Taken without permission, for fair use only.
Kosovo left a 'wasteland'
Retreating Kosovo rebels vow to fight back
Belgrade Says Kosovo Drive Is Over; Albanians
Dispute Claim
Kosovo rebels besieged, Serbs say offensive over
We won't surrender, say Kosovo rebels
Aid Workers Seek Kosovo Refugees
Kosovo negotiating team expected soon
___________________________________
Friday, July 31, 1998 Published at 11:49 GMT 12:49 UK
Kosovo left a 'wasteland'
More than 100,000 civilians from the Serbian province
of Kosovo are reported to be on the run following a week-long Serb offensive
against separatist ethnic Albanians.
Correspondents say entire
villages and towns have been abandoned.
International relief
workers are stepping up their efforts to track down the missing thousands
after finding about 50 terrified women and children with little food or
water in the forests near Malisevo in the west of the country.
The area is a former
stronghold of the separatist Kosovo Liberation Army. It fell to Serb forces
earlier this week.
The separatist guerrillas
are now surrounded by Serbian forces in a stand-off at one of their last
remaining strongholds - the village of Junik near the Albanian border.
A United States envoy,
Christopher Hill has gone to Belgrade to ask Yugoslav President Slobodan
Milosevic to keep his promise to end the Serb offensive in Kosovo and help
refugees return to their homes.
A European Union delegation
which met Mr Milosevic on Thursday accused Serbia of using excessive force,
and said parts of Kosovo had become a wasteland.
Mr Milosevic told the
EU delegation that the Serbian offensive in Kosovo was now over.
Speaking after the meeting,
Austrian diplomat Albert Rohan told the BBC that he had received assurances
that the Serbs would not shell the KLA stronghold of Junik, which has been
surrounded for several days.
But he said he and his
EU colleagues were not totally convinced by Mr Milosevic's intentions.
"We are sceptical considering
the performance of the Serb security forces over the last eight to nine
years, but we will see whether the deeds match the words," he said.
The delegation said
they believed progress had been made towards negotiations between the Serbs
and Kosovo separatists.
But they expressed dismay
at the level of destruction during the Serb offensive.
The British diplomat,
Emyr Jones Perry, said their impression from their tour was that there
"has been an excessive use of force."
His German colleague
Wolfgang Ischinger said "what has been created [in Kosovo] is literally
a wasteland."
The German foreign ministry
says it is to have talks on Friday with supporters of the separatists living
in Germany, to stop them collecting funds for the KLA.
Serb gains on the ground
In the latest fighting the Serb-led security forces
overran the town of Malisevo - the main stronghold of the KLA - forcing
thousands of its inhabitants to flee.
The BBC diplomatic correspondent
says that the successes of President Milosevic's forces have been so sweeping
that he may be less inclined to compromise on the degree of autonomy Kosovo
should have.
___________________________________
THE LONDON TIMES
July 31 1998
EUROPE
In a no man's land of mad dogs and smouldering villages, guerrillas say the only contact they have with Serbs is through the barrel of a gun,
Tom Walker writes from Likovac
Retreating Kosovo rebels vow to fight back
The Kosovo Liberation Army yesterday insisted
it had made only a tactical withdrawal from its former headquarters of
Malisevo, and that the fight against Serb forces would continue despite
its extensive territorial losses of the past four days.
Pinned back into Likovac,
a windswept hilltop village which is their remaining command centre in
central Kosovo, the guerrillas said they appreciated diplomatic efforts
made by America to bring them to the negotiating table, but said they would
make peace on their terms only.
The hardline defiance
of the ethnic Albanians was confirmed by an internal coup in Pristina,
tacitly backed by Washington, in which Ibrahim Rugova, their pacifist leader
of the past decade, has been marginalised. A new "all-party executive",
heavily biased towards the guerrillas, has been formed, in which Mr Rugova's
party, the Democratic League for Kosovo, has only one seat.
When the executive will
agree to meet the Serbs is unclear. In a makeshift "information centre"
in Likovac yesterday, a spokesman for the guerrillas said: "The only link
we have with them at the moment is the gun." Christopher Hill, the US Ambassador
to Macedonia, visited Likovac on Wednesday and he is expected to try to
return there next week in an effort to forge a final compromise with the
KLA.
Determined to prove
they still have a little bite to their bark, the guerrillas again barricaded
the east-west highway between Pristina and Pec. There was no heavy retaliation
from the Serbs and Yugoslavia's President Milosevic told European Union
diplomats at a meeting in Belgrade that the security offensive was over.
He gave a specific undertaking
that the Yugoslav Army would not shell the western town of Junik, the KLA's
border base. Analysts predict a lull in the Kosovo conflict, a breathing
space that could for the first time yield a genuine chance of dialogue.
The KLA were friendly
and welcoming in Likovac, whose small market bustled to an extent that
suggested all is not quite lost. Despite a steady tide of refugees, stalls
were crammed with vegetables and watermelons.
Generators whirred constantly,
giving the village, which lies in isolated territory 35 miles west of Pristina,
a makeshift atmosphere. Along with its own electricity supply, Likovac
has communications, too; a self-styled post office takes advantage of the
village's altitude to pick up the mobile phone signal from Pristina and
the Serbs have still not cut the landlines. There was an uncomfortable
feeling that Mr Milosevic's generals are toying with Likovac like a cat
with a mouse; a helicopter gunship could destroy the painfully exposed
village in minutes.
The guerrillas claimed
2,000 refugees were taking shelter in a nearby railway tunnel, fearful
of Serb snipers. A Red Cross business card on the table of the information
centre indicated there has been at least some contact with humanitarian
agencies. "We welcome all delegations who want to come here," said the
spokesman, warning us to be objective. We could get more details of the
KLA's reaction to the Serb offensives on the Internet, he said.
As we left our translator,
Bashkim, described how in better times he had read Dickens, Hemingway and
Zola. "You are free men," he said. "You do not know how it is to be born
into slavery."
Later we passed the
barricades manned by young guerrillas loyal to a commander called "Sultan".
They gave us clenched-fist salutes of defiance. Afterwards we entered the
no-man's land that is so much of central Kosovo, a realm of dogs driven
crazy by shellfire and heat, abandoned villages and wasting crops.
___________________________________
New York Times
July 31, 1998
Belgrade Says Kosovo Drive Is Over; Albanians Dispute Claim
By REUTERS
BELGRADE, Serbia -- President Slobodan Milosevic
of Yugoslavia told European Union envoys Thursday that a fierce Serbian-led
offensive that had snatched much of Kosovo back from ethnic Albanian separatists
was over.
But Albanian informants
said later that Serbian forces were still shelling villages in rebel territory
near the western border with Albania, and that civilians had fled into
highland woods with no means of sustenance.
The European Union envoys
also said they had found a wasteland devoid of people during a tour of
recaptured areas on Wednesday. Government troops apparently used excessive
force that had panicked people into mass flight, the envoys told reporters,
despite evidence that outgunned guerrillas had melted into the hills without
resistance.
The envoys reported
progress by ethnic Albanian political leaders in forming an all-party coalition,
known as G-15, for peace talks with Serbia, which is one of two republics
remaining in Yugoslavia.
[But Agence France-Presse,
quoting the Albanian-led Kosovo Information Service in Pristina, the capital,
reported that the coalition had disbanded. No reason was given, but there
have been differences among Albanian factions about the degree of autonomy
sought for Kosovo.]
"President Milosevic
assured that the military operation has come to a halt," said Albert Rohan,
secretary general of the Foreign Ministry of Austria, which holds the rotating
presidency of the European Union.
Rohan said Milosevic
had also pledged to stop besieging Junik, the main remaining rebel community
in western Kosovo, where insurgents are bottled up after being swept from
key roads in the center of the province.
But in Pristina, both
Serbian and Albanian informants said Serbian forces continued to close
in on Junik.
Milosevic issued a statement
through the state news agency Tanyug saying Belgrade would "continue to
curb all the violence in Kosovo which jeopardizes peaceful, free and joint
life of all citizens and national communities in this part of Serbia."
But the envoys said
they had found wanton destruction and desolation in regions retaken by
government forces, a legacy that would make restoring normal life very
difficult. Ninety percent of the residents of Kosovo are ethnic Albanians.
Tens of thousands of
ethnic Albanians fled towns and villages under government bombardment over
the last five months, with a new exodus this week from the town of Malisevo.
"We were shocked by
what we saw," Rohan said. "It gives the clear impression of an excessive
use of military force. The consequences to the civilian population seem
totally out of proportion with any military targets."
Wolfgang Ischinger,
a German representative in the delegation, said: "What has been created
here is literally a wasteland. We literally did not encounter a single
Albanian civilian, but an empty country, and that's what was so depressing."
"President Milosevic
promised to make returns possible, but it's hard for us to see how," he
added, referring to return of refugees.
Ischinger, who has met
Milosevic on previous missions, said the Yugoslav leader had shown some
flexibility this time "with respect to the extent of what self-government
could mean" for Kosovo.
Rohan said: "The status
quo in Kosovo is intolerable but we are not supporting independence. The
solution must be found in a large degree of self-government. We found Milosevic
very much in favor of early dialogue."
Emyr Jones Perry, a
British delegate, said talks could "begin in a matter of weeks if we are
very lucky."
___________________________________
Kosovo rebels besieged, Serbs say offensive over
By Jeremy Gaunt
BELGRADE, July 31 (Reuters) - Serbian forces were
closing in on a guerrilla bastion in the far west of Kosovo on Friday despite
a pledge by Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic that a major offensive
against ethnic Albanian separatists was over.
Both sides in Kosovo's
bloody conflict said Serbian forces were threatening the village of Junik,
a stronghold of the secessionist Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) close to
the border with lawless northern Albania.
Official Serbian sources
said the town was held by only a few dozen hardline guerrillas and that
their commanders had already crossed over into Albania.
Ethnic Albanians said
there were thousands of civilians in the village and that attempts had
been made to evacuate them.
The move against Junik
comes at the end of a week-long offensive by government forces that has
recaptured much of Kosovo from the KLA, which is waging a guerrilla war
to wrest the 90 percent ethnic Albanian province from Serbia.
By one government estimate
the KLA now controls just 10 percent of Kosovo compared with as much as
50 percent a week or so ago.
International observers
calculate that at least 500 people have died and some 150,000 have been
displaced in the past five months. Some 300-400 people are also missing.
Milosevic, who has been
under intense international pressure to find a peaceful solution to the
crisis, told visiting European Union officials on Thursday that the major
offensive was now over.
He also promised to
stop besieging Junik and other areas in the far west where insurgents had
fled, the envoys said.
The veteran Yugoslav
leader matched his pledges, however, with a call for the EU and United
States to lift sanctions imposed on his country when the crackdown on Kosovo
separatists began.
The EU officials, from
Britain, Germany and EU president Austria, said they had found a shattered
wasteland when they toured recaptured areas on Wednesday.
They suggested, after
a meeting with Milosevic, that government troops had used excessive force
and driven civilians to flight despite little KLA resistance.
Despite this, signs
emerged on Thursday that progress was being made in bringing the two sides
together -- a key goal of the EU and United States, both of which have
ruled out independence for Kosovo.
Some Western officials
have suggested that Serbian successes against the KLA may have made the
hardline separatists more amenable to compromise.
The EU delegation said
after their meeting that Milosevic now appeared willing to discuss autonomy
for Kosovo.
In Pristina, the Kosovo
capital, ethnic Albanians were also reported to be working to find a common
delegation among their bickering factions to put their case in talks with
Belgrade.
Britain's Emyr Jones
Perry told reporters talks could begin "in a matter of weeks if we are
very lucky."
The U.S. special envoy
for Kosovo, Chris Hill, has been working to bring the different ethnic
Albanian factions together, insisting that moderate leader Ibrahim Rugova
lead the delegation, that it be based in Pristina and that all views in
Kosovo be represented.
Copyright 1998 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
__________________________________
International News
Electronic Telegraph
Friday 31 July 1998
Issue 1162
We won't surrender, say Kosovo rebels
By Julius Strauss
THE Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic yesterday
told three European Union envoys that his government's major offensive
against Albanian separatists in Kosovo was over.
But as he spoke, the
rebels' leaders were declaring: "Our war of independence goes on." Despite
recent defeats and the loss of key roads, commanders in a northern stronghold
said yesterday that they would fight on until Kosovo was liberated.
One guerrilla commander
said: "The war might last one year or two years but in the end we will
win. They have tanks and big guns but we are not scared and our hearts
are strong. In the end we will prevail."
The commander has recently
returned from Germany where he ran a business for seven years. He said:
"This is the land of my birth and I have returned here to fight. I have
left my wife and children in Germany." Surveying the rolling countryside
around the commander's position we could see tractors working the fields
and men - most wearing the red and black badge of the Kosovo Liberation
Army - carrying automatic weapons.
We were offered the
traditional hospitality of goulash and bread for lunch in the officers'
mess. Outside, long, flat carts pulled by tractors and bearing families
away from the fighting further down the road meandered past, the refugees
clearly suffering in the afternoon sun. There are an estimated 1,500 in
this area alone.
The guerrilla stronghold
was one of many still holding out in Kosovo against the Yugoslav army.
Its exact location is now considered a military secret but it is about
four miles from the front line. We entered the territory using The Telegraph's
car. It took one-and-half hours along a dusty track mostly in first gear.
At the end of the ordeal, the car finally stopped and would go no further.
We were pulled from our positions, exposed to Serb snipers, by a tractor
driven by guerrillas.
The initial suspicions
of the local soldiers soon evaporated and we were able to talk with commanders
who admitted that they had suffered serious blows over the last few days.
Nevertheless they said the fight would go on. One said: "It will be difficult
for the next month but we will get stronger. You see, wherever there are
Albanians there are UCK," he said, using the Albanian acronym for the guerrilla
army.
Many of the Albanian
fighters are rag-tag and ill-trained but among them are men who are still
slowing the progress of the Serbs. One who was co-ordinating operations
last week goes by the name of The Tiger. He is an ethnic Albanian karate
champion who lives in Germany and owns a martial arts school and a private
investigation agency. Earlier this year he returned to the land of his
birth to join the KLA.
When the important southern
town of Orahovac fell to Serbian forces a week ago, The Tiger led a small
group of dedicated fighters across Serbian lines to rescue Albanian civilians
and fighters trapped in the town. After two days of dodging Serb patrols
and a dramatic escape from a second-floor window after Serbian paramilitaries
set fire to the house he was concealed in, he said he made it back to Malisevo
with nearly 400 ethnic Albanians.
Another guerrilla chief,
who operates on the main southern Pristina-Prizren road to the east of
Malisevo, is The Lion. A 36-year-old former student of chemistry at Pristina
University he prowls in a black Mercedes flagging down civilian cars at
random and checking the driver's papers.
He has his base in the
woods that overshadow the village of Crnoljevo. It is largely thanks to
him that the main road has remained closed for months forcing Serbs to
make a wide detour. During the last four months the ranks of the KLA have
swollen to an estimated 50,000 but only half have guns. Many of the volunteers
have received rudimentary training across the border in northern Albania.
Not all rebels are friendly
to outsiders. When we left rebel-controlled territory our car was stopped
by military police, heavily armed and cruising the enclave in a Nissan
patrol. They meticulously checked our papers and then warned us to leave
their land immediately and never return. In a bizarre form of checkpoint
etiquette that combined threats and civility, one of their number, who
wore black dungarees and a short neatly-trimmed beard, said in clipped
English: "If you value your life, leave now. All the best."
_______________________________________________
Friday July 31 2:02 AM EDT
Aid Workers Seek Kosovo Refugees
ISMET HAJDARI Associated Press Writer
PRISTINA, Yugoslavia (AP) - Aid workers were searching
remote southern areas of Kosovo for tens of thousands of civilians believed
to have fled a Serb offensive that drove ethnic Albanian rebels from their
strongholds.
The search for missing
civilians intensified after teams from the United Nations High Commissioner
for Refugees found about 500 terrified ethnic Albanians hiding Thursday
in the rugged hills near Malisevo, which the rebel Kosovo Liberation Army
abandoned two days before.
Maki Shinohara, a UNHCR
official, said the Albanians had little food and no water and were fearful
Serb police would hunt them down. She said the refugee agency would try
to ship them food and supplies today or Saturday.
In Geneva, UNHCR spokesman
Kris Janowski said at least 100,000 people had been displaced within the
rebellious province since Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic launched
a crackdown on Albanian militants in February.
The latest offensive,
which began last week, uprooted an estimated 20,000 people, although precise
figures had not been determined because police were blocking access to
area of fighting.
Milosevic told a European
Union delegation Thursday that the fighting near Malisevo, in southwestern
Kosovo, had ended and again offered to begin talks on the future of the
province if the Albanians can organize a negotiating team.
"President Milosevic
promised to make returns (of refugees) possible, but it's hard for us to
see how without additional confidence-building measures," said German representative,
Wolfgang Ischinger.
Before their meeting
with Milosevic, members of the EU delegation traveled to villages targeted
in the offensive to assess the level of destruction. "We were shocked by
what we saw. It gives the clear impression of an excessive use of military
force," Austrian diplomat Albert Rohan said. "The consequences to the civilian
population seem totally out of proportion with any military targets."
Ischinger said the Serb
attacks had created "a wasteland."
Albanians comprise 90
percent of Kosovo's 2 million people, and many of the Albanians want independence
from Serbia, largest of the two republics that form Yugoslavia.
U.S. and European diplomats
have been trying for months to arrange peace talks involving Ibrahim Rugova,
the most prominent Albanian leader. But Rugova's opposition to violence
has angered the KLA, which has refused to accept his leadership. On Thursday,
State Department spokesman James Rubin said Serb intimidation of civilians
in Kosovo was making it difficult for U.S. envoy Christopher Hill to "lock-in"
an Albanian delegation.
Like Serbia, the United
States and the Europeans reject independence for Kosovo, fearing it would
lead to similar demands among Albanian-speaking communities elsewhere in
the southern Balkans.
Much of the funding
for the rebels comes from Albanian communities in Western Europe. Germany's
foreign minister, Klaus Kinkel, said he would meet KLA representatives
in Bonn today to warn them that continued fighting in Kosovo would damage
Albanian relations with the West.
_______________________________________
Friday July 31 7:45 AM EDT
Kosovo negotiating team expected soon
PRISTINA, Serbia (Reuters) - Ethnic Albanian leaders
in Kosovo are close to forming an all-party executive to negotiate with
Belgrade on the restive province's future, politicians and newspapers said
on Friday.
Ibrahim Rugova, the
self-styled president of Kosovo, told reporters he expected to be able
to announce a "government" soon and that it would be a coalition of all
political factions.
"At a meeting of the
political parties we have agreed that the government will include all parties
which took part in elections and groups which did not take part in elections,"
he told reporters.
Rugova and other local
leaders have been struggling to come together into a cohesive unit since
unofficial elections for a Kosovo parliament last March.
What they call the Kosovo
government is likely to form the negotiating team to negotiate with Belgrade
to discuss ways to end the violence in Kosovo, a province of Serbia with
a 90 percent ethnic Albanian majority.
More than 500 people
have died in a separatist uprising in the past five months. The international
community has ruled out support for an independent Kosovo but is encouraging
Belgrade to grant the province more autonomy.
Rugova would not say
specifically whether the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), a guerrilla group
fighting for Kosovo's independence, would be included in the new team but
implied that it would.
"This is a government
which will include all ministries," he said when asked directly about KLA
participation.
Media in Belgrade and
Pristina, Kosovo's provincial capital, have speculated that a government
could be announced as early as Saturday, with the KLA being given control
of "ministries" responsible for security and defense.
A report in the Albanian-language
daily Koha Ditore, quoted by the Belgrade-based V.I.P. newsletter, said
Rugova had already agreed that Mehmet Hajrizi of the rival Albanian Democratic
Movement would be prime minister.
There would be three
deputy prime ministers, the newspaper said, most likely including Bajram
Kasumi of the Parliamentary Party of Kosovo and Veli Batiqi of the Christian
Democratic Party of Kosovo.
V.I.P., citing its own
sources, said the third deputy prime minister slot would be reserved for
Rugova's Democratic League of Kosovo and would likely go to Bujar Bukoshi,
the self-styled prime minister of Kosovo's current government-in-exile.
The new government is
also expected to have 18 ministries including the two likely to be controlled
by the KLA.
31 July 98
The Times
In a no man's land of mad dogs and smouldering
villages, guerrillas say the only contact they have with Serbs is through
the barrel of a gun,
Tom Walker writes from Likovac
Retreating Kosovo rebels vow to fight back
The Kosovo Liberation Army yesterday insisted
it had made only a tactical withdrawal from its former headquarters of
Malisevo, and that the fight against Serb forces would continue despite
its extensive territorial losses of the past four days.
Pinned back into Likovac, a windswept hilltop
village which is their remaining command centre in central Kosovo, the
guerrillas said they appreciated diplomatic efforts made by America to
bring them to the negotiating table, but said they would make peace on
their terms only.
The hardline defiance of the ethnic Albanians
was confirmed by an internal coup in Pristina, tacitly backed by Washington,
in which Ibrahim Rugova, their pacifist leader of the past decade, has
been marginalised. A new "all-party executive", heavily biased towards
the guerrillas, has been formed, in which Mr Rugova's party, the Democratic
League for Kosovo, has only one seat.
When the executive will agree to meet the Serbs
is unclear. In a makeshift "information centre" in Likovac yesterday, a
spokesman for the guerrillas said: "The only link we have with them at
the moment is the gun." Christopher Hill, the US Ambassador to Macedonia,
visited Likovac on Wednesday and he is expected to try to return there
next week in an effort to forge a final compromise with the KLA.
Determined to prove they still have a little
bite to their bark, the guerrillas again barricaded the east-west highway
between Pristina and Pec. There was no heavy retaliation from the Serbs
and Yugoslavia's President Milosevic told European Union diplomats at a
meeting in Belgrade that the security offensive was over.
He gave a specific undertaking that the Yugoslav
Army would not shell the western town of Junik, the KLA's border base.
Analysts predict a lull in the Kosovo conflict, a breathing space that
could for the first time yield a genuine chance of dialogue.
The KLA were friendly and welcoming in Likovac,
whose small market bustled to an extent that suggested all is not quite
lost. Despite a steady tide of refugees, stalls were crammed with vegetables
and watermelons.
Generators whirred constantly, giving the village,
which lies in isolated territory 35 miles west of Pristina, a makeshift
atmosphere. Along with its own electricity supply, Likovac has communications,
too; a self-styled post office takes advantage of the village's altitude
to pick up the mobile phone signal from Pristina and the Serbs have still
not cut the landlines. There was an uncomfortable feeling that Mr Milosevic's
generals are toying with Likovac like a cat with a mouse; a helicopter
gunship could destroy the painfully exposed village in minutes.
The guerrillas claimed 2,000 refugees were taking
shelter in a nearby railway tunnel, fearful of Serb snipers. A Red Cross
business card on the table of the information centre indicated there has
been at least some contact with humanitarian agencies. "We welcome all
delegations who want to come here," said the spokesman, warning us to be
objective. We could get more details of the KLA's reaction to the Serb
offensives on the Internet, he said.
As we left our translator, Bashkim, described
how in better times he had read Dickens, Hemingway and Zola. "You are free
men," he said. "You do not know how it is to be born into slavery."
Later we passed the barricades manned by young
guerrillas loyal to a commander called "Sultan". They gave us clenched-fist
salutes of defiance. Afterwards we entered the no-man's land that is so
much of central Kosovo, a realm of dogs driven crazy by shellfire and heat,
abandoned villages and wasting crops.
Weissenborn: A vanload of Kosovo Albanians tried
to race through German border controls but ploughed into a tree here at
high speed, killing seven passengers and injuring 20. The van was travelling
at about 60mph with frontier guards in pursuit. Police said they believed
the 27 had hoped to slip across Germany's mountainous eastern border with
the help of two Czech smugglers. The driver fled. (Reuters)
The Daily Telegraph
We won't surrender, say Kosovo rebels
By Julius Strauss
THE Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic yesterday
told three European Union envoys that his government's major offensive
against Albanian separatists in Kosovo was over.
But as he spoke, the rebels' leaders were declaring:
"Our war of independence goes on." Despite recent defeats and the loss
of key roads, commanders in a northern stronghold said yesterday that they
would fight on until Kosovo was liberated.
One guerrilla commander said: "The war might
last one year or two years but in the end we will win. They have tanks
and big guns but we are not scared and our hearts are strong. In the end
we will prevail."
The commander has recently returned from Germany
where he ran a business for seven years. He said: "This is the land of
my birth and I have returned here to fight. I have left my wife and children
in Germany."
Surveying the rolling countryside around the
commander's position we could see tractors working the fields and men -
most wearing the red and black badge of the Kosovo Liberation Army - carrying
automatic weapons. We were offered the traditional hospitality of goulash
and bread for lunch in the officers' mess. Outside, long, flat carts pulled
by tractors and bearing families away from the fighting further down the
road meandered past, the refugees clearly suffering in the afternoon sun.
There are an estimated 1,500 in this area alone.
The guerrilla stronghold was one of many still
holding out in Kosovo against the Yugoslav army. Its exact location is
now considered a military secret but it is about four miles from the front
line. We entered the territory using The Telegraph's car. It took one-and-half
hours along a dusty track mostly in first gear. At the end of the ordeal,
the car finally stopped and would go no further. We were pulled from our
positions, exposed to Serb snipers, by a tractor driven by guerrillas.
The initial suspicions of the local soldiers
soon evaporated and we were able to talk with commanders who admitted that
they had suffered serious blows over the last few days. Nevertheless they
said the fight would go on. One said: "It will be difficult for the next
month but we will get stronger. You see, wherever there are Albanians there
are UCK," he said, using the Albanian acronym for the guerrilla army.
Many of the Albanian fighters are rag-tag and
ill-trained but among them are men who are still slowing the progress of
the Serbs. One who was co- ordinating operations last week goes by the
name of The Tiger. He is an ethnic Albanian karate champion who lives in
Germany and owns a martial arts school and a private investigation agency.
Earlier this year he returned to the land of his birth to join the KLA.
When the important southern town of Orahovac
fell to Serbian forces a week ago, The Tiger led a small group of dedicated
fighters across Serbian lines to rescue Albanian civilians and fighters
trapped in the town. After two days of dodging Serb patrols and a dramatic
escape from a second-floor window after Serbian paramilitaries set fire
to the house he was concealed in, he said he made it back to Malisevo with
nearly 400 ethnic Albanians.
Another guerrilla chief, who operates on the
main southern Pristina- Prizren road to the east of Malisevo, is The Lion.
A 36-year-old former student of chemistry at Pristina University he prowls
in a black Mercedes flagging down civilian cars at random and checking
the driver's papers.
He has his base in the woods that overshadow
the village of Crnoljevo. It is largely thanks to him that the main road
has remained closed for months forcing Serbs to make a wide detour. During
the last four months the ranks of the KLA have swollen to an estimated
50,000 but only half have guns. Many of the volunteers have received rudimentary
training across the border in northern Albania.
Not all rebels are friendly to outsiders. When
we left rebel-controlled territory our car was stopped by military police,
heavily armed and cruising the enclave in a Nissan patrol. They meticulously
checked our papers and then warned us to leave their land immediately and
never return. In a bizarre form of checkpoint etiquette that combined threats
and civility, one of their number, who wore black dungarees and a short
neatly-trimmed beard, said in clipped English: "If you value your life,
leave now. All the best."
Albanians die trying to enter Germany
By Andrew Gimson in Berlin
SEVEN Kosovo Albanians were killed and 15 were
seriously injured yesterday when their van hit a tree at high speed as
they tried to escape pursuing German border guards near Dresden.
Police believed that the 24 people in the van
were trying to cross illegally into Germany in the mountainous wooded region
with the help of two Czech smugglers. The driver slowed down but then sped
off, only to lose control. He is believed to have fled into the woods after
the crash. The police have noticed an increasing number of Albanians trying
to cross into Germany since the fighting started in Kosovo.
German troops posted to the Balkans and Italy
are being paid large tax- free "danger money" allowances to compensate
them for the supposed risks and hardships they undergo.
A German soldier on a four-month tour in Bosnia
gets an extra £5,360, while the rate for four months in Croatia or
at the Piacenza air base in Italy is £3,300. Government auditors
in Bonn say the payments are unjustified, as the 3,000 German troops in
the Balkans are currently exposed to no special danger and those stationed
at Piacenza stay in hotels. But the Ministry of Defence said Bosnia and
Croatia are as dangerous as ever.
Financial Times
KOSOVO: Milosevic tells EU offensive has ended
By Guy Dinmore in Belgrade
Slobodan Milosevic, the Yugoslav president, told
European Union envoys on Thursday that government forces had ended their
latest offensive against ethnic Albanian rebels in Serbia's southern province
of Kosovo. Mr Milosevic also said government forces had no intention of
shelling the village of Junik, close to the border with Albania, where
hundreds of civilians and rebels of the separatist Kosovo Liberation Army
(KLA) are surrounded.
"The European Union will hold the president to
his assurances," said Emyr Jones-Perry, a British official.
Albert Rohan, an Austrian diplomat who headed
the three-member EU delegation, accused the army and police of using "excessive
force" in the week-long operation.
"Milosevic assured us that the military action
has come to a halt," Mr Rohan said after the delegation's talks in Belgrade.
Serbian state television reported that Mr Milosevic
had urged the EU to lift its political and economic sanctions against Yugoslavia.
The latest offensive has sent tens of thousands
of ethnic Albanians fleeing from their homes. Many are living out in the
open with little food. Several babies have been born, and Kosovo Albanian
officials accuse the Serbian police of blocking aid deliveries.
"What has been created is literally a wasteland,"
said a German diplomat, Wolfgang Ischinger. The five-month conflict has
displaced about 150,000 people, including several thousand Serbs, and risks
dragging in neighbouring Albania and Macedonia.
The fighting in Kosovo appears to have died down,
but it is not clear if government forces will be able to secure their gains.
Police said KLA rebels had re-established a roadblock near Malisevo, a
stronghold they abandoned on Tuesday.
Diplomatic efforts, led by the US ambassador,
Chris Hill, are focused on forming a Kosovo Albanian negotiating team that
would restart talks with Mr Milosevic with the immediate aim of securing
a ceasefire and returning refugees to their homes.
The new line-up, which has yet to be approved
by the fractious KLA, is expected to be headed by Mehmet Hajrizi, a former
Marxist and political prisoner who is seeking to shunt aside Ibrahim Rugova,
the more moderate leader re-elected in March as "president" of the Kosovo
Albanian majority.
The Guardian
Fleeing rebels cede ghost HQ to Serbs
By Richard Boudreaux in Malisevo
Friday July 31, 1998
The Yugoslav government has been showing off its
biggest trophy from five months of fighting in Kosovo - a ghost town that
served as the stronghold of ethnic Albanian separatists.
The rebels and the last of Malisevo's 35,000
or more ethnic Albanian inhabitants left the town a few hours before the
arrival on Tuesday of Serbian paramilitary police and Yugoslav army tanks.
Mazrek Jaha, aged 80, the only Albanian seen
in the town on Wednesday, said the apparently orderly retreat from a huge,
five-day government assault was bloodless.
"They heard explosions from over there," he said,
pointing toward hills on the eastern horizon. "Then they left. Ran away
to the woods. All of them."
The loss of Malisevo was a staggering, but not
fatal, blow to the Kosovo Liberation Army. It marched unchallenged into
this placid farming town three months ago and turned it into a bustling
military headquarters for the world's fastest-growing guerrilla force -
one that eventually over- extended itself.
"They are not a strong, well-organised army,"
said Major Bozidar Filic, a Serbian police officer. "As soon as their first
line of defence broke, they ran away... We never expected it would be so
easy."
The civilian exodus was the largest single displacement
of people since the conflict began. Until this week, the fighting had made
147,000 people homeless, including 40,000 who have left the province, according
to the United Nations.
One foreign official said he saw "tractor load
after tractor load" of refugees moving through the Drenica valley, 10 miles
to the north, on Wednesday. Others were seen heading south, while some
were believed to be sleeping nearby in the forests.
The flight was no surprise. Since fighting began
last winter, government forces have shelled, looted and burned parts of
nearly every village they have occupied. More than 400 people have been
killed.
But Malisevo has survived unscathed. There were
no bullet-scarred walls and little spent ammunition. Only a few shops in
town had been looted.
Kosovo's map
Self-rule must be credible
Leader
Friday July 31, 1998
It is a familiar tale. European envoys report
finding a "wasteland" in central Kosovo. Foreign monitors say they have
"lost track" of more than 20,000 refugees who fled the town of Malisevo.
Serb officers deny ethnic cleansing, but the burning houses and the bewildered
peasants on dusty roads evoke memories of Bosnia not long ago. The impression
of hopeless drift is echoed at the diplomatic level. Yesterday the EU troika
team met President Slobodan Milosevic in Belgrade to be told, with equal
implausibility, that the offensive in Kosovo was over and that he might
be more "flexible" on the terms of autonomy.
The truth is that for Serbia to show flexibility
requires three things to happen - none of which is very likely so far.
First, Serbia has to be weakened - which means that international pressure
must be sustained over months rather than surge up and then subside as
has happened in Kosovo. Second, Kosovan resistance has to be knitted together
to form something like a common front - a more than usually difficult task.
On Wednesday the US ambassador from neighbouring Macedonia thought he had
won tentative agreement to bring together the separatist Kosovo Liberation
Army and some of the political elements in Pristina to form an all-party
transitional government. But Ibrahim Rugova, the current president who
would be excluded from the plan, also announced his own scheme on Wednesday
- which did not necessarily include the KLA.
The KLA, brought to life by years of Serb repression,
is a complicating factor which has quickly dominated the scene. Suggestions
that the West has tacitly condoned the new Serb offensive, in order to
clip the KLA's wings and make it more amenable, are hotly denied. At the
least, the rapid emergence of armed resistance has left would-be mediators
baffled. But a weaker KLA could be a greater obstacle to negotiations,
playing a Hamas-like role. A smarter strategy might be to back the KLA
and in doing so push for unity among the factions.
The third requirement is for a coherent road
map ahead. If self-rule is a more prudent goal than independence, it has
to be so comprehensive as to make little difference. Any peaceful solution,
as German foreign minister Klaus Kinkel said yesterday, has to be underwritten
by an international military presence. In this sense, Kosovo has already
become another Bosnia, although we are still a long way off another Dayton
agreement
ITN News
Serbs close down on guerilla bastion despite Milosevic's pledge
Serbian forces were closing in on a guerrilla
bastion in the far west of Kosovo on Friday despite a pledge by Yugoslav
President Slobodan Milosevic that a major offensive against ethnic Albanian
separatists was over
Both sides in Kosovo's bloody conflict said Serbian
forces were threatening the village of Junik, a stronghold of the secessionist
Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) close to the border with lawless northern
Albania.
Official Serbian sources said the town was held
by only a few dozen hardline guerrillas and that their commanders had already
crossed over into Albania.
Ethnic Albanians said there were thousands of
civilians in the village and that attempts had been made to evacuate them.
The move against Junik comes at the end of a
week-long offensive by government forces that has recaptured much of Kosovo
from the KLA, which is waging a guerrilla war to wrest the 90 percent ethnic
Albanian province from Serbia.
By one government estimate the KLA now controls
just 10 percent of Kosovo compared with as much as 50 percent a week or
so ago.
International observers calculate that at least
500 people have died and some 150,000 have been displaced in the past five
months. Some 300-400 people are also missing.
Milosevic, who has been under intense international
pressure to find a peaceful solution to the crisis, told visiting European
Union officials on Thursday that the major offensive was now over.
He also promised to stop besieging Junik and
other areas in the far west where insurgents had fled, the envoys said.
The veteran Yugoslav leader matched his pledges,
however, with a call for the EU and United States to lift sanctions imposed
on his country when the crackdown on Kosovo separatists began.
The EU officials, from Britain, Germany and EU
president Austria, said they had found a shattered wasteland when they
toured recaptured areas on Wednesday.
They suggested, after a meeting with Milosevic,
that government troops had used excessive force and driven civilians to
flight despite little KLA resistance.
Despite this, signs emerged on Thursday that
progress was being made in bringing the two sides together - a key goal
of the EU and United States, both of which have ruled out independence
for Kosovo.
Some Western officials have suggested that Serbian
successes against the KLA may have made the hardline separatists more amenable
to compromise.
The EU delegation said after their meeting that
Milosevic now appeared willing to discuss autonomy for Kosovo.
In Pristina, the Kosovo capital, ethnic Albanians
were also reported to be working to find a common delegation among their
bickering factions to put their case in talks with Belgrade.
Britain's Emyr Jones Perry told reporters talks
could begin "in a matter of weeks if we are very lucky".
The U.S. special envoy for Kosovo, Chris Hill,
has been working to bring the different ethnic Albanian factions together,
insisting that moderate leader Ibrahim Rugova lead the delegation, that
it be based in Pristina and that all views in Kosovo be represented.
BBC NEWS
Friday, July 31, 1998 Published at 11:49 GMT
12:49 UK
Kosovo left a 'wasteland'
More than 100,000 civilians from the Serbian province
of Kosovo are reported to be on the run following a week-long Serb offensive
against separatist ethnic Albanians.
Correspondents say entire villages and towns
have been abandoned. International relief workers are stepping up their
efforts to track down the missing thousands after finding about 50 terrified
women and children with little food or water in the forests near Malisevo
in the west of the country.
The area is a former stronghold of the separatist
Kosovo Liberation Army. It fell to Serb forces earlier this week.
The separatist guerrillas are now surrounded
by Serbian forces in a stand-off at one of their last remaining strongholds
- the village of Junik near the Albanian border.
A United States envoy, Christopher Hill has gone
to Belgrade to ask Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic to keep his promise
to end the Serb offensive in Kosovo and help refugees return to their homes.
A European Union delegation which met Mr Milosevic
on Thursday accused Serbia of using excessive force, and said parts of
Kosovo had become a wasteland.
Mr Milosevic told the EU delegation that the
Serbian offensive in Kosovo was now over.
Speaking after the meeting, Austrian diplomat
Albert Rohan told the BBC that he had received assurances that the Serbs
would not shell the KLA stronghold of Junik, which has been surrounded
for several days. But he said he and his EU colleagues were not totally
convinced by Mr Milosevic's intentions.
"We are sceptical considering the performance
of the Serb security forces over the last eight to nine years, but we will
see whether the deeds match the words," he said.
The delegation said they believed progress had
been made towards negotiations between the Serbs and Kosovo separatists.
But they expressed dismay at the level of destruction during the Serb offensive.
The British diplomat, Emyr Jones Perry, said
their impression from their tour was that there "has been an excessive
use of force." His German colleague Wolfgang Ischinger said "what has been
created [in Kosovo] is literally a wasteland."
The German foreign ministry says it is to have
talks on Friday with supporters of the separatists living in Germany, to
stop them collecting funds for the KLA.
Serb gains on the ground
In the latest fighting the Serb-led security forces
overran the town of Malisevo - the main stronghold of the KLA - forcing
thousands of its inhabitants to flee.
The BBC diplomatic correspondent says that the
successes of President Milosevic's forces have been so sweeping that he
may be less inclined to compromise on the degree of autonomy Kosovo should
have.
--
Kosova Information Centre - London
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