BALKAN WITNESS
Articles on the Kosovo Conflict: Reports from the Area of Conflict
For regular updates on events and issues in the former Yugoslavia, see also
Balkan Investigative Reporting Network's Balkan InsightNote: Each article shown below represents the opinion of the author, and not necessarily of anyone else.
NEW Death Toll in Kosovo Due to War Balkan Witness staff, 2007
Serbian mass grave "holds up to 500" Kosovo victims Reuters, June 4, 2007
More Mackatica Body Burning Revelations IWPR, April 20, 2005
State Security destroyed evidence of Kosovo war crimes Humanitarian Law Center, December 23, 2004
Kosovo Atrocity Cover-up IWPR, December 23, 2002
In the Name of the Victims By Natasha Kandic, Humanitarian Law Center, November 18, 2002
New Mass Graves Found IWPR, June 14, 2002
Under Orders: War Crimes in Kosovo Human Rights Watch, October 2001
Serbs Break Silence on Atrocities By R. Jeffrey Smith, Washington Post, July 1, 2001
Compilation of reports on the Racak Massacre
Kosovo Atrocity Cover-up By IWPR, May 11, 2001
The Filipovic Story By Anthony Borden, IWPR, March 30, 2001
The Promise of Justice: Burning the Evidence National Public Radio, January 25, 2001
Serb Officers Relive Killings By Miroslav Filipovic, IWPR, April 4, 2000
KOSOVO / KOSOVA: As Seen, As Told - Volume I OSCE Kosovo Verification Mission, Oct 1998-June 1999
KOSOVO / KOSOVA: As Seen, As Told - Volume II OSCE Kosovo Verification Mission, June-Oct 1999
The Kosovo Numbers Game By Ian Williams, Institute for War and Peace Reporting, November 12, 1999
More Than 2,100 Bodies Exhumed from Kosovo Graves CNN, November 10, 1999
A Village Destroyed: War Crimes in Kosovo Human Rights Watch, October 1999
Kosovo: the untold story (Part 1) -- Peter Beaumont and Patrick Wintour, The Observer (London), July 18, 1999
Kosovo: the untold story (Part 2)
Letters from Stankovec (Kosovar Refugee Camp in Macedonia) By Donna Behrendt, July 1999
Letters from Post-war Kosovo By Peter Lippman, July 1999
A Kosovo Albanian Family in Macedonia By Peter Lippman, July 6, 1999
Balkan Crisis Reports Institute for War and Peace Reporting, Feb. 1999 to present.
New York Times Coverage of NATO Intervention March-June, 1999
Investigators Overwhelmed by Extent of War Crimes Uncovered (Audio) NPR, June 30, 1999.
Serbs Shun Discussion of Atrocities Washington Post, June 24, 1999.
Mass Graves Found All Over Kosovo Associated Press, June 22, 1999.
Survey of Serbian War Crimes in Kosovo Physicians for Human Rights, June 15, 1999.
Editor In Exile By Elizabeth Rubin, The New Yorker, May 17, 1999.
Erasing History: Ethnic Cleansing in Kosovo U.S. State Department, May 10, 1999
Refugees: Doctors being singled out Seattle Times, April 20, 1999.
Massacre of Over Sixty Villagers Near Bela Crkva Human Rights Watch, April 17, 1999.
Ethnic Hungarians Fear They're Next Seattle Times, April 17, 1999.
Serb Preparations for Kosovo Attack Started Long Before Bombing Seattle Times, April 12, 1999
Action Alert From the Kosova Task Force USA, April 11, 1999.
The Anatomy of a Purge Washington Post, April 11, 1999.
Kosovo Refugees Describe "Nights of Fear" in Belanice Human Rights Watch, April 8, 1999.
Belgrade Blues By Jasmina Tesanovic, April 6, 1999.
Cleansing Pristina By Gjeraqina Tuhina, Institute for War and Peace Reporting, April 5, 1999.
Yugoslav Forces Systematically Expel Ethnic Albanians Human Rights Watch, March 30, 1999.
The Racak Case in the Belgrade Media By Helsinki Watch, February, 1999
Report on Serious Violations of International Humanitarian Law in Kosovo in 1998 No Peace Without Justice, February 1999
Report on the violation of human rights and freedoms in Kosova in the course of 1998 Council for The Defence of Human Rights and Freedoms (Prishtina), January 22, 1999
Report on the Racak Massacre Human Rights Watch, January, 1999
Peace Hopes Dim In Serb-Battered Kosovo By Peter Lippman, Seattle Times, August 21, 1998
First Person: Jailed In Repressed Kosovo By Peter Lippman, Seattle Times, April 9, 1998
See also Compilation of reports on the Racak Massacre
Summaries of articles listed above
NEW Death Toll in Kosovo Due to War A Balkan Witness compilation of reports on numbers of Kosovars killed due to Serbian attacks.
Serbian mass grave "holds up to 500" Kosovo victims Serbia will open a mass grave on Tuesday believed to contain up to 500 Albanian victims of the Kosovo war, fresh evidence of Serb atrocities as the U.N. decides whether to grant the province independence. Authorities believe the bodies were originally buried elsewhere, then dug up, collected, and dumped at the quarry on June 3, 1999, a senior Serbian official told Reuters. -- Reuters, June 4, 2007
More Mackatica Body Burning Revelations Eyewitness accounts contain dramatic new evidence of how police working for Slobodan Milosevic burned truckloads of ethnic Albanian corpses in a factory in southern Serbia during the 1999 NATO conflict. -- IWPR, April 20, 2005
State Security destroyed evidence of Kosovo war crimes The cover-up of the war crimes committed in Kosovo in 1998 and during the NATO bombardments was, above all, a police activity carried out by the most trustworthy men of the late of the head of Ministry of Interior Affairs of Serbia, of the former President of the Government of Serbia, of the one time head of the Public Security, and the former head of the State Security. -- Nataša Kandić, Humanitarian Law Center, December 23, 2004
Secretive exhumations of Kosovo Albanian victims and the reluctance of the authorities to take action against the culprits. The net result of 18 months’ of exhumations is the remains of some 770 people, including those of nine children and of several dozen women. The number will probably increase, because it is believed that the last grave in Batajnica may yield anything from 50 to several hundred bodies. The great unknown is still who killed these people. Was it the police, the army, paramilitary formations, or local Serbs? -- IWPR, December 23, 2002In the Name of the Victims A new report on a Serbian massacre of Kosovo Albanian women and children on March 28, 1999. --Natasha Kandic, Humanitarian Law Center, November 18, 2002
New Mass Graves Found More evidence of Serbian mass killings of Albanian civilians could soon emerge, but the perpetrators of these crimes may never be prosecuted. -- IWPR, June 14, 2002
Under Orders: War Crimes in Kosovo This report’s main aim is to document the war crimes committed by Serbian and Yugoslav government forces in Kosovo between March 24 and June 12, 1999 - the period of the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia. Through well-researched case studies, as well as scientifically rigorous statistical analysis, the goal is to provide a credible account of the terrible events that have taken place in the hope that the perpetrators will be brought to justice. At the same time, the report acknowledges that Serbian and Yugoslav government forces did not have a monopoly on abusive behavior. The report therefore provides documentation of international humanitarian law violations committed by the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) as well as by NATO. The authors hope that this report breaks new ground by providing both a broad and detailed account of war crimes in Kosovo, along with the political background and context of the conflict. By including first-hand accounts and testimony, the report also gives voice to the innocent victims of war. -- Human Rights Watch, October 2001
Serbs Break Silence on Atrocities Slain ethnic Albanians from Kosovo were pulled from the trucks and tossed into the pits, doused with gasoline, and set on fire. When the flames died, the tractor driver switched his engine on and eased a layer of dirt over the blackened sludge. Those who conceived of the operation expected that these secret horrors would never surface, a reasonable view under the authoritarian government that ran Yugoslavia until last October. What they did not count on was the enduring anger and shame of those who were ordered to drive the trucks, hoist the bodies and operate the tractors. Finally, two years later, after the downfall of President Slobodan Milosevic and the advent of a government in Belgrade that is willing to listen, these Serbs caught up in wartime horror are beginning to talk. The nightmarish memories they are recounting for authorities form the backdrop for Milosevic's sudden extradition Thursday to a U.N. war crimes tribunal in The Hague and may end up buttressing the charges against him. -- By R. Jeffrey Smith, Washington Post, July 1, 2001
Compilation of reports on the Racak Massacre
Kosovo Atrocity Cover-up There's more and more evidence of a concerted Serbian campaign to destroy the remains of Kosovo Albanians butchered by Milosevic's forces. Serbia is being haunted by horrifying tales of atrocities committed in the Kosovo conflict two years ago. The stories tell of wholesale burning of Albanian bodies to destroy evidence of widespread massacres. -- IWPR, May 11, 2001
The Filipovic Story Documents on Yugoslav war crimes in Kosovo were leaked to the reporter by Yugoslav army sources, in an effort to stop Slobodan Milosevic from provoking a new conflict in Montenegro. The top-secret document presented a disturbing picture of army officers still deeply troubled by crimes committed by their comrades in Kosovo. It did not bode well for a military operation against Montenegro. The report explicitly raised the question of whether such troops could be relied on in any new civil conflict. -- Anthony Borden, IWPR, March 30, 2001
The Promise of Justice: Burning the Evidence Serbian security forces incinerated the remains of hundreds of ethnic Albanians in an industrial furnace during the 1999 war in Kosovo. The secret operation was part of a highly organized effort by Serbia's leadership to conceal evidence of possible war crimes from international investigators. So far, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia has exhumed around 4,000 bodies and inspected hundreds of gravesites. An additional 3,500 people are officially registered as missing in Kosovo, including hundreds of Serbs and Gypsies. -- National Public Radio, January 25, 2001 (Includes text plus audio.) For a later story, see Kosovo Atrocity Cover-up (IWPR).
Serb Officers Relive Killings A Yugoslav Army intelligence report gives a unique insight into the enormity of war crimes in the Kosovo enclave last spring. War-weary Serb officers have spoken for the first time of sickening atrocities committed by the Yugoslav Army in Kosovo during the NATO bombing campaign. -- Miroslav Filipovic, IWPR, April 4, 2000
KOSOVO / KOSOVA: As Seen, As Told - Volume I With numerous interviews of victims and witnesses, this report presents a comprehensive analysis of the human rights findings of the OSCE-KVM. It gives an overview of the nature of the human rights and humanitarian laws violations in Kosovo. It looks at the specific impact of those violations on different groups in Kosovo society. Covers the period of October 1998 to June 1999. -- OSCE Kosovo Verification Mission, July 1999.
KOSOVO / KOSOVA: As Seen, As Told - Volume II OSCE Kosovo Verification Mission, December 1999
The Kosovo Numbers Game -- How many people were killed in Kosovo? Opponents of the NATO bombing campaign claim estimates were wildly exaggerated through cynical propaganda. But the totals for confirmed dead are mounting. "Holocaust revisionism" - denial of the genocide of the Jews during World War II - is illegal in some countries. But the downward revision of the numbers murdered in Kosovo is proving very fashionable - even in the New York Times. -- Ian Williams, Institute for War and Peace Reporting, November 12, 1999
More Than 2,100 Bodies Exhumed from Kosovo Graves War crimes investigators have exhumed the bodies of 2,108 ethnic Albanians in Kosovo, a fraction of the thousands estimated killed during a brutal crackdown on the province by Yugoslav and Serb security forces, a U.N. prosecutor said Wednesday. -- CNN, November 10, 1999 A Village Destroyed: War Crimes in Kosovo In the early morning of May 14, 1999, in the midst of NATO's air campaign against Yugoslavia, Serbian security forces descended on the small village of Cuška--Qyshk in Albanian--near the western Kosovo city of Pec (Pejė). Fearing reprisals, many men fled into the nearby hills while the rest of the population was forcibly assembled in the village center. An estimated twelve men were killed during the roundup in various parts of the village. At approximately 8:30 a.m., the security forces in green military uniforms with painted faces and masks separated the gathered women, children, and elderly from the remaining men who had not managed to flee. The more than 200 villagers were threatened and systematically robbed of their money, jewelry, and other valuables. Their identification papers were destroyed. Twenty-nine men between the ages of nineteen and sixty-four were divided into three groups and taken into three separate houses, where they were forced to stand in a line. In each house, uniformed men sprayed them repeatedly with automatic weapons. In one of the houses, a gunman finished off several of the fallen men with pistol shots. Each house was set on fire and left to burn. The events in Cuška are far from unique: hundreds, if not thousands, of ethnic Albanians were killed by Serbian special forces and paramilitaries throughout Kosovo between March and June - many of them in a similar manner. -- Human Rights Watch, October 1999Kosovo: the untold story (Part 1) The Observer's definitive account of the Kosovo war. The Racak massacre was a revenge attack planned by Yugoslav forces under General Sreten Lukic, head of the Ministry of Interior forces in Kosovo. -- Peter Beaumont and Patrick Wintour, The Observer (London), July 18, 1999
Kosovo: the untold story (Part 2)Letters from Stankovec A volunteer nurse writes from a camp for displaced Kosovo Albanians on the Macedonian border. -- Donna Behrendt, July, 1999
Letters from Post-war Kosovo Three journal entries from a July visit to Kosovo. -- Peter Lippman, July, 1999
Letter from Skopje: a Kosovo Albanian Family in Macedonia At Dardan's house in Pec there were some 75 Albanians, displaced from nearby villages and other parts of the town. The army came there and shot into the ceiling, and gave them five minutes to leave. They all ran away, running out the doors, through the windows, "through the walls." Dardan scoffed at the idea that Albanians left Kosovo because of the NATO bombardment. He said, "People were overjoyed when it started. They were calling us here from Kosovo. Here in Macedonia, Albanians were celebrating in the streets." Dardan told me that Pec and Gjakova, further south, were the worst hit. The old market center of Gjakova is completely burned. Pec is even more destroyed, but more people were killed in Gjakova. The Serbs wanted to make an Albanian-free corridor in this western area along the border with Albania. Very few Serbs had lived in Gjakova - it was 97% Albanian. -- Peter Lippman, July 6, 1999
Balkan Crisis Reports IWPR's network of correspondents provides inside analysis of the events and issues driving the crisis in Kosovo and the region. Searchable archive of reports back to February 1, 1999.
New York Times Coverage of NATO Intervention March-June, 1999. Index with links to published articles.
Investigators Overwhelmed by Extent of War Crimes Uncovered International investigators are overwhelmed by the extent of war crimes they are uncovering throughout Kosovo. In village after village, bodies of Kosovar Albanians protrude from hastily dug graves. Many bodies have been dumped in wells. Although Serb forces have retreated, the devastation they left makes it extremely difficult for the traumatized survivors to pick up their lives. The War Crimes tribunal in the Hague, its resources stretched thin, will probably be able to investigate only a small fraction of the crimes committed. (Audio) -- NPR, June 30, 1999.
Serbs Shun Discussion of Atrocities Over the last two weeks, as foreign reporters have finally gained access to the killing fields of Kosovo, television viewers and newspaper readers all over the world have been given horrifying accounts of the violence committed by Yugoslav and Serbian forces on the ethnic Albanian population. But here in Serbia, there has been little public discussion of atrocities and no substantive reporting on the subject by the heavily censored news media. -- Washington Post, June 24, 1999
Mass Graves Found All Over Kosovo Ask someone for directions to a field holding the corpses of 142 people who were executed and he says, after that I'll show you a grave holding six members of a single family. Mass graves are everywhere in Kosovo: more than outsiders can track down in their first days back in the province; enough to keep war crimes prosecutors busy for years, if they choose. Apparently fearing just such prosecution, Serb soldiers, paramilitary, police, and civilians cremated many of their ethnic Albanian victims, or returned to exhume corpses for burning or reburial in single graves, survivors say. But while the 2 1/2-month war was time enough for killing untold thousands, it wasn't enough time for cleaning up afterward. The signs of slaughter abound. -- Associated Press, June 22, 1999
Survey of Serbian War Crimes in Kosovo Until Serb forces departed, to be an ethnic Albanian in Kosovo was to be vulnerable to theft, destruction of property, separation from family members, sexual violations, killing, beating, torture, and/or deportation for no reason other than one's ethnic identity. Such was the lot of many of those whom PHR interviewed. Such accounts of suffering, individually and collectively, are a powerful testimony to the cruelty, thoroughness, and extraordinary breadth of Milosevic's war against unarmed and helpless Kosovar Albanian men, women, and children. -- Physicians for Human Rights, June 15, 1999 (PDF file)
Editor In Exile Can a radical newspaper become the blueprint for an independent Kosovo? The newspaper had been founded in April of 1997, and its irreverent and activist coverage of the province's political life had at one time or another irritated all the major players in Kosovo. By Elizabeth Rubin, The New Yorker, May 17, 1999.Erasing History: Ethnic Cleansing in Kosovo Summary of a comprehensive overview of Serbia's campaign to rob the people of Kosova of their homeland, their identity, their dignity and even their existence. The report contains charts and maps that show where human rights abuses occurred, the locations of internally displaced persons and refugee camps, and gives a detailed account of how Serbia's campaign of ethnic cleansing took place. We have generally tried to avoid posting information coming directly from the U.S. government. However, in the case of this document, the information is important and presented well, and it would be hard to come by something this comprehensive from other organizations that simply don't have the resources to gather it. -- U.S. State Department, May 10, 1999.
Refugees: Doctors being singled out Masked Yugoslav troops found Dr. Vesel Elezi when they roamed through the Kosovo city of Urosevac on April 4 and ordered residents to leave. He pleaded for his life, saying, "I'm a doctor." One of the soldiers replied, "You are exactly the person I am looking for," and Elezi was shot. Under the 1949 Geneva Conventions governing the conduct of war, health-care professionals are supposed to be exempt from deliberate hindrance or attack. But in Kosovo, refugees say Yugoslav troops are targetting not only ethnic Albanian doctors but also their facilities, leaving virtually the entire remaining population without access to medical treatment. -- Seattle Times, April 20, 1999.
Massacre of Over Sixty Villagers Near Bela Crkva Five witnesses, interviewed separately, have described in detail how Serbian security forces executed more than sixty ethnic Albanian men in the village of Bela Crkva (Bellacerka, in Albanian) just hours after NATO bombing began in Yugoslavia on March 24. -- Human Rights Watch, April 17, 1999.
Ethnic Hungarians Fear They're Next On the walls of homes and public buildings in the Yugoslav province of Vojvodina, the slogans are ominous: "Hungarians: Your God is dead and doesn't care for you anymore." -- Seattle Times, April 17, 1999.
Serb Preparations for Kosovo Attack Started Long Before Bombing More than three months before NATO launched airstrikes against Serbian targets, Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic was readying a fresh offensive against ethnic Albanians in Kosovo. As early as December, Serb special police and paramilitary units began to infiltrate Serbia's southern province. Ignoring an October deal for peace, Milosevic massed interior-ministry police and Yugoslav army troops in Kosovo and along its northern border in numbers far beyond those allowed by the cease-fire plan. By mid-March, Serb forces had wired tunnels and bridges on the main southern highway with dynamite, and Serbian civilians had armed themselves to the teeth. -- Seattle Times, April 12, 1999
Action Alert 50 cities and towns in Kosova have been leveled to the ground, forcing the citizens to flee into the mountains to escape the murdering Serb army. They are attempting to survive without any food or shelter in frigid climate, absolutely uncertain of their fate. -- From the Kosova Task Force USA, April 11, 1999.
The Anatomy of a Purge An account of how Kosovars were systematically attacked and destroyed by the Serb army during the last two weeks. -- Washington Post, April 11, 1999.
Cleansing Pristina After ten days in the Kosovo capital, watching the expulsions and the packed trains, our correspondent is forced to leave. After filing reports for a week with her name withheld, she now relates her own expulsion and journey over the Macedonian border. -- Gjeraqina Tuhina, Institute for War and Peace Reporting, April 5, 1999.
Kosovo Refugees Describe "Nights of Fear" in Belanice Refugees fleeing into northern Albania described an atmosphere of utter terror in the Kosovo village of Belanice, which was used by Yugoslav forces as a gathering point for ethnic Albanians living in the Malishevo district. Dozens of witnesses interviewed by Human Rights Watch reported that they were robbed, threatened with death, suffered physical deprivation, and that refugees were occasionally murdered. On April 1, their ordeal in Belanice came to an abrupt end, when they were forcibly expelled from the village toward the Albanian border. -- Human Rights Watch, April 8, 1999.
Belgrade Blues I hope we all survive this war, the bombs: the Serbs, the Albanians, the bad and the good guys, those who took up the arms, those who deserted, refugees going around the Kosovo woods and Belgrade's refugees going around the streets with their children in arms, looking for non-existing shelters, when the alarm for bombing sets off. ... I think of the Albanians in Kosovo, of my friends and their fears, I think they must be worse off then us: fear springs up at that thought, it means that it is not the end yet. -- By Jasmina Tesanovic, April 6, 1999.
Yugoslav Government Forces Systematically Expel Ethnic Albanians From Kosovo Refugees reported to Human Rights Watch researchers today that Serbian special police and Yugoslav military units are systematically expelling ethnic Albanians from Kosovo, including the cities of Pec and Prizren, in a well-orchestrated and centrally organized campaign to rid the region of the majority of its population. The stories of refugees interviewed by Human Rights Watch staff in Albania and Macedonia revealed a consistent pattern in the conduct of the expulsions and their timing, underscoring the fact that the Yugoslav government evidently made a decision over the weekend to "cleanse" the region of ethnic Albanians. -- Human Rights Watch, March 30, 1999.
Report on Serious Violations of International Humanitarian Law in Kosovo in 1998 This report demonstrates the existence of a campaign organized from within the state structure of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia involving the widespread commission of violations of international humanitarian law in Kosovo. See especially Section III-C, which catalogs Yugoslav military attacks on the Albanian civilian population of Kosovo in 1998. -- No Peace Without Justice, February 1999
Report on the violation of human rights and freedoms in Kosova in the course of 1998 The Council's 1998 annual report details the killing, massacre and physical liquidations of 1934 Albanians; kidnapping, arrests, ill-treatments, persecutions and displacement of 500,000 Albanians; and destruction and burning of 41.538 houses and flats. These events occurred in the year prior to NATO's intervention. -- Council for The Defence of Human Rights and Freedoms (Prishtina), January 22, 1999
Report on the Racak Massacre In heavily documented reports, Human Rights Watch categorically rejected Yugoslav government claims that the victims of the January 15 attack on Racak were either Kosovo Liberation Army soldiers killed in combat, or civilians caught in crossfire. After a detailed investigation, the organization accused Serbian special police forces and the Yugoslav army of indiscriminately attacking civilians, torturing detainees, and committing summary executions. The evidence suggests that government forces had direct orders to kill village inhabitants over the age of fifteen. The killing of forty-five ethnic Albanian civilians provoked an apparent shift in western policy toward Kosovo. Yugoslav government sources, echoed by some Left writers and media sources worldwide, have claimed that reports of the Racak massacre were faked. -- Human Rights Watch, January, 1999.
See also The Racak Case in the Belgrade Media, a report from Helsinki Watch, February, 1999.
See also War Crimes Indictment of Milosevic and others, Count 24 (a).
See also Compilation of reports on the Racak MassacrePeace Hopes Dim In Serb-Battered Kosovo The government of Serbia has killed hundreds of Albanians in Kosovo this year, displaced at least 200,000, and at last report destroyed around 300 villages. After a sudden and brutal massacre in Drenica in late February, Serbian police expanded their attacks throughout Kosovo, especially along the western border with Albania. By Peter Lippman, Seattle Times, August 21, 1998
First Person: Jailed In Repressed Kosovo I traveled to Pristina, capital of the southern Yugoslav province of Kosovo, last month as an affiliate of the California-based organization Peaceworkers. We met with Kosovo Albanians and Serbs, and observed massive demonstrations by Albanians who were protesting the recent massacre in the nearby Drenica region. Our visit culminated in our unexpected arrest. We were detained and summarily sentenced to 10 days in jail for failure to register our presence in Pristina with the local police. An American diplomat trying to get us released likened this infraction to "tearing the tag off a mattress." By Peter Lippman, Seattle Times, April 9, 1998