is trying to downplay the problem of spreading
the information that there is allegedly lack of evidence and that any
parallels may be drawn between the abducted Serbs and the Albanian
terrorists and criminals convicted as an outcome of due process of the law
and now serving their well-deserved sentences.

- Destruction of cultural and historic sites: Destruction of Serbian
cultural monuments, the symbols of the centuries' old roots of Serbian
statehood and spirituality in the region of Kosovo and Metohija continues
unabated. 86 churches and medieval monasteries have been destroyed, burned
or seriously damaged.

- Discrimination and a cultural and spiritual genocide against Serbs: Under
the auspices of the United Nations, UNMIK has tolerated and encouraged by
its actions discrimination against Serbs, especially in education (closing
of universities and schools), culture and the media in the Serbian language.

Discrimination against Serbs and Montenegrins is particularly evident in the
judiciary, education, employment, etc. By contrast, Albanians irrespective
of their skills are favoured to any other ethnic groups, which is a gross
violation of the principle of equality of various ethnic communities and the
principle of multiethnicity.

The Albanian names of streets, settlements and institutions have been forced
upon. UNMIK has not only turned a blind eye to this practice but has
directly taken part in it.

3. Disarmament of the terrorist so-called Kosovo Liberation Army: The report
of UNMIK's Human Right Unit (dated 29 February 2000) unequivocally confirmed
the well-documented arguments of the Government of the FR of Yugoslavia that
the terrorists of the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army had neither been
disarmed nor demilitarized and that the alleged transformation of the
terrorist so-called Kosovo Liberation Army into the so-called Kosovo
Protection Corps was a charade and a manipulation, staged to avoid the
obligation to genuinely demilitarize and disarm this illegal terrorist
organization.

KFOR and UNMIK, and Special Representative B. Kouchner in particular, bear
full responsibility for the establishment, with their blessing, of an
illegal Albanian armed formation, composed mostly of notorious Albanian, as
well as international terrorists, recruited in neighbouring and other States
known for fomenting international terrorism, including Islamic extremists
from Chechnya.

- Criminalization of the Province: KFOR and UNMIK bear sole responsibility
for the state of chaos, lawlessness and general criminalization of the
Province.

This state of affairs casts a long pall of disgrace over the United Nations,
because Kosovo and Metohija has been turned into a stronghold of
international organized crime and terrorism and a haven of narco-mafia,
smugglers of arms, purveyors of white slavery, juvenile crime and
prostitution in Central and Western Europe. This is not only an important
source of income for the implementation of the separatist- terrorist
strategy developed by Albanian extremists in Kosovo and Metohija, but had an
important share in the criminalization and destabilization of Europe as a
whole and in preventing the ongoing integration processes.

According to German federal police, Albanian criminals and terrorists in
Kosovo and Metohija are responsible for the import of 80 per cent of
Europe's heroin. The annual "revenue" from the laundering of "proceeds" from
illicit trafficking in drugs and arms through a network of 200 banks and
foreign exchange bureaux amounts to US$ 1.5 billion. Even in the notoriously
biased West, it is no longer concealed that 30-50 per cent of the money
spent on arms by the terrorist so-called Kosovo Liberation Army derives from
illicit drug trade.

According to UNMIK police commissioner for the Pristina area Jules Moreaux
in the period since January 2000 alone, DM 6 million has been stolen from
non-governmental organizations in Pristina. It is characteristic, in this
respect, that large sums have been stolen just from one Islamic NGO.

Despite the state of an overall criminalization of the Province, UNMIK has
started preparations to re-admit tens of thousands of Albanian criminals
deported from Western Europe (Switzerland, Germany, etc.), thus additionally
intensifying the ethnic cleansing of Serbs, Montenegrins, Roma and other
non- Albanians in the Province.

4. Voter registration and local elections in Kosovo and Metohija: Under
Security Council resolution 1244 (1999), UNMIK has no authority to issue
identification documents to Yugoslav citizens of Kosovo and Metohija or to
conduct voter registration and hold elections in the Province. In accordance
with the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the FR of Yugoslavia, that
right has been vested in the competent State authorities of the Republic of
Serbia and the FR of Yugoslavia alone, in line with the existing
legislation.

Fair and democratic elections in Kosovo and Metohija will be possible to
organize only after necessary conditions have been created and after
appropriate structures of local government (substantial autonomy) for which
elections will be held have been established as an outcome of a
comprehensive political process, with active and equal participation of the
official authorities and institutions of the Republic of Serbia and the FR
of Yugoslavia and the representatives of all ethnic communities in Kosovo
and Metohija, as well as an appropriate participation of representatives of
the UN Security Council.

The Government of the FR of Yugoslavia repudiates strongly all attempts to
call elections in Kosovo and Metohija as long as the basic conditions, i.e.
peace and stability under Security Council resolution 1244 (1999), have not
been created.

To that end, it is necessary to ensure, first and foremost, a free and safe
return of all expelled Serbs and other non-Albanians, to deport more than
250,000 foreign nationals who entered Kosovo and Metohija illegally after
the deployment of KFOR and UNMIK and to reach agreement with the Government
of the Republic of Serbia and the Government of the FR of Yugoslavia on the
basic parameters of a political settlement for Kosovo and Metohija, in line
with Security Council resolution 1244 (1999).

5. Political settlement as an imperative for preserving the sovereignty and
territorial integrity of the FR of Yugoslavia and the Republic of Serbia:
Security Council resolution 1244 (1999) and the related documents have
unambiguously reaffirmed that Kosovo and Metohija is an integral part of the
single territory of the FR of Yugoslavia and the Republic of Serbia.

All attempts to determine parameters of "substantial autonomy" of Kosovo and
Metohija outside the constitutional and legal framework of the FR of
Yugoslavia and the Republic of Serbia are illegal, especially if done
without active participation of their competent authorities. Likewise, the
Government of the FR of Yugoslavia is strongly against the Security Council
legalizing any document on the substance of a future autonomy for Kosovo and
Metohija which will take any other premises as its starting-point.

- A political settlement presupposes:

(a) respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Republic of
Serbia and the FR of Yugoslavia;

(b) full discharge of the mandate of UNMIK and KFOR, in line with Security
Council resolution 1244 (1999) and the Military Technical Agreement, in
particular: physical and property safety for all inhabitants, disbandment
and disarmament of the terrorist so-called Kosovo Liberation Army or its
surrogate, the so-called Kosovo Protection Corps; respect for human rights;
free and safe return for all expelled and deportation of all foreign
nationals illegally staying in the Province; restoration of public order and
peace; free movement; return of Yugoslav authorities to the State border and
its full control;

(c) autonomy within the Republic of Serbia, while guaranteeing equality of
all citizens and ethnic communities;

(d) dialogue between legitimate representatives of ethnic communities and
representative of the State, with appropriate participation of
representatives of the Security Council of the United Nations.

The Government of the FR of Yugoslavia most vigorously opposes all projects
about the future status of autonomy and self-government that provide for the
separation of this Serbian province from the present constitutional and
legal system of the Republic of Serbia and the FR of Yugoslavia and have no
grounding either in Security Council resolution 1244 (1999) or in the
existing constitutional order of the FR of Yugoslavia which is inviolable.

The FR of Yugoslavia will not accept, nor will it be bound, in any way, by
any act which strives to impose outside solutions on Kosovo and Metohija
irrespective of their source or provenance.

6. Return of the Yugoslav Army (VJ) and police (MUP): Despite very clear
provisions of Security Council resolution 1244 (1999) and the Military
Technical Agreement (o.p. 4 and paras 6 and 10 of Annex 2 to the Resolution
as well as para 4 of the Military Technical Agreement), KFOR and UNMIK have,
without any justification, prevented the return of VJ and MUP personnel to
the Province.

IV. RESPONSIBILITY OF THE SECURITY COUNCIL

The Security Council of the United Nations, as the guarantor of its
resolution 1244 (1999), bears full responsibility for its non-implementation
and gross violation, primarily of those provisions reaffirming the
sovereignty and territorial integrity of the FR of Yugoslavia on its entire
territory.

Failing to take, in the one-year period after the adoption of its resolution
1244 (1999), appropriate measures to ensure its strict compliance, the
Security Council has confirmed its unwillingness to fulfil its obligations
under the Charter of the United Nations. Consequently, it is directly
responsible for the past adverse consequences of such conduct on its part.

Proceeding from its sovereign rights guaranteed by the
Chernomyrdin-Ahtisaari document, Security Council resolution 1244 (1999) and
the Military Technical Agreement, as well as bearing in mind the irrefutable
facts that KFOR and UNMIK, and particularly Special Representative B.
Kouchner, have systematically violated, undermined or have been unable to
implement Security Council resolution 1244 (1999), the Government of the FR
of Yugoslavia notes that the international mission in Kosovo and Metohija
under United Nations auspices has been a complete failure. KFOR and UNMIK,
Special Representative Kouchner in particular, are solely responsible for
the exodus, ethnic cleansing, genocide and apartheid against Serbs,
Montengrins, Roma, Goranci, Muslims, Turks and other non-Albanians, as well
as for a disastrous situation in all segments of economic and social life in
the Province.

By their overall conduct contrary to the provisions and goals of Security
Council resolution 1244 (1999) and the related documents, the international
security (KFOR) and civil (UNMIK) presences in Kosovo and Metohija have
betrayed the confidence placed in them by the Government of the FR of
Yugoslavia in agreeing to the temporary deployment of this international
mission under United Nations auspices in a part of its territory.

V. DEMANDS OF THE GOVERNMENT OF THE FR OF YUGOSLAVIA

In view of the above considerations, the Government of the FR of Yugoslavia
demands that the Security Council:

- declare null and void all acts and decisions taken by Head of UNMIK
Bernard Kouchner, contrary to Security Council resolution 1244 (1999);

- condemn in the strongest terms, put an end to the activity of Bernard
Kouchner and withdraw from Kosovo and Metohija the forces of KFOR and UNMIK,
who are directly responsible for the systematic violation of Security
Council resolution 1244 (1999) and for countless loss of life, untold
suffering of the Serbian and other non-Albanian population as well as for
the damage caused by the Albanian terrorists in the presence of tens of
thousands of KFOR and UNMIK members;

- urgently take all necessary measures to ensure full and consistent
implementation of its resolution 1244 (1999);

- most strongly condemn continued aggression of the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization against the FR of Yugoslavia through material, political and
media support to the Albanian separatists and terrorists in Kosovo and
Metohija whose activities, in conjunction with the obstruction of the
implementation of its resolution 1244 (1999) by UNMIK and KFOR, are aimed at
destabilizing and breaking up the territorial integrity of the FR of
Yugoslavia, at reshaping its internationally recognized borders and, by
extension, at causing widespread instability and conflict in the region with
unforeseeable consequences on peace and security in the Balkan region;

- take all necessary steps to compensate for the damage and other losses
inflicted on the population, the economy and cultural heritage of Kosovo and
Metohija by UNMIK and KFOR and by the terrorist and criminal gangs they are
supporting.

Belgrade, June 7, 2000

AMBASSADOR BRANKOVIC - MILITARY, POLITICAL, MORAL DEFEAT OF NATO

GENEVA - The people of Yugoslavia defended their country a year ago both
militarily and politically, and achieved a moral victory over NATO, said on
Thursday at a press conference in the Geneva-based United Nations, the
Yugoslav mission head to the U.N. Office in Geneva, Ambassador Branko
Brankovic.

Following is the statement made by Ambassador Branko Brankovic-

"It is unfortunate that at the beginning of the 21st century, instead of
peace and prosperity, we witness conflicts, violence, poverty, terrorism,
regional wars and instability. The main characteristics of the
globalization, imposed by the United States and some European countries, is
the ruling of the world by creation of uncertainty, instability, fear,
violence and conficts in accordance with interests of a small number of
militarily and economically world power wielders.

The main goal of the new world order proclaimed by the United Nations and
some European countries is to partition sovereign states, destroy economies
of some countries and transform them into obedient subjects of the power
wielders by introducing chaos.

Contemporary terrorism is the instrument to the realization of such
strategy, and its goal is to create crises in countries the United States
and a number of European countries wish to subjugate to their interests.

The lack of efficiency of the West in general to fight terrorism is an
outcome of the fact that the West is foremost profit-oriented and that human
lives are second-rated. It is thus no wonder that American officials
continue to keep contacts with Albanian drug and prostitution bosses.

The United States were against the adoption of the Statute of the
International Criminal Court. The International Criminal Court was conceived
 

as an instituion that would continuously impartially judge terrorism. The
refusal of the United States to accept the statute of the International
Criminal Court indicates that the United States, in view of their activities
on world stage, is in constant fear of justice. At the same time, the United
States did not mind to launch and by various pressures create the so-called
Hague Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, as an institution that would serve
globalization. This Tribunal, apart from being a disgrace for the United
Nations and international law in general, is aimed at concealing obvious
violence giving it thus legitimacy.

Such behaviour of global proportions demonstrated by the United States in
particular and some European countries as well, resulted in the criminal,
armed aggression carried out by the United States against the FR of
Yugoslavia. The aggression lasted for 78 consecutive days and brought about
numerous human casualties and enormous material damage. What the United
States and other NATO Member States did certainly not envisage was the
resistance of Yugoslavia demonstarted towards such an aggression. In view of
that, this aggression ended unsuccessfully. The peoples of the FR of
Yugoslavia have defended their country, defeating the NATO aggressor,
militarily, politically and morally.

The attempt of the NATO aggressor to occupy by sham the entire territory of
the FR of Yugoslavia through the so-called Rambouillet Agreement was
rejected with the adoption of the Ahtisaari-Chernomyrdin Document and the UN
SC resolution 1244 (1999). The adoption of the said documents was realised
with the approval of the FR of Yugoslavia, whereby the FR of Yugoslavia
showed not only flexibility but also its confidence in the United Nations.

"Today, one year after, it is obvious that KFOR and UNMIK have violated
their mandate entrusted in the resolution 1244 (1999) and the given
confidence. KFOR, UNMIK and B. Kouchner bear sole responsibility for the
prevailing chaos, for the murders, kidnappings of over 2000 Serbs and other
non-Albanians, for the ethnic cleansing and transformation of Kosovo and
Metohija into a centre of terrorism and organized international crime. The
culmination of hypocrisy of NATO leaders, today, one year after the end of
the aggression, is that they are decorating one another for crimes they
committeed in the aggression against the FR of Yugoslavia. I expect that
Mrs. Carla del Ponte, Chief Prosecutor of the shameful Tribunal for former
Yugoslavia in The Hague, will soon be decorated.

Ever since they came to Kosovo and Metohija, KFOR and UNMIK have
systematically supported separatists and terrorists, destabilizing the
situation in the entire region. It brought about a humanitarian catastophe,
ethnic cleansing, apartheid and genocide against Serbian and other
non-Albanian population. Since the deployment of KFOR and UNMIK, more than
350,000 Serbs and non-Albanians have been expelled, over 5,000 terrorists
acts committed, 1000 persons killed, almost 1,000 kidnapped and more than 86
Serbian churches and 50,000 houses destroyed. KFOR has not stopped there. It
started to shoot innocent civilians, as it was the case on June 6 this year
when KFOR indiscriminately opened fire at innocent civilians, wounding 3
persons.

In view of all this, the Federal Government demands that the Security
Council of the United Nations-

-declare null and void all acts and decisions taken by the Head of UNMIK
Bernard Kouchner, contrary to Security Council resolution 1244 (1999);

-condemn in the strongest terms, put an end to the activity of Head of UNMIK
Bernard Kouchner and withdraw from Kosovo and Metohija the forces of UNMIK
and KFOR, who are directly responsible for the systematic violation of
Security Council resolution 1244 (1999) and for countless loss of life,
untold suffering of the Serbian and other non-Albanian population and for
the damage inflicted by Kosovo Albanian terrorists in the presence of tens
of thousands of KFOR and UNMIK members;

-urgently take all necessary measures to ensure full and consistent
implementation of its resolution 1244 (1999);

-most strongly condemn continued NATO aggression against the FR of
Yugoslavia through the maintenance of the illegal system of sanctions and
embargoes imposed by NATO Member States, through constant attempts of
undermining the FR of Yugoslavia and through material, political and media
support for the Albanian separatists and terrorists in Kosovo and Metohija,
whose activities, in conjunction with the obstruction of UNMIK and KFOR in
the implementation of resolution 1244 (1999), are aimed at the
destabilization and breaking up of the territorial integrity of the FR of
Yugoslavia, at reshaping internationally recognized borders and, therefore,
at causing widespread instability and conflict in the region, with
far-reaching negative implications for peace and security in the Balkan
region;

- take all necessary measures to compensate for the damage and other losses
inflicted on the populaiton, economy and cultural heritage of Kosovo and
Metohija by UNMIK and KFOR and by terrorist and criminal gangs they are
supporting."

EXHIBITION OF PHOTOS OF ANTI-YUGOSLAV NATO CRIMES OPENS IN VIENNA

VIENNA - An exhibition of photographs of crimes committed by NATO during its
aggression on Yugoslavia last year opened in Vienna late on Wednesday.

Opening the exhibition of 150 photographs entitled "A year later - keeping
the NATO aggression from oblivion", Yugoslav Ambassador Rados Smiljkovic
said the pictures should be a reminder of "a period in the nation's history
that was tragic as it was honourable".

Alfred Gerstl, M.P., former speaker of the Austrian Parliament's upper
house, as well as Wolfgang Rohrbach, vice president of the Austria Nostra
Society, spoke on the anniversary of the NATO aggression.

PETITION DELIVERED FOR LIFTING SANCTIONS AGAINST YUGOSLAVIA

LONDON - A petition signed by 10,000 British citizens was delivered to the
cabinet of British Prime Minister Tony Blair for the immediate lifting of
sanctions against Yugoslavia.

The petition was delivered by the delegation of the parliamentary committee
for peace in the Balkans, headed by committee chairman, Labour party deputy,
Alice Mann.

At the time of the delivering of the petition, gathered outside the
government headquarters were several hundred people who with their presence
offered support to the petition and its demands.

Along with the petition was delivered a letter to the prime minister which
said that the 10,000 signatories of the petition are unified in their demand
that all sanctions be lifted against Yugoslavia and financial support lent
to it for the rebuilding of economic and civilian infrastructure destroyed
in NATO's aggression last year (March-June).

Also required is direct British humanitarian support, and the prime minister
was told it was "shameful" that Britain is taking part in sanctions against
Yugoslavia.

BRITISH DEPUTIES CHARGE NATO'S AGGRESSION WAS ILLEGAL

LONDON - British parliament foreign policy committee, after several months
of investigation, assessed on Wednesday that NATO's aggression last year
(March-June) on Yugoslavia had violated norms of international law and that
the aggression was illegal.

Foreign Office political director, Emir Joans-Parry, although he defended
government policy, assessed in his testimony before the committee that the
aggression was illegal.

That is the first admission by a senior official of the British government,
which was among the forerunners of the aggression, that NATO had not
observed international laws.

The committee revealed that British public prosecutor John Morris raised
last year the issue of legality of the aggression, but politicians had
ignored his demand.

RUSSIA DEEPLY CONCERNED ABOUT MOUNTING VIOLENCE IN KOSOVO-METOHIJA

MOSCOW - The Russian foreign ministry on Tuesday expressed deep concern at
the escalation of ethnic Albanian violence against non-Albanians in the
U.N.-administered Serbian (Yugoslav) Kosovo-Metohija province.

There is an "unnaceptably high rate" of crime in Kosovo-Metohija and crimes
targetting the province's non-Albanians have lately escalated, according to
the statement of the ministry's spokesman circulated on Tuesday.

More than a dozen terrorist acts have been committed over the past week, in
which 8 Serbs were killed and 20 others were wounded, the statement said.

These crimes conclusively prove that these outbreaks of violence are
ethnically motivated and occur with the connivance of the U.N. mission
(UNMIK) and the international force (KFOR), which are not using their full
powers under U.N. Resolution 1244 to stabilise the situation in the
province, it added.

They are fully responsible for the unsatisfactory security of local
residents, inter-ethnic clashes and the mounting crime rate, the statement
said.

http://www.albaniannews.com
Albanian Daily News
June 16, 2000

Tables Have Turned for Serbs and Albanians

PRISHTINA - Nebojsa, a 40-year-old Serb, and his
family live like virtual prisoners in a small Kosovo
flat, fearing their lives would be in danger if they
ventured too far from home.

Heavily-armed British troops guard their dreary
apartment building in the provincial capital Prishtina
around the clock to prevent any attacks by vengeful
Albanians angry at years of Serb repression.

Too afraid to travel without a military escort, the
family of two adults and four children has spent most
of the time indoors since NATO-led KFOR peacekeepers
and the United Nations took de facto control of the
troubled province one year ago.

Like other Serbs who did not flee Kosovo following the
end of the West’s bombing campaign from March to June
last year and the withdrawal of Yugoslav forces, they
are isolated and rely on international help for
survival.

Greek soldiers take their children to school in a
Serb-populated village during the week, and the family
depends on humanitarian assistance for food.

They are among several hundred Serbs remaining in
Prishtina, compared to many thousands who lived there
before the West’s offensive. Around 50 to 60 families
stay in this building on a garbage-littered and
potholed street near the city centre.

“We live like in a ghetto,” said Nebojsa, an
unemployed economist who did not want to reveal his
family name. “Our entire life is in this flat and
around this building.”

His wife said she had not seen her mother for six
months although she lived in a nearby village.

“What kind of life is this when I need to have a
soldier standing next to me so that I can buy my
groceries?” she said. “And even though a soldier is
protecting me, the Albanians do not want to sell me
their goods because I’m a Serb.”

Similar stories are told elsewhere in Kosovo, regarded
by nationalists as the cradle of Serb culture and
religion.

Local Serbs say only around 500 have stayed in the
eastern town of Gjilan, down from more than 20,000.
Most live close to the Christian Orthodox church in an
area protected by US troops.

“This is like a reservation where the Americans put
the Indians,” said Zika, a 48-year-old Serb.

Thousands of Kosovo Albanians could be heard
celebrating in the main square, playing traditional
music and holding speeches to express gratitude to US
President Bill Clinton and other Western leaders for
putting an end to harsh Serb rule. (Webmaster's note: We must not forget our good old propaganda, huh?)

“This is even worse than jail,” said Slavoljub,
another Serb man, listening without showing emotion.
“At least there you feel safe.”

Their fate illustrates how the tables have turned in
Kosovo, still legally part of Yugoslavia but now under
de facto international rule.

LEPINE, Jun 16, 2000 -- (Reuters) A landmine awareness demonstration in the Kosovo
capital Pristina was cancelled on Thursday after a mine blast a few kilometers away
killed two Serbs and critically injured a third.

United Nations envoy Bernard Kouchner, Kosovo's effective governor, had planned to
address the demonstration, set up for the international media.

Instead, he drove under tight security to the site of the mine attack, a railway
crossing near the village of Lepine, 22 km (14 miles) southwest of Pristina, and vented his
anger on the "cowards" who had laid the mine in what was considered a deliberate attack
aimed at Serbs.

"It was an outrage - so easy to organize - and I am so ashamed that people do that
in the night - that some people here are criminals, murderers," he said after inspecting
the wreckage of the Serbs' vehicle, twisted into fantastic shapes, while around him
Finnish peacekeepers swept the area for more possible mines.

Kouchner was flanked by Kosovo's moderate ethnic Albanian leaders Ibrahim Rugova
and Hashim Thaci - the first time they had shown solidarity with the peace process
by visiting the site of an attack on Serbs rather than their own people.

Both condemned the latest incident, coming just over a year after the multinational
peacekeeping force took over Kosovo from the retreating Serbs.

DESTABILISE KOSOVO?

"This act will make an already unstable situation more difficult," said Thaci,
calling on the peacekeepers to redouble their efforts.

The state news agency Tanjug identified the two Serbs killed in the mine blast as
Zlatko Denic, born in 1963, and Borko Filipovic, born in 1975. The wounded Serb was
identified as Dejan Filipovic, whose age was not given.

The blast blew away the front of their van and left a crater a meter across and a
meter deep. Crates of beer from the van's load were scattered about. Its windscreen lay
shattered 20 meters away.

Reports from the hospital in nearby Kosovo Polje, now run by a Russian contingent,
said Dejan Filipovic had lost one leg and was likely to lose the other.

"It was an antitank mine of 4 kilograms (8 lb.) of explosive or more," said General
Juan Ortuno, commanding officer of the NATO-led peacekeeping force in Kosovo, who
accompanied Kouchner.

"It is impossible to protect against such attacks - one or two people could have
laid it in an hour or so last night. It was a professional job, but in Kosovo, so many people
have military experience."

Kosovo's minorities Serbs have been the targets of frequent attacks by vengeful
ethnic Albanians, angry at years of Serb repression, since NATO-led peacekeepers took de
facto control last June.

More than 150,000 Serbs have fled for Serbia proper since Yugoslav forces withdrew
from Kosovo one year ago. About 100,000 remain, many living in enclaves protected by
peacekeepers. Kosovo's total population is about two million.

Serbs populate all the villages around Lepine and use small tracks like the one where the mine had been laid to get from place to place because the main roads cross Albanian areas.

The run-up to the June 12 anniversary of the arrival of KFOR peacekeepers and the
U.N.-led civilian administration saw an upsurge in violence, with eight Serbs killed
in one week alone. Some 58 attacks against ethnic Serbs were registered in May.

Local officials believe that ethnic Albanian extremists are responsible for the
murders and assaults.

Yugoslav authorities have seized on the attacks to denounce the KFOR and UN
presence as a failure, demanding that they leave Kosovo, which is still legally,
part of Yugoslavia.

PRISTINA - Two Serbs were killed and one was seriously injured when their van hit an
antitank landmine planted in a newly built railway crossing on the road from Laplje
Selo to Lepina. Killed were Borko Filipovic (24) and Zlatko Denic (32), while Dejan
Filipovic was seriously injured and Russian physicians are fighting for his life in
the Russian hospital in Kosovo Polje. The three Serbs were responsible for making a
delivery of food articles to the Serb population in Lepina. During the
investigation, KFOR found more antitank landmines in immediate proximity also
embedded in the road.

The place where the incident occurred was visited by UNMIK head Bernard Kouchner so
that he could "convince himself personally of the consequences of the acts of
terrorist groups," announced UNMIK. The spokesperson of that mission, Susan Manuel,
assessed that "the newest act of terrorism is proof that the extremists do not want
peace, that they are using any and all means to endanger the members of minority
ethnic communities and thus bring into question the efforts of the international
community, UNMIK and KFOR, to establish peace and a safe environment for all
citizens in Kosovo and Metohija".

Translated by S. Lazovic (June 16, 2000)

Kosovska Mitrovica, June 15th (Tanjug) - In this morning's attack
of ethnic-Albanian terrorists on the road Preoce-Letina near Laplje Selo
in Kosovo Polje district, when a passenger pickup with three Serbs
ran into anti-tank mine, Zlatko Denic (born in 1963) and Borko
Filipovic (born 1975) were killed, while Dejan Filipovic was severely
wounded and is now in the Russian hospital in Kosovo Polje, Tanjug
was informed by Serbian sources in Kosovo Polje.

KFOR blocked the entire area and does not allow the access to the Serbs,
which resulted in bitterness of Serbian population gathering in large number
as a sign of protest.

Recent Albanian violence in Kosovo has cast a shadow over KFOR's efforts to
repatriate Serb refugees.

By Radosa Milutinovic in Kosovska Mitrovica

Sheltered in the mountains 30 miles east of Pristina, Slivovo appears empty
and desolate. A KFOR military encampment sits atop a plateau overlooking the
village. Alliance helicopters circle the area continuously

Slivovo is one of a cluster of villages in central Kosovo abandoned by most
of their Serb residents in June 1999 following the withdrawal of Yugoslav
forces from the province. KFOR is now attempting to encourage the refugees
to return by securing the area.

But within the last two weeks Operation Trojan has been jeopardised by a
spate of ethnic violence across Kosovo, which has left eight Serbs dead and
a dozen injured. In the ethnically-mixed village of Cernica in south-east
Kosovo, for example, three people died, including a four-year-old boy, in a
drive by shooting on June 4.

The upsurge in violence has undermined Serbian confidence in the
international forces' ability to protect them. Most of the unrest has
occurred outside central Kosovo, but the area has not escaped the troubles.

Major Mathew McDonald, the Canadian officer in charge of planning for
Operation Trojan, had already indicated the need to relocate the Gracanica
market, where on June 6 unknown assailants lobbed a hand grenade into a
group of Serbs, injuring three people.

During a subsequent protest by local Serbs, KFOR troops guarding the zone
commander, General Richard Shireff, shot and wounded a demonstrator.

Shireff, who has been praised by some Serb community leaders for his efforts
to improve safety in central Kosovo, said of the attacks, "I have no
difficulties in describing what I have seen in the last two days as
terrorism."

"We are engaged in solving problems such as freedom of movement,
communications, health services, education and trade," Shireff said.
"[Operation] Trojan is supposed to increase the security level and quality
of life for Serbs in the zone of our responsibility."

Prior to the latest wave of violence, Father Sava, one of the leaders of the
Serbian National Council of Kosovo and Metohija, said the association fully
supported Operation Trojan. After the Gracanica events, the SNC suspended
co-operation with the international administration. Council president,
Bishop Artimje, said many in the Serb community were boycotting his
colleagues "almost as if we were guilty of the victims."

McDonald insisted, however, that Operation Trojan had brought considerable
improvements for the Serb community. "We noticed at checkpoints that the
roads were only being used by Albanians," McDonald said. "Serbs from Kosovo
Polje were using strange roundabout routes to get to Gracanica. So we
decided to work out where Serbs wanted to go to and when, not only to
provide an escort, but to repair the roads."

As a result, KFOR has built around 20 km of roads between the various Serb
communities and is also working on a rail link from Lipljan to Kosovo Polje
and onto Zvecan, McDonald said.

In the last two weeks, bus routes had been re-established to Gracanica and
Mitrovica, two larger Serb enclaves. Phone lines now work between Caglavica,
Laplje Selo and Gracanica, and via radio relay with Kosovo Polje and
Pristina.

One Slivovo resident, Stana Simic, welcomed the new bus routes. "I went to
Gracanica yesterday to phone my children. I hope they will return to live
here like before. I told them it is safe here and that we have no problems,"
Stana said. "We get along well with the army."

In addition to providing escorts for farmers out in their fields, McDonald
said KFOR has introduced a radar system called Coyote to monitor the area at
night. Any suspicious signals are investigated by helicopter patrols. "We
recently discovered a group of people trying to bury automatic rifles and
mortars," McDonald said.

Captian Tom Bateman of the Scottish Dragoons leads a joint British-Swedish
force, of just over a hundred men, which patrols the wider forested area
between the Gracanica and Pristina municipalities. There are six Serbian
villages in the area, including Slivovo, surrounded by Albanian communities.
 

"Our initial aim is to return 15 Serbian families to Slivovo from Gracanica
where they are now," Bateman said. "Also a dozen men come every day to
Perovici village, under our protection, to prepare houses for their own
return."

Bateman said he was sure the KFOR troops in his area had the security
situation under control.

Stojna Marinkovic from Slivovo said it seems the villagers are free to go
where they want nowadays. But she added, "I still keep close [to home]
unless my husband goes with me."

Marinkovic fled Slivovo on June 19 last year along with virtually all the
other villagers. Her son Goran, 19, disappeared the same day in the near-by
village of Labljani. She returned three weeks later, escorted by Swedish
K-for soldiers.

"Perhaps there are Serbs with blood on their hands and they are afraid to
come back. My son was not guilty. He was a victim. If he had been guilty he
would have escaped immediately. He wouldn't have stayed," Marinkovic said.

Danijela Pavic, 18, returned to Slivovo this February. Danijela, like many
who fled Slivovo, ended up in Smederovo in Serbia, where she lived for 10
months. "We didn't have our own houses there so we came back," she said. "We
feel safe here now."

Bateman hopes that word will get back to others in Smederovo and that people
will start thinking about returning home. He said a medical surgery, school
and distribution centre were soon to be opened in a house near the KFOR
military camp.

Shireff believes the priority at the moment is for people who want to
return, to come back and see for themselves whether they think the situation
is secure.

Radosa Milutinovic is an IWPR contributor.

Glas Javnosti, Belgrade, Yugoslavia
June 17, 2000

KFOR bans Serbs from visiting cemetery on religious holiday

Albanians placed explosives

STARO GACKO (Beta) - On Saturday KFOR banned Serbs from Staro Gacko near Lipljan
from visiting their local cemetery on the religious holiday Zadusnice [All Souls'
Day - a day when deceased loved ones are remembered, their graves visited and
candles lit].

Norwegian members of the international forces in Kosovo advised that there was a
serious possibility that explosive devices had been placed at the cemetery.

On Friday one Albanian was seriously injured while placing such devices at the
cemetery in Staro Gacko. The identity of the perpetrator and details regarding his
condition were not made public; however, Serb sources claim that he is from the
neighboring village of Toplicane, which is inhabited by Albanians, and that "the
right side of his body was blown to bits".

In Kosovo Polje, KFOR advised Serbs to visit the cemetery only under military
accompaniment and under no circumstances by themselves or using local roads.

In the Pristina Center for Peace it was confirmed that KFOR did not offer
accompaniment for Serbs to go to the Orthodox cemetery. It is probable that none of
the some 300 remaining Serbs in Pristina will risk going to the cemetery.

Translated by S. Lazovic (June 17, 2000)

full text:
http://www.decani.yunet.com/memorandum.html

    During the course of nearly one year of an internationally brokered
"peace" under the rule of UNMIK and the protectorate of KFOR, the
following is documented in the MEMORANDUM on Massive and Systematic
Violations of Human Rights in Post War Kosovo, issued by the Serb
National Council of Kosovo and Metohija, 28 April (7 June) 2000:

- Kosovo Serbs and other non-Albanian groups still live in ghettoes
without security;

- they are deprived of basic human rights -- the right to life, free
movement and work;

- their private property is still being usurped;

- their homes burned and looted [10's of thousands];

- there is hardly any multiethnicity at all -- in fact the reverse is
true;

- ethnic segregation is greater now than almost at any other time in
Kosovo;s turbulent history;

- not only are Serbs under pressure to leave the Province, but also
Romas, Slav Moslems, Croats, Serb speaking Jews and Turks;

- more than 80 Orthodox churches have been either completely destroyed
or severely damaged since the end of the war;

- ancient churches, many of which survived 500 years of Ottoman rule,
could not survive several months of the internationally guaranteed
peace;

- organized crime and discrimination against non-Albanians is epidemic;

- 200,000 Serbs (2/3rds of the prewar Serb population) have fled;

- 50,000 Romas, Slav Moslems, Croat Catholics and other had to leave;

- more than 500 Serbs have been killed;

- nearly 700 abducted during the peace;

- 300 abducted during the war by the KLA and are still missing;

- 120,000 Serbs have lost employment overnight;

- all institutions, the University, hospitals and factories are
systematically purged by the KLA black robed "military police;"

- Kosovo Albanians who refuse to pay "taxes" and "protection money" to
extremists become victims of intimidation and execution;

- Serbs and many non-Albanians still do not have access to hospitals,
the University and public services, simply because they cannot walk
freely in the
street;

- the Serbian language is completely banished from public life;

- all Serb inscriptions, road signs and advertisements have been
systematically removed;

- thousands of Serb books in public libraries have been systematically
burned;

- unguarded Serb cultural monuments and statues have been torn down and
destroyed;

- Albanians greatly pressure Serbs to sell their property under threats
and extortion, refusals result in example torching, killings and grenade
attacks.

    If this repression and persecution is continued unabated it is
likely that soon most of the remaining Serbs will also be forced to flee
Kosovo. One year after the war, Kosovo is still ruled by apartheid.

Mr. Kouchner,

My name is Petar Jeknic and I am journalist. I am the correspondent of French
international radio in Pristina. I came here on September 3 of last year. For five
months I was the trainer and deputy of the chief and executive director of "Kontakt
Radio" in Pristina. After that I conceived of and founded the Independent Media
Group. I was director of "Radio Galaksija" until June 16 of this year which I left
because of the nationalism of a newly hired employee and his question 'Where do you
think you are living?' I have written for IWPR from London. This is the third
dangerous zone in which I have lived and worked. I went as a journalist to Bosnia,
where I was in Sarajevo until 1997 and in Banja Luka until I came here. In the
meanwhile, I spent about a year in Croatia. I came to Varazdin a month after
Operation Storm (Oluja). I worked as an AFP correspondent, and my favorite topic was
people accused of war crimes. I am writing all this so that you cansee that I am
first and foremost a journalist, and then everything else.

I heard you speak in the Government Building when you listed the successes of the
one year anniversary of the mission. I also heard general Ortuno speak. When I look
in my notebook, I see that I wanted to ask several questions. One of them was
whether you could tell if you knew of any place in the world where you can be killed
for speaking a given language. You told us how concerned you were when the
electrical system went out at a temperature of minus 30 degrees Celsius. You were
concerned and I was freezing. How is it that this never happened in earlier years? I
know, that is a political question. I wanted to ask you why you listed the
transformation of the KLA into a civil institution among the successes? Should we
continue to be naive? I wanted to ask you if you had ever competed for enrollment at
some academy of theater arts but I didn't because for the job that you do, you do
put on a good act.

Mr. Kouchner, you placed flowers in the place where they hurt my Tina [Valentina
Cukic]. She was my pupil, so to speak. I taught her poorly because at the age of 23
life circumstances have left her without a spleen. She is lucky to be alive. When
she was wounded, she called for God, not for justice and tolerance, not for the UN
police. She is a reporter. The fact that you are followed around by Sonja
Nikolic-Jusufi is no protection and no consolation to us. The fact that there are
ten of us Serb journalists in Pristina is not important. The fact that no one can
protect us and that those among our Albanian colleagues who condemn this kind of
attack do not dare raise their voices will not improve or secure our position and
working conditions.

The fact that you created registration for automobiles which cannot go anywhere with
their new license plates, the fact that [voter] registration has failed, the fact
that there is no freedom of movement, the fact that there are no jobs, the fact that
there is no exchange of goods and capital in the Serb enclaves, the fact that
primitivism rules in Kosovo, the fact that there are no hospitals, the fact that the
chances of a Serb being killed in Kosovo by a member of another nation are 20 times
greater, as you said yourself... are you counting these, too, among the
accomplishments which will make you the replacement for Sadako Ogata, who is soon
leaving the function which she is performing?

Please do not tell me about your experiences in Africa nor the years it will take
for the situation to stabilize. General Ortuno is here so that a few years from now
we can talk about "the historic mission of the Eurocorps during which it was
practically created". The fact that you cannot get ordinary locomotive engineers for
a train which would connect the Serb enclaves is evidence enough of your competency.
Your colleague Ortuno talks more about tolerance, and less about the justice system,
because he has nothing to say on the subject. The attacks on the Serbs are called
"criminal acts" and not "terrorist acts". It is plain to see why; if they were
"terrorist acts" they would have to be condemned by KFOR. As it is, the matter is
delegated to the UN police. The most useless institution in Kosovo. Do you know that
my car was stolen? Stolen and then destroyed.

Standing next to the "corpse" of a worthless automobile manufactured in 1985, it
took me ten minutes to explain to an police expert from Nepal, with great assistance
on the part of the British soldier who made the effort to find the car, that I
wasn't the thief but the owner! Do you know how many statements I had to make?

And finally, there is Tina. A young woman who still doesn't know what it means to be
a journalist, who is only in the process of becoming one. For her to be wounded and
for her life to be destroyed thanks to terrorists and criminals?! Don't ask me "what
can be done" because if I had your salary, I would probably be able to think of
something. If you insist, call me and I will tell you what to do. My email is
[email protected].

Until we hear from you in the near future, Mr. Kouchner.

Petar Jeknic

P. S. I believe that you know that by signing this letter I may well have signed my
own death warrant. Don't be concerned; I believe in God and the "meting out of
justice", as Christ taught.

Translated by S. Lazovic (June 24, 2000)

Moscow, June 29 - Kosovo and Metohija is a place where genocide is
being carried out not only against the Serbian people, but also against
culture and civilization in general, the Patriarch of Moscow and All
Russia Alexei II said in a special TV appearance late Thursday.

The Patriarch voiced support for the Serbian people and their struggle
for preserving freedom, dignity and independence.

In a show broadcast on Russian TV channel 1, Patriarch Alexei II
commented on documentary films on destroyed Orthodox churches
and monasteries in Kosovo and Metohija and other barbaric actions
by ethnic Albanian terrorists.

The show host said the shots were taken by Russian cameramen in
Kosovo and Metohija over the last few days.

Saying that he is deeply touched by what he saw, the Russian Patriarch
stressed that the shots proved that holy objects of Orthodox culture and
civilization are being destroyed in Kosovo and Metohija.

The Patriarch said the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), an ethnic
Albanian terrorist organization, was chiefly responsible for the evils
committed in the province, which he said has become a center of terrorism,
crime and drug smuggling.

It was assessed in the talks that Russia should put more effort in informing
the widest domestic and foreign public on the truth about Kosovo and
Metohija. The Patriarch pointed out that the claims about alleged genocide
against the ethnic Albanian population, which were used as the pretext for
the aggression on the FR of Yugoslavia, were mere lies.

The show was broadcasted late last night within the main news program,
while the show host reminded that June 28 is a great day for Serbian
people, on which Serbs mark the anniversary of the Battle of Kosovo.

New York, 1 July - FR of Yugoslavia has again drawn the UN Security
Council's attention to the responsibility and blame for the tidal wave
of terrorism in Kosovo and Metohija which is not abating, and by
which false picture and claims of UN's mission about its alleged
successful operation in Serbian province are refuted.

Chief of mission of FR of Yugoslavia to UN, ambassador Vladislav
Jovanovic in his latest letter sent last night to the President of Security
Council, French ambassador Jean David Levitte pointed out that
incontrovertible fact that KFOR and UNMIK's missions have not done
their jobs, nor mandate which was given to them under Resolution 1244.

The letter was forwarded and to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

At the beginning of the letter, Jovanovic emphasizes that FR of Yugoslavia
with the latest turning to the Security Council brings the attention to that
body of UN, responsible for implementing Resolution 1244, on escalation
of terrorism and violence in southern province of Yugoslav constituent
Republic of Serbia.

At the same time, and other forms of criminal acts of so-called KLA are
increased, through pressures and harassments, which terrorists are
carrying out against Serbs and other non-Albanian population. Terrorists
are strengthening that kind of tactics, especially in the areas from which a
large number of non-Albanian population have already been expelled.

And indescribable monstrous killings of people on the doorstep of their
homes or in the field during agricultural works are brutal, Jovanovic points
out in an accusing tone. Terrorists are stealing livestock from people and
cause other damages in order to endanger their economic establishment,
and all of that is aimed at forcing the Serbs and other non-Albanian
population to leave their ancestral homes and to leave Kosovo and
Metohija.

KFOR and UNMIK have failed to create minimum-security conditions
for Serbs and other non-Albanians. Their freedom of movement is
extremely limited in which way they are denied the basic preconditions for
the exercise of any other right, critically said Yugoslav ambassador.

Jovanovic then points out to the Security Council the fact that members of
UN mission, in the past two months, haven't solved no case of terrorist
attack, nor perpetrator was apprehended. No instigator or organizer of
terrorist attacks on non-Albanian population has been discovered. Instead
of that, KFOR and UNMIK blockade Serbian and non-Albanian
enclaves and in that way disrupt communications between people, arrest
Serbs only on false reports of Albanians, often seizing them from hospital
beds, and even open fire on frightened and exasperated Serbs protesting
their situation.

Terrorists don't have mercy toward nothing, and so towards holy places,
orthodox churches and monasteries, stressed Jovanovic in the letter,
quoting the fact about 100 orthodox churches, monasteries and cultural
monuments which terrorists destroyed, burned or looted. Brutal act of that
unprecedented vandalism was the attack on Decani monastery, which
happened in the night between 21 and 22 of June, it is said in the
Yugoslav ambassador's letter.

In spite of those irrefutable proofs about terrorists' crimes, reports are
written to the Security Council about allegedly success of UN mission in
Kosovo and Metohija, accusingly points out ambassador Jovanovic.

How false are claims about that so-called "success" of UN mission,
Jovanovic points out to the president of Security Council through directly
opposing of facts, against lies: "It is claimed in reports that terrorist
so-called KLA has been demilitarized and disarmed, and at the same time
large caches of heavy weapons of terrorists like the one in the village of
Klecka, are being discovered or when a fierce mortar attack on the
Decani monastery is being carried out. It is also claimed that security is
being improved, and facts are saying that Albanian extremists step up their
terrorist activities aimed at completing the ethnic cleansing of the remaining
Serbs and non-Albanians. In addition to all of that, it is evident that the
calls of the leaders of ethnic Albanians to tolerance are only empty and
simple phrases".

The escalation of violence and atrocities in Kosovo and Metohija are
taking place at the time when the Security Council is debating and
deciding the future of the presence of UN in Kosovo and Metohija,
Yugoslav ambassador warns about incompatible coincidence.

In the letter to the Security Council, position of FR of Yugoslavia is being
presented about unacceptability of organizing local elections in Kosovo
and Metohija, in the circumstances in which there are no basic conditions
for their holding. As one of the important index of non-existence of
needed conditions for holding elections, ambassador Jovanovic quotes the
fact that the basic thing hasn't been accomplished - consistent
implementing of Resolution 1244 which Security Council brought and for
which exactly that body of UN is responsible.

Ambassador Jovanovic added and rather long list of horrible crimes,
murders, kidnapping, torturing and other kinds of violence which terrorists
from so-called KLA carried out in the last two months. Rather long list
with precisely stated names of people on who different crimes were
committed, is irrefutable confirmation of all positions and evaluations
which FR of Yugoslavia pointed out to that body of UN and through the
latest warning letter to Security Council.

At the end of the letter, ambassador Vladislav Jovanovic again sent the
critique and protest to the Security Council because he wasn't allowed to
speak at the recent session of the Council.

In spite of the difficult situation in Kosovo and Metohija, Security Council
didn't take any measures to prevent and stop tragic and dangerous
condition in the southern Serbian province, Jovanovic emphasized at the
end of the letter.

82 year-old Serb killed near Gnjilane
July 02, 2000

Gnjilane, 2 July - Yesterday, late in the afternoon, on pasture within
reach of Gornje Livoce, near Gnjilane, Sava Stojkovic, 82 years
old Serb from that village waskilled, according to the
Church-national committee of Gnjilane.

Stojkovic was watching cows at
the place called Liniste with six young Serbs, at the distance of half
kilometers from the village, when about 5p.m. four armed ethnic Albanian
attackers in group came with the intention to steal the cattle from Serb
cattle breeders.

While young Serbs managed to escape, Stojkovic stayed near cattle.
Then, as it is stated, one of the attackers fired upon him with a
submachine gun. He was hit by eight bullets and killed him immediately.

Unofficially, according to the Church-national committee of Gnjilane,
attackers were captured and they are from the same village as Sava
Stojkovic, yesterday's new victim of ethnic Albanian terror.

SERB KILLED IN GORNJI LIVOC
(B2-92, 3. 7. 2000.)

Kosovo, Sunday - A Kosovo Serb was killed yesterday near the village of
Gornji Livoc, KFOR stated today, giving the likely reason for this
murder as a fight over cattle. KFOR have used helicopters in the search
for four suspects who were seen running from the murder scene. American
KFOR forces arrested seven people in connection with the incident but
later freed them due to lack of evidence.

MINE EXPLOSION IN THE VILLAGE OF CERNICA
(Serbia Info, 3. 7. 2000.)

Gnjilane, June 30 (Tanjug) - After a short break, ethnic Albanian
terrorists in the multiethnic village of Cernica resumed their terrorist
activities against Serbs. According to amateur radio operators, an
explosion occurred near the house of Milorad Simic at around 2.45 p.m.
today. Fortunately, there were no casualties. Windows and tiles of
Simic's house were destroyed in the explosion, while the surrounding
houses suffered minor damages. Together with four other Serb houses, the
house of Milorad Simic is surrounded by ethnic Albanian ones. This was
not the first attack on the Serbs in that part of the village. After the
explosion, KFOR soldiers visited the scene, but ethnic Albanian
attackers remained unknown.

PRISTINA, Yugoslavia (AP) - Unidentified attackers fired at a car on a rural
road in Kosovo's American sector Wednesday, wounding three Serb men, the U.S.
command said.

 Yugoslav news agencies identified the wounded as a Serbian Orthodox priest
and two seminary students.

 Later, U.S. troops fired warning shots over a crowd of angry Serbs who
gathered in the town of Klokot to protest the attack, a U.S. statement said.
There were no injuries, and the crowd broke up.

 The U.S. statement said the three men were traveling from Klokot to Vitina,
about 30 miles south of Pristina when the attack occurred at midday.

 U.N. civilian police found the wounded men along the road and took them to
the U.S. military hospital at Camp Bondsteel where they were listed in stable
condition pending surgery.

 Yugoslavia's private news agency Beta and the state-run Tanjug agency
identified the three as clerics.

 The attack was the latest against Kosovo's dwindling Serb minority in wake
of the June 1999 withdrawal of Yugoslav forces following the 78-day NATO
bombing campaign. The alliance launched the airstrikes to stop Yugoslav
President Slobodan Milosevic's crackdown against ethnic Albanians.

 Although the attackers were not identified, ethnic Albanian extremists have
carried out numerous attacks against Serbs in the American sector over the
past 13 months.

 In another development, Serb villagers in two communities just across the
provincial boundary from Kosovo reported a mortar fire early Wednesday and
blamed ethnic Albanian extremists.

 There were no injuries, the villagers said. The attack reportedly occurred
near the Serbian villages of Merdare and nearby Borovac, 120 miles southeast
of Belgrade.

 ``This is getting worse and worse,'' said Danijela Pavlovic, 35, who lives
in Merdare. She said the fire came from Mirovac, an Albanian-populated
village on the other side of the separation line.

 ``We'll all leave if this continues,'' she said, adding she had sent her
teen-age son to stay with relatives in a town farther from the border.

 Serbian police declined comment, but an officer, speaking on condition of
anonymity, said the mortar attack shortly after midnight was preceded by
sniper fire against a nearby police checkpoint.

 AP-NY-07-12-00 1455EDT

PRISTINA, Yugoslavia, June 26 (AFP) - A Serbian man was
kidnapped after his car was cut off from a convoy escorted by UN
police near the northwestern Kosovo town of Podujevo, a UN police
spokesman said Monday.
   A UN police vehicle was leading a small convoy of Serbs from a
border crossing near Merdare Saturday when a car with four men
pulled in front of the last vehicle which was carrying a man and a
woman, said spokesman Charley Johnson.
   The suspect car then slowed down, separating the car from the
convoy and forcing it to stop. The woman was driven back to the
boundary with Serbia by the men and the man was abducted, Johnson
said.
   It was "just like a wolf singling out a sheep," said Johnson.
   Local Serb witnesses told AFP the man was Tomislav Markovic and
identified the woman with him as his wife.
   Johnson said UN police were investigating the incident and
considering also putting escort vehicles at the rear of convoys in
the future, although the force is severely understaffed.
   Serbs entering and leaving the UN-run Yugoslav province are
frequently escorted by international peacekeeping troops or UN
police for their own safety, amid persistent anti-Serb violence.

Obilic, July 31st (Tanjug) - Serbs and
their property in Obilic are still targets
of Albanian extremists, and during the
last few days several incidents
occurred.

On July 31st, Albanian terrorists set on
fire house of Bozidar Vasic in Cerska
Street in Obilic, which was bombed the
previous evening. Neighbors noticed
the fire and extinguished it. Although
firemen, KFOR and UNMIK were
immediately called, nobody showed at the site.

Yesterday afternoon around 4:45 PM, five Albanian extremists in green "Mercedes"
vehicle stopped Zarko Stanojevic (25) and beat him afterwards. Stanojevic, who
was going home towards Cerska St., got severe injuries of nose and bloody
swellings on head and body, and was later helped by KFOR soldiers.

Later the same evening, between 9:30 and 10:30 PM, Albanian extremists shot at
family house of severely beaten Stanojevic from automatic weapons, but
fortunately nobody was hurt in that attack.

Thursday, August 3 7:34 AM SGT

{See what NATO, and KFOR, have wrought. Hardly the
tolerant society promised by them; in fact, the
reverse.]

PRISTINA, Yugoslavia, Aug 2 (AFP) -
Four people, including a 12-year-old boy, were killed
in two incidents in Kosovo Wednesday, a spokeswoman
for the KFOR multinational peacekeeping force said.

Three Roma gypsies from the same family were killed in
an explosion at around 9:30 p.m. (1930 GMT) in the
village of Mali Alas, near Lipljan, 15 kilometres
(nine miles) south of Pristina, Captain Kath Hurley
said.

Later, some time after 10:30 p.m. in the village of
Magura seven kilometres (four miles) west of Mali
Alas, a 12-year-old boy was shot dead by an
unidentified attacker or attackers, she said.

The youth, who was hit four times in the chest, was
thought to be an ethnic Albanian and the two incidents
are not believed to be connected, Hurley said. KFOR
was investigating the attack, but no arrests had been
made, she added.

A short while earlier a patrol of Finnish peacekeepers
investigating a fire in Mali Alas had found an
unexploded mortar bomb tied to a fence, Hurley said.

"They started to warn off the people in the area.
Three Roma individuals came out of their house and
were walking towards the Finnish patrol when the
improvised explosive device was detonated," Lieutenant
Nick Mansfield said.

Hurley said the victims were a father, his son and a
nephew. A second son was lightly injured in the blast,
but did not require hospital treatment, she said.

Two victims died instantly. A KFOR doctor arrived at
the scene by helicopter but was unable to save the
life of a third Roma who died later of his injuries,
Mansfield said.

Mali Alas is a mixed Roma and Albanian village in an
area of Kosovo where Serbs, Roma and ethnic Albanian
communities lived near each other, KFOR said.

Earlier KFOR had reported that the three were killed
when their car hit a landmine. This was later
contradicted.

Kosovo's Serbian and Roma minorities have regularly
fallen victim to ethnically motivated attacks since
KFOR entered the Serbian province after NATO bombed
Yugoslav security forces out of Kosovo.

Wednesday's incident was the most serious since June
15, when two Serbs were killed by a landmine on the
road between the ethnically mixed town of Kosovo Polje
and Lipljan.

 http://www.nandotimes.com/no_frames/global/story/0,4382,500236922-500346724-502000175-0,00.html

The Associated Press

PRISTINA, Yugoslavia (August 7, 2000 5:16 p.m. EDT
http://www.nandotimes.com) - Accusing the United
Nations of allowing ethnic cleansing to continue in
Kosovo, the Belgian branch of the humanitarian group
Doctors Without Borders announced Monday it was
leaving the embattled area.

Doctors Without Borders "can no longer tolerate the
serious and continuous deterioration of living
conditions of the ethnic minorities in Kosovo," the
group said in a statement released in Pristina.
French teams from Doctors Without Borders will remain
in the province.

The group said the Belgian doctors had been
"eyewitnesses to the daily harassment and terror
against the Serb minority in (the towns of) Vucitrn
and Srbica and the Albanian minority in (the
northern part of Kosovska) Mitrovica."

The group said life for ethnic minorities was marked
by killings, drive-by shootings, hand grenade
attacks, verbal abuse, threats, robbery and blackmail.
Many had been forced to leave their homes, the group
said.

More than a year after NATO and the United Nations
marched into Kosovo, mistrust and violence still
fester between ethnic Albanians, Serbs and other
minority groups. International officials make almost
daily appeals for tolerance, saying ethnic tensions
are preventing the southern Serb province from
achieving economic and social progress.

"Doctors Without Borders questions the
appropriateness of humanitarian medical and
psychological assistance when, in the presence of
internationally mandated protection forces, the
fundamental rights of people are being denied," the
statement said.

The Paris-based group, which was awarded the Nobel
Peace Prize in 1999, has worked in Kosovo since
1993. It provides home-based care in the ethnically
divided city of Kosovska Mitrovica.

-----------------ON THE SAME EVENT:--------------------

PRISTINA, Yugoslavia, Aug 7 (AFP) - The international aid group
Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders, MSF) said Monday
that it was pulling out of north Kosovo to protest the UN's failure
to protect ethnic minorities.
   "More than a year after UNMIK and KFOR assumed responsibility
for civil and military administration, a large number of people
still live in extreme insecurity," MSF said in a statement issued
jointly in Pristina and Brussels.
   UNMIK -- the UN administrative mission in Kosovo -- is led by
Bernard Kouchner, a co-founder of MSF. KFOR is the NATO-led
peacekeeping force in the province.
   "Ethnic groups are continually terrorised. There are acts of
organised violence against them ... that amounts to ethnic
cleansing," said the head of the MSF mission in north Kosovo,
Philippe Rosen.
   "We refuse to be accomplices to what is happening. We refuse to
remain silent faced with the lack of efficient action on behalf of
the international community," he added.
   The Belgian staff of MSF's operations in north Kosovo will pull
out of the divided town of Kosovska Mitrovica as well as the Serbian enclaves around the towns of Srbica and Vucitrn.
   The organisation's Spanish and French staff in the rest of the
province will continue their work.
   MSF, winner of last year's Nobel Peace Prize, deployed 190
expatriate staff from 16 countries in Kosovo after the province was
put under UN administration in June last year.
   It had already been active in Kosovo for six years, before
NATO's 78-day campaign of aerial bombardments of Yugoslavia forced
Serbia to relinquish control of the predominantly ethnic Albanian
province.

http://www.albaniannews.com
Albanian Daily News
August 12, 2000

Trials Throw Doubt on Kosovo Courts
PRISHTINA - The prolonged trial of a Kenyan aid worker for theft has
raised troubling questions about policing and legal standards in Kosovo
more than a year after the United Nations took over the province.
Peter Muriuki, 40, a project officer for CARE International, and two
Albanian men have been in custody since shortly after the theft on April
1 of a safe belonging to another aid agency that held some 500,000
German marks ($250,000).
At hearings this week key witnesses withdrew the testimony the case was
based on, saying they had been intimidated by members of the UN
international police force in Kosovo into giving evidence against
Muriuki and the other men.
But the court, UN-run but dominated by Albanian judges, continued the
case, calling for the police officers accused of coercion to appear on
Monday to confront witnesses.
"There is no evidence left that implicates the three defendants so we
are puzzled why the case is continuing," an international trial observer
said. "The bigger issue here is the quality of the UNMIK (UN Mission in
Kosovo) police."
Muriuki and CARE International have also alleged the U.S. police officer
at the centre of the case harassed defendants and exhibited bias. Senior
UN police officials deny such charges but acknowledge proper arrest
procedures were not followed.
Legal monitors from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in
Europe have complained about police conduct and the behaviour of the
presiding judge, an Albanian, who is reported to have asked CARE for a
job for his son.
The accused face a maximum of 20 years imprisonment if found guilty. "We
think fundamentally there is no case against Peter," said Care
International spokeswoman Alix de Mauny. "We believe profoundly in his
innocence."
Justice Hard to Deliver
Bernard Kouchner, head of the UN mission that has run Kosovo as a de
facto protectorate since a NATO bombing campaign forced out Serb forces,
has refused to move the trial but acted on OSCE concerns by putting an
international judge on the case.
The Muriuki trial highlights the challenges for the United Nations,
which arrived in mid-1999, in establishing a credible justice system in
post-war Kosovo with untrained local judges, inexperienced prosecutors,
and ill-defined procedural rules.
Judges from Kosovo's isolated Serb minority community boycott
proceedings, leaving trials against non-Albanians open to accusations of
ethnic bias.
The first acquittal of Serbs on charges of killing Albanians came this
week, but only after an international judge was appointed and the US
army, following a media inquiry, belatedly acknowledged it had shot the
victim.
UN officials also accept that the international police force assembled
in Kosovo to deliver fair and impartial justice has had serious teething
troubles and struggled to stem a tide of violent crime, ethnic
intimidation and disorder.
The situation in one case encouraged international police to override
international law and arrange the illegal extradition of a Kenyan man,
Moses Omweno, to face theft charges.
Omweno was seized in Nairobi in June, held incommunicado, transported
back to Kosovo and charged.
OSCE monitors found the British police involved acted "in reckless
disregard for the law" and Omweno was released and allowed to leave the
region. An Angolan man suspected of the same theft was deceived into
returning to Kosovo by the agency that employed him, with UNMIK
knowledge, and also had to be released on human rights grounds.
UNMIK police deputy commissioner Michael Jorsback told Reuters on Friday
that he was considering action against those involved in the Omweno
case.
But perfection could not be expected, he said, when the police were
1,000 short of a proposed 4,700 staffing level, came from 48 countries
with different training standards, worked via interpreters and
experienced staff changes every six to nine months. "Partly individuals
have taken too much initiative and it's partly a system failure," said
Jorsback. "There are still a lot of grey areas and we are expected to
perform professionally. It's not easy." (Reuters)

Story Filed: Saturday, August 19, 2000 10:59 AM EDT

CRKVENA VODICA, Yugoslavia (AP) -- NATO peacekeepers increased patrols in a Kosovo village
Saturday, a day after nine Serb children were injured in a grenade attack.

The attack came just hours after an explosion in the province's capital wounded one woman and
damaged several political offices.

Flight Lt. Tim Serrell-Cooke, a spokesman for British peacekeepers, said the grenades were hurled by
three occupants of a vehicle who ignored warning shots fired in the air by a U.N. policeman as they sped away.

The grenades were tossed into a basketball court in the village of Crkvena Vodica, about 7 miles
northwest of Pristina, the
provincial capital. Nine children were treated for minor injuries and released from a local hospital.

Two men were questioned and released, told to report back Saturday for further interrogation,
Serrell-Cooke said. Angry and
tense villagers stoned a car carrying ethnic Albanians early Saturday, but no injuries were reported.

NATO bombings forced an end to the government crackdown on Kosovo Albanians last year, but
violence continues to mar chances of ethnic reconciliation.

Most of the 200,000 Serbs who lived in Kosovo have fled, after a rash of revenge attacks (let's not forget this fairy tale, right?) by the majority ethnic Albanians.

Some parents of the injured children expressed anger Saturday.

``If some of us are guilty, let them hit on us, not on our kids,'' said one woman, whose 8-year-old girl
was among the injured. Like others, she would not give her name for fear of further attack.

One man blamed ``Albanian terrorists'' for the incident. He said the children hurt were aged 5 to 15.

Another blast, attributed to political tensions ahead of local elections in October, damaged a building
housing the offices of the Democratic League of Kosovo in the central town of Malisevo.

Nobody was hurt in the explosion late Friday. U.N. spokeswoman Claire Trevena said a dark colored van
was seen leaving the blast site after the explosion, but U.N. police had no suspects in the incident.

The party is led by pacifist Ibrahim Rugova, the symbol of Kosovo Albanian resistance to Serb
dominance in the decade before tensions exploded into violence in 1998.

In Pristina on Friday, an explosion went off behind a building run by the Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe,
damaging offices of Serb, ethnic Albanian and other political parties housed there.

One woman suffered cuts and bruises and several other people were in shock, Serrell-Cooke said.
NATO officials said the explosion appeared to have been caused by a bomb.

The OSCE is in charge of democracy-building in the province.

Kosovo, a southern Yugoslav province, has been run by the United Nations since the end of the 78-day
NATO bombing campaign.

 Belgrade, Yugoslavia, Aug. 22 (UPI) -- Three Serb children in Kosovo
escaped unharmed when occupants of a passing car opened fire on them
following a similar incident last Friday in which nine adolescent Serbs were
hurt in a grenade attack. Meanwhile near Pristina the U.N. mission unearthed
a mass grave of what are believed to be Serbs.

 The unknown attackers opened fire on the children in the village of Staro
Gracko, near Lipljan, on Monday. After the first shot, the oldest of the
three children, Milos Nedeljkovic threw himself to the ground pulling his
two sisters down with him and so prevented any of them from being hit, the
news agency Beta said Tuesday quoting Serbian sources.

 The attackers, in an Opel Ascona car, then drove toward Veliki Alas, once
a mixed Serbian and Albanian village but since the arrival of the United
Nations peacekeeping force in June last year becoming all Albanian, the
agency said.

 U.N. police investigated the incident on the spot and later set off to
Veliki Alas, Beta reported.

 On Friday, nine Serb children all under 15 years of age were slightly
injured when two hand grenades were tossed at them on a basketball court
from a passing car in the village of Crkvene Vodice. They were treated in a
U.N. military hospital and later discharged.

 In another development, the U.N. mission in Kosovo was reported by the
Belgrade newspaper Blic Tuesday to have discovered a mass grave in the
Pristina suburb of Dragodan, containing 160 bodies believed to be the
victims of Albanian militants over the past year.

 Blic said UNMIK had invited family members of kidnapped or missing Serbs
and Roma (Gypsies) to come forward and try to identify the bodies.

 A woman, Vesna Mulici, has identified a body from the mass grave as that
of her husband Ram Mulici, the paper said. She told Blic, "I saw many
identity cards with photographs and names of Serbs while I was trying to
recognize the things that belonged to my husband."

 Blic said UNMIK had neither confirmed nor denied the report. But it added
that UNMIK had repeated its appeal to relatives and friends to come to
Pristina and help the Committee for Missing and Kidnapped Persons identify
the remaining 159 bodies unearthed at Dragodan.

 The paper also said strong peacekeeping troops had until recently secured
and barred access to that Pristina graveyard.

   PARIS - The European Union (EU) Tuesday expressed its
concern over the persistent acts of violence occurring
in Kosovo just before local elections take place on
October 28.

France, the current rotating presidency of the EU,
said in a declaration that the EU is deeply concerned
with the ongoing acts of violence between Albanians
and Serbs.

“The international community will continue to
implement with determination all means whatsoever to
end the violence so these elections can be conducted
under the best conditions possible,” said the
declaration.

It added that the international community will not
allow extremists to sabotage the electoral process in
Kosovo.

EU strongly condemned the terrorist attack on August
18 in Prishtina against the mission of the
Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe
(OSCE), which protects political parties in Kosovo.

On August 18, while the Yugoslav representative in
Prishtina was being attacked, 10 children were injured
in the explosion of a grenade thrown from a moving car
in the village of Crkvene Vodice near Obilic in
central Kosovo.

   PRISTINA, Yugoslavia, Aug 28 (AFP) - Bernard Kouchner, head of
the United Nations' mission in Kosovo, condemned Monday the killing
of two Serbs as protesters attacked his administration's failure to
ensure their community's safety.
   "It has been a bloody and tragic weekend for Kosovo," he said in
a statement released in Pristina.
   "Those who commit such acts are killing their future, the future
of Kosovo. This is not the way for the province to rebuild. This is
not a route to democracy," he said.
   Pavle Nedeljkovic, 75, was mown down by a burst of automatic
gunfire while tending his livestock just outside the village of
Crkvena Vodica, central Kosovo, late Sunday, the Serbian National
Council (SNV) said.
   His death came just hours after an eight-year-old Serbian child,
Nikola Nikolic, was run down by an ethnic Albanian motorist, who
carried on driving and ploughed into two more children on bikes and
a teenage pedestrian, seriously injuring them, in Skulanevo village,
six miles (10 kilometres) further south.
   The motorist was arrested and is expected to be charged with
"vehicular homicide and driving while intoxicated," UN spokeswoman
Claire Trevena said. However, police sources told AFP they were
investigating the possibility that the children were deliberately
targeted.
   Kouchner sent his sympathies to the victims' families, and
declared: "Sympathies and prayers are not enough. Kosovo's people
have got to stop the killings. The right minded people of Kosovo
cannot allow terror and violence to take hold.
   "While the attacks on minorities are silently condoned, Kosovo's
people are moving backwards rather than joing the UN mission and working towards the province's future."
   Meanwhile, in the Serbian enclave of Gracanica, around 1,000
Serbs gathered to hear local political leaders denounce the violence
against their community and accuse the United Nations and the KFOR
peacekeeping force of failing in their duty to protect minorities.
   The demonstrators were accompanied by about 20 children carrying
banners displaying the slogans: "NATO go home," "Stop killing our
children" and "Kosovo is Serbia".
   Slobodan Ilic, head of the local branch of Yugoslavian president
Slobodan Milosevic's Serbian Socialist Party, was warmly cheered
after he denounced KFOR, but the crowd dispersed peacefully after
their protest.
   Earlier KFOR's British-led central brigade announced that with
the arrival of new commanders and a combat battallion of Royal
Marine Commandos it would adopt more aggressive tactics in dealing
with ethnic attacks.
   The marines and troops from Scandinavian countries in the
brigade would concentrate on patrolling tense areas rather than
manning fixed positions and hope to catch extremists unawares, Major
Tim Pearce said.
   Members of Kosovo's Serbian and Roma communities have in
particular been the target of attacks....

PRISTINA, Yugoslavia, Sept 9 (AFP) -
A clerk with the aid agency Caritas shot a Kosovo Albanian and his two
sons during an argument over the handing out of roof tiles, a spokesman
for Kosovo's UN police force told AFP Saturday.
Two of the victims died on the spot, the third was taken to hospital in
a critical condition and may also die, Derek Chappell told AFP.
"An argument began over the distribution of roof tiles. The suspect was
responsible for their distribution," he said.
"After the argument began, the suspect brought out a handgun and shot
the father and his two sons."
The clerk, a Kosovo Albanian, was working in the central Kosovo village
of Lozica, 20 miles (30 kilometres) west of Pristina, when the incident
occurred at around midday Friday.
The aid worker fled the scene in a Caritas minibus, a spokesman for the
KFOR peacekeeping force said, but was later arrested near the scene and
a weapon seized.
Chappell said the dead were Idrez Buzhda and his son Hajrullah. Buzhda's
son Misin was taken to Pristina hospital.
Russian peacekeeping troops from the KFOR peacekeeping force and
civilian UN police officers were sent to the scene, Chappell said.
Saturday was celebrated in Kosovo as a "Day against violence". Around
6,000 people gathered in central Pristina to hear UN administrator
Bernard Kouchner and the leaders of parties representing minority
communities urge Kosovo's majority ethnic Albanian population to prepare
for their October 28 municipal election in an atmosphere of calm and
tolerance.
Caritas is a non-governmental, Catholic international aid agency with
branches in several countries.

A senior Albanian official working for the UN mission in Kosovo has been
found murdered.
Rexhep Luci - who was the head of the Department of Housing and
Reconstruction in the regional capital Pristina - was found shot in his
apartment building in the city.
He was found on a staircase by UN police on Monday evening, local time.
He had received six gunshots to the chest.
Officials with Nato's peace implementation force, K-For, say the murder
may be linked to the Mafia.
Police say a suspect vehicle was seen near the scene.
K-For troops set up roadblocks in the area. No arrests were made.
As director of the Department for Housing and Reconstruction in
Pristina, Mr Luci was responsible for giving planning permission for all
new buildings in the Pristina area.
Since the end of the war in June 1999, the city has seen a huge
construction boom, with new houses and businesses going up on most
streets, most without any official permits.
While no clear motive has been established for his murder, K-For
intelligence reports suggest his killing may be linked to attempts to
demolish illegally-built hotels.
The KLA has links to the lucrative hotel business
Mr Luci's department has just embarked on a programme to knock down the
buildings.
Hotels have become a highly lucrative business, many of which are linked
to former members of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA).
Mr Luci is the second senior Albanian official to be murdered this year.
Earlier this summer a former KLA commander working for the UN was
killed. Nobody has yet been charged with his murder.

PRISHTINA (Reuters)- An Albanian journalist was killed
in the Kosovo town of Vucitern on Sunday, the United
Nations said on Monday.

UN spokeswoman Susan Manuel said Shefki Popova - a
correspondent for the Kosovo daily Rilindja - was
killed late on Sunday evening.

“Witnesses say they saw two people running from the
scene which was near the municipality building,”
Manuel told reporters.

Popova was taken to hospital where he died from his
injuries, she said.

No further information was immediately available.

According the Beta news agency in Belgrade, at about
23:00 last night, two unidentified persons opened fire
on the journalist in Vucitern and then fled, as UN
police spokesman Yvan de Sainte-Foy said.

According to KFOR, the journalist was shot at near the
culture hall in the very centre of Vucitern, after
which he was stabbed with a knife several times.

Popova, who was 50, died on the way to hospital, KFOR
spokesman Bernard Cellier said.

De Sainte-Foy said that no one had been arrested and
that an investigation was under way.

Popova spent 26 years working for Rilindja, Kosovo’s
oldest Albanian language daily, which was founded in
1944 He had been working as the paper’s Vucitern
correspondent for several years, the paper said.
(Reuters)

There are fears that organised crime is spiralling out
of control in Kosovo after the murder of a senior
Albanian official working for the UN mission in the
province.

The UN has ordered a security review for local staff
after the mission's director of planning,
reconstruction and development, Rexhep Luci, was shot
dead in what K-For officials say was a "mafia"
killing.

Unidentified gunmen shot Luci, 58, in the back six
times as he returned to his apartment in the regional
capital, Pristina, on Monday evening.

Luci's tasks included signing demolition orders for
illegal buildings. At the time of his murder, the
department was in the process of demolishing a hotel
complex.

Colleagues said Luci had been threatened twice in the
last 10 days.

An initial K-For report on the killing says Luci may
have been killed by "mafia" figures related to the
hotel industry.

The hotel complex was partly financed by the Kosovo
Hotels Association, which the department said was set
up by former members of the Kosovo Liberation Army who
seized control of property across the province when
Nato troops entered Kosovo last June.

PRISTINA, Sep 14, 2000 -- (Agence France Presse)
Italian Carabinieri police seized more than two
million packets of cigarettes weighing 47 tonnes in a
single raid on a warehouse in Kosovo, Major Lorenzo
Lebini told AFP Wednesday.

The officers, part of a police unit attached to the
Kosovo's KFOR peacekeeping force, found the cigarettes
in cartons marked with the logos of the world's best
known brands in a raid Tuesday on a warehouse in the
town of Pec, in the west of Kosovo.

One person was arrested in the raid, which followed a
similar operation in Pristina on August 13 in which
half a million packets of contraband cigarettes were
seized and which formed part of the same
investigation, said Lebini.

In total 130 tons of cigarettes -- bearing the brands
Lucky Strike, Winston, Dorchester, Pall Mall and
Phillip Morris -- were discovered in the latest raid.

An investigation has been launched into the source of
the remaining packets, Lebini said.

The KFOR Multinational Specialized Unit is charged
with investigating organized crime in Kosovo, a
Yugoslavian province under the administration of the
United Nations since the end of its 1998-1999 civil
war in June last year. ((c) 2000 Agence France Presse)

PRISTINA, Sep 15, 2000 -- (Agence France Presse)
Gunmen shot dead a Serb woman at her home in the
ethnically mixed town of Kamenica, in eastern Kosovo,
a spokesman for United Nations police in the Yugoslav
province said Thursday.

Unidentified gunmen fired at the house of 45-year-old
Mijana Stojanovic, at 10:35 p.m. (2035 GMT), fatally
wounding her, Derek Chappell said.

She died an hour later at a Russian-staffed camp of
the multinational KFOR force in Kosovo.

Kamenica is home to Serbs and ethnic Albanians.

There was still no word meanwhile of broadcast
journalist Marjan Melonasi, who works for RTK radio
and television.

Melonasi, of Serb and ethnic Albanian parents, was
reported missing from the provincial capital Pristina
on Saturday, but there was nothing to indicate it was
a kidnapping, Chappell said.

On Sunday evening, Albanian journalist Shefki Popova
was killed in the northern town of Vucitrn. He worked
for the Albanian-language Kosovar daily Rilndja.
Police said no suspect had been arrested.

The minority Serb population is regularly attacked in
the mainly ethnic Albanian province, which has been
run by a UN administration since the end of the civil
war there in June 1999 and where KFOR troops keep
order. ((c) 2000 Agence France Presse)

SILOVO, Yugoslavia –– Every four hours, day and night,
soldiers of the U.S. 1st Armored Division patrol this
Kosovo village, carefully avoiding the open sewers,
standing silently in cornfields on guard against
intruders who might bomb a house or burn a crop to
drive away the few hundred Serbs who remain here.

The soldiers live in a former mortuary, a windowless
building that shares a hilltop with a cemetery and a
small church. When they are not patrolling, they
escort townspeople who need to leave the village to
work, shop or visit relatives. With loaded guns at the
ready, they keep watch over soccer games, birthday
parties and any other event that might draw a crowd.

A little more than a year after they arrived, the main
mission of the 5,500 U.S. troops in Kosovo has
completely reversed: Instead of protecting ethnic
Albanians from Serb paramilitaries, they go to great
lengths to protect the small Serbian population from
vengeful Albanians. It's a nearly thankless role that
requires hundreds of soldiers to do daily bodyguard
duty for people considered foes not long ago.

Kosovo has become a treadmill. In dozens of
interviews, officers and enlisted men said they can do
valuable work here--and do it carefully and
enthusiastically--but still never know whether they
have achieved anything meaningful. For many GIs,
Kosovo is a mission without goal posts or time limits.

"It's a good mission to help a country put its past
behind and get off on the right foot," said Staff Sgt.
Henry Gonzalez, who leads patrols from the hilltop
outpost. "I just wish we were better at it, to the
point they appreciated it."

On one recent Sunday, Gonzalez and his men spent
several hours standing in full battle gear in
100-degree heat to keep watch over a Serb wedding. The
revelers did not offer a word of acknowledgment in
return.

Although the peacekeepers of NATO's Kosovo Force,
known as KFOR, have undoubtedly made this a less
violent and more orderly place, military commanders
admit they still have not accomplished their original
mission: providing a "safe and secure environment" so
that the ethnic Albanian majority and the local
Serbian minority can start healing their wounds. Not
only do the old hatreds persist, but new forms of
criminality and political violence are enmeshing the
U.S. troops in Kosovo.

"It is like sticking your hand into a spider web,"
said a senior Army official who asked not to be
identified.

With dismay evident in their voices, some U.S.
soldiers complain that neither Serbs nor ethnic
Albanians seem interested in peace. More than half the
troops interviewed in a recent survey conducted by
Charles Moskos, a military sociologist at Northwestern
University, said they expected Kosovo would be the
same when they left as when they arrived.

Unbecoming Conduct

That kind of frustration now reveals itself in small
acts of impatience or arrogance among soldiers who
spend six months at a time here, with little relief
from repetitious guard duty. When U.S. troops first
poured into Kosovo in June 1999, the problems were
much more severe--at least in one elite Army unit,
according to a Pentagon report released this week.

More than 800 soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division
arrived in Kosovo last September, when it was more
unsettled and violent than today. With scant training
in how to manage conflict between civilians, some of
the paratroopers routinely manhandled Albanians. But
their officers kept quiet about it--until a member of
the unit was accused of murdering a Kosovo Albanian
girl in January.

Staff Sgt. Frank Ronghi was sentenced in August to
life in prison for luring an 11-year-old into the
basement of a building, then raping and killing her.
During Ronghi's court-martial, evidence emerged that
other soldiers in his unit had routinely groped the
breasts and buttocks of women during searches in the
town of Vitina, and had beaten civilian men during
interrogations. Their behavior, the Pentagon said in
its report this week, "violated basic standards of
conduct, human decency and Army values."

Moreover, the report went beyond identifying a few
wrongdoers and pointed to a systemic problem. Many of
the first U.S. soldiers to arrive in Kosovo last year
were from elite divisions, such as the 82nd Airborne,
that were expecting combat and had not been trained
for peacekeeping. Soldiers in Ronghi's unit--whose
motto was "Shoot 'em in the face"--had "difficulties
tempering their combat mentality," the report
concluded.

The Pentagon says that all U.S. troops now in Kosovo
have received at least some preparation for
peacekeeping duties, although the extent of that
training varies greatly, from a few days to more than
two months. The report is certain to fuel a debate
over whether the military should have a separate cadre
of peacekeepers rather than ask war-fighting units,
such as the 82nd Airborne or the 1st Armored, to put
aside their combat mind-set. As something of a
compromise, the U.S. troops who have the most contact
with ordinary Kosovo residents are reservists in civil
affairs and military police units who bring something
of a civilian mentality, as well as specialized
training, to the mission.

But no one in Kosovo is cutting the peacekeepers much
slack. American troops guard Serbs, then dodge rocks
when Serbs riot to protest their living conditions.
Ethnic Albanians have benefited hugely from the U.S.
intervention, and yet they defy KFOR with attacks on
the Serbs and by continuing to hoard weapons and train
militias.

"The KFOR say they are doing their jobs, doing their
jobs. But then nothing happens," said Petar Dinkic, a
Serbian shopkeeper in Vitina.

Among U.S. military officials all the way up the chain
of command, a major frustration is the lack of a
bottom line for the Kosovo mission. The Army's
standard briefing on the situation includes a chart
titled "Destabilizing Factors." At the top of the list
is "Political end state undefined," followed by "Lack
of functional government."

Defining the mission in Kosovo--its purpose and end
point--has emerged as one of the most contentious
national security issues in the presidential campaign.
George W. Bush, the Republican nominee, has criticized
the Kosovo mission as an example of how the U.S.
military is overextended with humanitarian duties
around the world. Vice President Gore, the Democrat,
defends the U.S. intervention last year and the
current effort to rebuild Kosovo as the kind of
"forward engagement" necessary to preserve American
interests.

Neither candidate has explained in detail how he would
proceed in Kosovo, but it is clear that U.S. military
commanders will press the next president for hard
decisions.

"You have to wonder whether we are going to be
rotating troops through there for years just to keep
the place more or less stabilized, because there are
no peace talks, no negotiations, not even a real plan
for what Kosovo is supposed to become in the long
run," said one senior military policymaker.

"When we go on patrol, I like to ask people, 'How long
do you think KFOR will be here?' And they tell me,
'You are not leaving soon, and maybe not ever,' " said
Sgt. Hector Roman, who is on duty here with a National
Guard military police unit from Puerto Rico. "I don't
know if that means we are doing our jobs well, or
not."

Sitting in his tiny jewelry shop on a busy street in
Urosevac, Zylfis Shehu answered Roman. "We would like
to have taxes and police and government, but all that
is difficult and will not happen in a day," the ethnic
Albanian shopkeeper told the American sergeant. "My
opinion is that I want KFOR to stay for a long time,
because without them, there would be no law. Everybody
with a gun would be their own law."

Hot Cars

The Puerto Rican MPs hit the streets ready for combat,
with machine gunners atop their vehicles. Once they
set up a checkpoint, though, the gunners tap out salsa
tunes on the roofs of their Humvees for the
entertainment of passersby.

"We have our own style," says Roman.

One Saturday night, Roman's squad set up a roadblock
and pulled over automobiles to search for weapons.
Their sniffing German shepherd did not discover any
guns or explosives. But they did find a steady stream
of luxury cars, mostly Mercedes-Benzes and BMWs,
driven by young men without any ownership or
registration papers. The excuse was always the same:
All the papers got lost during the war.

>From the darkness, one of Roman's soldiers offered a
verdict on each vehicle that soon became a refrain:
"Esta caliente"--It's hot.

The most pressing danger, according to U.S. officials,
stems from criminal enterprises run by ethnic
Albanians who already have made this corner of the
Balkans into a European hub for trafficking in
narcotics, illegal aliens, stolen cars and
prostitutes.

"Crime is a significant problem in the way of
developing a sound economic system and freedom," said
Lt. Gen. Dennis Hardy, commander of the American
sector of Kosovo, which covers nearly 900 square
miles. But, he said, U.S. troops will not go after
crime kingpins. "I don't see us going after drug
trafficking or prostitution," he said. "It is not our
intent, not our mission."

Instead, when U.S. peacekeepers come across criminal
activity, they turn the information over to the U.N.
police, who are responsible for law enforcement. All
the U.S. military can do is provide some muscle when
the police make an arrest or conduct a search.

"It is very frustrating because you see what's going
on here, but you don't have all the tools or the legal
authority you would have back home to clean things
up," said Roman, a police detective in civilian life.

Taking on the criminals is all the more difficult
because of their links to local leaders, including
many of the ethnic Albanian nationalists who fought
the Serbs and are treated as heroes in their
communities.

"We call it the thugocracy," said a senior U.S. Army
officer. "The mafia, the politicians and the so-called
freedom fighters are all connected."

No Reconciliation

To support the Kosovo mission, the U.S. Army has built
three base camps that continue to expand every day.
The largest of them, Camp Bondsteel, now covers 1,000
acres. Its more than 350 buildings include a hospital,
a prison, two chapels, two gyms and two huge mess
halls that serve 20,000 meals a day for soldiers and a
huge supporting cast of civilian contractors.

When the sun is up, the sounds of earthmovers and
construction crews fill the air. At night it is quiet
except for the helicopters setting off or returning
from patrols. Almost every corner of Bondsteel is
brightly lit with orange streetlights. Stadium lights
point outward, starkly illuminating the landscape for
a few hundred yards beyond the eight-foot-high dirt
berms and barbed-wire fences. Vast and alone in the
night, Bondsteel is called "the Death Star" by
soldiers in support jobs, who often go for weeks
without leaving the base.

Aside from a few enterprises in which Serbs and ethnic
Albanians work side by side under KFOR auspices, there
are no substantial efforts to reintegrate the ethnic
Albanian and Serb communities in Kosovo. Instead, the
peacekeepers are just trying to ensure the safety of
the remaining Serbs in the hope that someday Kosovo
can become a functioning multi-ethnic society.

In the town of Vitina, for example, the black flag of
the 101st Airborne "Screaming Eagles" flutters over a
sandbagged guard post between two general stores where
Serbs often gather. In Urosevac, the 29 Serbs who
remain, out of a prewar population of about 30,000,
receive almost daily visits from soldiers bringing
groceries or just checking on their welfare. And
across the U.S.-patrolled sector of Kosovo, soldiers
keep permanent watch on 33 Serb churches and 27
schools.

"If we pulled out, all of the Serbs would be gone
within minutes," said Sgt. David Coleman, who leads
patrols in Gnjilane, where 65 Serb families live in a
sector code-named "Kansas."

The soldiers in "Kansas" man checkpoints where they
spot intruders by referring to binders with photos of
all the neighborhood's residents and their cars. Once
a week the peacekeepers escort Serb farmers to a stone
courtyard outside a Serb church to operate a heavily
guarded market for their fruits and vegetables. With
prodding, some ethnic Albanians have begun shopping
there.

"We see some progress," said Lt. Col. David Hogg, "but
they aren't exactly having each other over for
barbecues yet."

Living as a virtual prisoner inside the church
compound, Vitomis Vasich, a Serb, does not see much
improvement.

"We are not satisfied with KFOR, and we cannot accept
that the most powerful army in the world cannot find
out who commits murders and burnings right under their
noses," Vasich said.

Busy No Man's Land

In the view of U.S. commanders, the constant shootings
and house burnings reflect "unfulfilled expectations"
that the war would produce an independent Kosovo. How
far the people of Kosovo are willing to go to achieve
that dream is a question that looms every day as the
sound of gunfire grows louder in a patch of woodland
just outside the American sector.

Under the agreement that ended the NATO bombing
campaign, a "ground separation zone" about two miles
wide was created along the boundary between Kosovo and
Serbia. Neither KFOR nor Serb forces are allowed to
enter it. But the village of Dobrosin, with a
population of about 400 ethnic Albanians, falls within
that no man's land and has become a busy training camp
for pro-independence militants.

Checkpoint Sapper, manned by a platoon of the 1st
Armored Division, sits on a bluff a few hundred yards
from Dobrosin. From that vantage, U.S. soldiers have
watched hundreds of men descend on the village for a
three-week training cycle that has grown so
predictable that U.S. troops know which days the
trainees get target practice.

Ethnic Albanian leaders have repeatedly promised U.S.
officials that they have nothing to do with this
activity. They insist that it can be ascribed to a
small militia, known by its initials in Albanian as
the UCPMB, which they say is a ragtag outfit of no
political importance. The Albanians claim that the
group's sole goal is to liberate a handful of Albanian
villages that remain under Serb jurisdiction. But
there is ample evidence that the training in Dobrosin
is supported from within the American sector.

On average 300 people a day go down the narrow road
into the village, a huge amount of traffic for a
hamlet otherwise isolated from the world. Moreover,
the amount of ammunition that U.S. troops hear
expended daily far exceeds anything that might have
been stored in the village.

"We have blocked the majority of the key points of
entry, but we have not completely sealed off the
supply," said Hogg, operations officer for the U.S.
command in Kosovo. "It is such a large area that if
someone wanted to get something over, sure they
could."

The surrounding countryside is heavily wooded and
sparsely populated. Motion sensors and other
surveillance devices have been planted, and special
forces units run patrols at night, U.S. officials
said. But to cut off the weapons traffic would require
the permanent commitment of several hundred soldiers,
the officials said.

This summer the militants in Dobrosin have launched
repeated forays into nearby villages, resulting in
firefights with Serb forces. U.S. officials worry that
one of these skirmishes might spill over into a
confrontation with the troops at Sapper. The
worst-case scenario is that men trained in Dobrosin
will turn on the peacekeepers if Washington tries to
pull out under an arrangement that provides less than
independence.

On a hot summer night, the troops at Checkpoint Sapper
watch "Con Air" and then "Saving Private Ryan" on the
TV in their mess tent. They have seen the videos so
often that they know the scripts by heart. Outside, a
mortar round thumps in the distance. Then another.
Then several more in rapid succession.

There is a stir of activity at the command post. A
soldier inside a Bradley Fighting Vehicle carefully
scans Dobrosin with an infrared sight, but there is
little sign of activity--a couple of cars set off down
a wooded path, two men slowly walk back from an
observation post that allows them to look into Serb
territory.

Over the course of an hour and a half, the mortar fire
continues sporadically in what sounds like a
considerable skirmish in the wooded hills of the
separation zone. Except for those left on watch, the
soldiers at Sapper get into their bunks, but most just
stay in their uniforms because they have been mustered
in the wee hours often enough. As they go to sleep, no
one really knows what is happening around them.

PRISTINA, Sep 19, 2000 -- (Agence France Presse) A
Serb and a Roma gypsy have been killed in two separate
incidents in Kosovo, peacekeepers said Monday, in the
acts of violence against minorities in the UN-run
province.

The gypsy was shot dead Sunday during an argument in a
bar in the village of Firaja in the south of Kosovo,
according to Major Scott Slaten, chief spokesman for
the NATO-led KFOR peacekeeping force.

Two other Roma and an ethnic Albanian were injured in
the incident, he said.

The gunman, armed with a Kalashnikov assault rifle,
was also injured but managed to flee into a nearby
base of the Kosovo Protection Corps (KPC), the unarmed
civilian successor to the Albanian guerrilla group,
the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA).

He was later arrested. It was not clear Monday whether
the gunman was a KPC member.

In the ethnically mixed town of Gnjilane, 18 miles (30
kilometers) southeast of Pristina, a Serb was killed
Sunday when a grenade was thrown at him as he repaired
a car in front of his house, Slaten said.

The killing appeared to be linked to a second grenade
attack in Gnjilane the same day in which a Serb owned
home was damaged but no one injured.

In another incident in the same town, a 14-year-old
ethnic Albanian boy was arrested after he threw a
Molotov cocktail into the garden of a Serb home.

Since the end of Kosovo's 1998-1999 civil war in June
last year and the arrival of the KFOR peacekeepers,
the province has been wracked by political and ethnic
violence. ((c) 2000 Agence France Presse)