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Meldung vom 30.09.1998 15:12 http://seite1.web.de/show/36122E47.NL1/
London fordert Untersuchung von Berichten über Kosovo-Massaker
London (dpa) - Der britische Außenminister Robin Cook hat am Mittwoch eine genaue Untersuchung der jüngsten Berichte über Greueltaten in der serbischen Unruheprovinz Kosovo gefordert. «Ich bin entsetzt über die Berichte von Massakern an Zivilisten, darunter Frauen und Kinder in Gornje Obrinje und bei Vucitern», erklärte der Minister in London.
     Cook äußerte die Erwartung, daß der Internationale Gerichtshof für Jugoslawien in Den Haag seine Ermittlungen auch auf diese Vorfälle ausdehne. Die britische Regierung lud nach Angaben des Ministers führende Beamte aus den Ländern der Internationalen Kontaktgruppe für diesen Freitag nach London ein. Dabei solle weiter über die Bemühungen um eine politische Lösung der Kosovo-Krise gesprochen werden.
     Ausländische Beobachter hatten nach amtlichen britischen Angaben bei Gornje Obrinje am 28. September die Leichen von 14 Albanern gefunden. Die meisten seien durch Schüsse in den Kopf exekutiert worden.
     Sechs von ihnen seien älter als 60 Jahre alt gewesen, fünf jünger als zehn, hieß es aus dem Außenministerium. Bei sechs Toten habe es sich um erwachsene Frauen gehandelt, bei drei weiteren um Männer. Einige der Leichen seien verstümmelt gewesen.
     Außerdem hätten internationale Beobachter die Leichen von 17 Albanern in der Nähe von Vucitern entdeckt. Bei 15 von ihnen habe es sich offenbar um Zivilisten gehandelt. Vor der Entdeckung der Toten sei in der Gegend gekämpft worden.
     Presse und Fernsehen in Großbritannien berichteten am Mittwoch ausführlich über ein Massaker beim Dorf Gorne Obrinje. Die Zahl der Opfer schwankte dabei zwischen 16 und 19. Die Tageszeitung «The Times» sprach von «einem der schlimmsten Fälle von Abschlachten in einem Jahrzehnt Balkan-Konflikt».
     Weitere Journalisten, die beim Dorf Gornje Obrinje die Leichen der Opfer sahen, berichteten von der «schlimmsten Greueltat, denen unabhängige Augenzeugen in der sechs Monate langen kriegerischen Auseinandersetzung begegnet sind».
     Ein sechs Monate altes Baby sei lebend neben der Leiche seiner Mutter gefunden worden, meldete die «Financial Times». Der Reporter der Zeitung sagte sogar, er habe in einer Schlucht nahe beim Dorf Gornje Obrinje die Leichen von 19 massakrierten Zivilisten gesehen. Die BBC sprach von 18 Toten.
     Die Reporter deuteten übereinstimmend an, der Massenmord, der am vergangenen Samstag verübt worden sein soll, könne eine serbische Vergeltungstat gewesen sein. Am Vortag seien in dem Gebiet, einer waldreichen Hügellandschaft etwa 35 Kilometer westlich der Kosovo- Hauptstadt Pristina, sieben serbische Polizisten ums Leben gekommen.
     Nach Angaben des serbischen Informations-Zentrums in Pristina sollen zwei Polizisten von angeblich schwerbewaffneten Albanern getötet worden sein, fünf weitere seien bei einer Minenexplosion getötet worden.
     «Unter den 16 Toten waren ein Baby, das neben der Leiche seiner Mutter lag, und ein Junge mit durchschnittener Kehle», schilderte der «Guardian»-Korrespondent den Anblick am Tatort: «Es war klar, daß diese Gruppe - wir zählten fünf Frauen und vier Kinder darunter - nicht 'im Kreuzfeuer umgekommen' oder 'versehentlich von der Artillerie getroffen' worden sein konnten. Das war Mord aus nächster Nähe.»
     © dpa
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Meldung vom 30.09.1998 13:44  http://seite1.web.de/show/36121994.NL1/
Menschenrechtskommission: Fast 1 500 Kosovo-Albaner getötet

Belgrad/Pristina (dpa) - Seit Ausbruch der blutigen Unruhen in der südserbischen Provinz Kosovo im Januar dieses Jahres sind dort 1 472 Albaner getötet worden. Nach Angaben der Menschenrechtskommission in der Provinzhauptstadt Pristina vom Mittwoch waren unter diesen Opfern 162 Frauen und 143 Kinder. Weitere rund 1 300 Albaner aus dem Kosovo gelten als vermißt, zitierte die Agentur Beta (Belgrad) weiter aus dem Bericht.
     Nach Schätzungen der Menschenrechtler wurden zudem in den vergangenen Monaten rund 1 700 Albaner von den serbischen Behörden verhaftet. Über ihren Verbleib gebe es vielfach keine Informationen.
     Das offizielle Belgrad hatte erst am Montag die Zahl der Opfer auf Seiten der serbischen Polizei und der jugoslawischen Armee mit 126 Toten angegeben.
© dpa
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Meldung vom 30.09.1998 14:08  http://seite1.web.de/show/36121F6F.NL1/
Schröder kann mit Besuchsdiplomatie nicht bis Kanzlerwahl warten
Bonn (dpa) - Gerhard Schröders Korb mit Glückwünschen wird täglich voller. Am Mittwoch gratulierte auch Irans Staastpräsident Mohammed Chatami. Viele Staatsmänner wollen ihn treffen und schicken dem künftigen deutschen Regierungschef Einladungen.
     Bill Clinton will den Wahlsieger möglichst bald im Weißen Haus sehen, auch mit Helmut Kohls Freund Boris Jelzin ist bald ein Treffen in Moskau verabredet. Den Vorzug bekam am Mittwoch in Paris Jacques Chirac, der sich noch am Wahlabend gemeldet hatte.
     Etwas verschnupft reagierten die Leute um Tony Blair, weil Schröder mit dem frischen Glanz des Wahlsiegers keine Zeit mehr fand, den Labour-Parteitag in Blackpool mit seiner Anwesenheit zu schmücken. Doch die obligatorische Visite in der französischen Hauptstadt hat nun einmal Vorrang, an diese Regel seiner Vorgänger hielt sich auch Schröder, auch wenn noch nicht richtig im Amt ist.
     Derzeit sonnen sich die deutschen Sozialdemokraten in lange vermißter internationaler Anerkennung. Bei den von sozialdemokratischen Regierungschefs dominierten europäischen Spitzentreffen sei seine Partei nun nicht mehr der arme Verwandte, auf den alle etwas mitleidig blickten, weil er es zu Hause zu nichts bringe, schwärmt Parteichef Oskar Lafontaine.
     Bis zu seienr Wahl als Kanzler im Parlament kann Schröder nicht warten, um möglichst viele persönliche Kontakte zu knüpfen oder lockere Bekanntschaften aufzufrischen. Solange die Entscheidung über den künftigen Außenminister noch nicht gefallen ist, kann er auf keinen Emissär mit der notwendigen Autorität für Antrittsbesuche in den europäischen Hauptstädten zurückgreifen.
     Doch nichts zuletzt wegen der außenpolitischen Terminlage drängen die Sozialdemokraten darauf, möglichst rasch mit den Grünen unter die Haube zu kommen. Der Euro, die EU-Erweiterung und vor allem die deutsche EU-Ratspräsidentschaft stehen vor der Tür. Im Blick darauf wollen die Sozialdemokraten (SPD) möglichst wenig der abgewählten Mitte-Rechts-Koalition überlassen.
     Von dort erwartet man bei der SPD wenig Widerstand, auch wenn erste Übergabegespräche mit alten Ressortchefs erst in der kommenden Woche geplant sind. Finanzminister Theo Waigel hat zwar seine Reise zum IWF nach Wahington abgesagt, doch Außenminister Klaus Kinkel will zumindest noch in den kommenden Tagen «Businness as usual» machen.
     Von seinen EU-Kollegen will sich der deutsche Außenminister Anfang kommender Woche verabschieden. Auch ein Kurztrip nach Tirana in Sachen Kosovo ist noch in Planung.
     Wenn der ehrgeizige sozialdemokratische Zeitplan aufgeht, kann Schröder seinen offiziellen Einstand als neuer Kanzler bereits am 23. und 24. Oktober beim EU-Sondergipfel in Pörtschach am Wörther See geben. Wenige Tage vorher will er, so ist es jedenfalls ins Auge gefaßt, im Parlament nach erfolgter Wahl durch die rot-grüne Mehrheit den Amtseid leisten.
     Helmut Kohl wil sich aber auf jeden Fall die Abschiedsvorstellung in Pörtschach ersparen, selbst wenn er dann noch formal amtierender Regierungschef sein sollte. Für den dann unter Alt-Kanzler firmierenden Kohl, so ist zu hören, soll es eine Sonderehrung im Kreis seiner ehemaligen Kollegen auf dem EU-Gipfel im Juni kommenden Jahres in Köln geben.
© dpa
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Meldung vom 30.09.1998 12:18    http://seite1.web.de/show/36121296.NL1/
Drei Rotkreuz-Mitarbeiter bei Minenunfall im Kosovo verletzt
Genf (dpa) - Drei Rotkreuz-Mitarbeiter sind am Mittwoch im Kosovo bei einem Minenunfall verletzt worden. Wie das Internationale Komitee vom Roten Kreuz (IKRK) in Genf mitteilte, fuhr der erste von zwei Rotkreuz-Wagen auf die Mine.
     Eine Krankenschwester und zwei albanischstämmige Ärzte aus dem Kosovo wurden dabei verletzt.
     Der Zwischenfall ereignete sich auf einer Straße rund 25 Kilometer von Pristina, der Hauptstadt der serbischen Provinz, entfernt. Die beiden Fahrzeuge hätten sich auf einer Routine-Mission zwischen den Ortschaften Likovac und Donje Obrinje befunden.
     Über die Schwere der Verletzungen konnte das IKRK in Genf zunächst keine Angaben machen. Die Rotkreuz-Mitarbeiter seien jedoch sofort von den Insassen des zweiten Fahrzeugs medizinisch betreut und nach Pristina überführt worden, hieß es.
© dpa
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Meldung vom 30.09.1998 11:55   http://seite1.web.de/show/3612000B.NL1/
Britische Zeitungen: Massaker mögliche Vergeltungstat von Serben
London (dpa) - Britische Zeitungen und das Fernsehen haben am Mittwoch ausführlich über ein mutmaßliches Massaker unter 16 Zivilisten im Kosovo berichtet, das sich am vorigen Samstag ereignet haben soll.
     Journalisten, die beim Dorf Gornje Obrinje die Leichen sahen, sprachen von der «schlimmsten Greueltat, denen unabhängige Augenzeugen in der sechs Monate langen kriegerischen Auseinandersetzung begegnet sind » («The Guardian»).
     Die Reporter deuteten übereinstimmend die Möglichkeit an, daß es sich dabei um eine serbische Vergeltungstat gehandelt haben könne. Einen Tag vor der Bluttat seien in dem Gebiet sieben serbische Polizisten ums Leben gekommen.
     Nach Angaben des serbischen Informationszentrums in Pristina sollen zwei Polizisten von angeblich schwerbewaffneten Albanern getötet worden sein, fünf weitere seien bei der Explosion einer Mine umgekommen.
     «Unter den 16 Toten waren ein Baby, das neben der Leiche seiner Mutter lag und ein Junge mit durchschnittener Kehle», schilderte der «Guardian»-Korrespondent den Anblick in einer waldreichen Hügellandschaft, etwa 35 Kilometer westlich von Pristina.
     «Es war klar, daß diese Gruppe - wir zählten fünf Frauen und vier Kinder darunter - nicht 'im Kreuzfeuer umgekommen' oder 'versehentlich von der Artillerie getroffen' worden sein konnten. Das war Mord aus nächster Nähe.» Die meisten seien durch Schüsse aus kurzem Abstand getötet worden, als sie bergauf fliehen wollten, berichtete die «Financial Times».
     Ein sechs Monate altes Baby sei lebend neben der Leiche seiner toten Mutter gefunden worden, meldete das Blatt.
     Die «Times» sah in dem Massenmord «einen der schlimmsten Fälle von Abschlachterei in einem Jahrzehnt Balkan-Konflikt». Der Chef der britischen Liberaldemokraten, Paddy Ashdown, sprach sich am Mittwoch in einem Zeitungsbeitrag für militärische Vorgehen gegen serbische Truppen aus, falls die Übergriffe andauernten. Er hatte sich in den vergangenen Tagen im Kosovo aufgehalten und Serbiens Präsident Slobodan Milosevic in Belgrad getroffen.
     «Luftangriffe stellen das einzige Mittel dar, und damit kann man nach meiner Ansicht etwas erreichen», erklärte er in dem Artikel für den «Guardian».
© dpa
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Meldung vom 30.09.1998 12:09   http://seite1.web.de/show/36120349.NL1/
Mäßiges Interesse für deutschen Vorschlag einer Kosovo-Konferenz
Genf (dpa) - Das UNO-Flüchtlings-Hochkommissariat (UNHCR) will den Vorschlag des deutschen Außenministers Klaus Kinkel für eine Nothilfekonferenz zur Lage der Flüchtlinge im Kosovo nicht selbst aufnehmen.
     Die Hochkommissarin Sadako Ogata sagte am Mittwoch in Genf, die Initiative für eine solche Konferenz müsse vom Generalsekretär der Vereinten Nationen ausgehen. Das UNHCR sei aber zur Mitarbeit bereit.
     «Kinkel setzt sich dafür ein, humanitären Aktionen mit den nötigen politischen Aktionen zu verbinden. Das macht Sinn. Deshalb muß die Initiative vom Generalsekretär ausgehen. Wir werden sehen, welches Format sich für eine solche Konferenz ergibt», sagte Ogata.
     Kinkel hatte am Samstag an Kofi Annan und Ogata geschrieben und eine Konferenz zur Linderung des Flüchtlingselends im Kosovo vorgeschlagen. Sie sollte schon in dieser Woche in Genf stattfinden.
     Die Hochkommissarin war am Dienstag von einer fünftägigen Reise durch Ex-Jugoslawien und Albanien zurückgekehrt. Sie lehnte einen Militäreinsatz gegen Serbien nicht eindeutig ab.
     «Wir befürworten nicht den Einsatz von Gewalt. Aber viele Leute in der Region glauben, daß das die einzige Möglichkeit ist, um einen Waffenstillstand zu erlangen. Ein Militäreinsatz müßte mit einer politischen Lösung verknüpft werden.»
© dpa
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Meldung vom 30.09.1998 11:07  http://seite1.web.de/show/3611F4DA.NL1/
Kohls Regierung für deutsche Beteiligung an Kosovo-Einsatz
Bonn (dpa) - Deutschland wird sich an einem internationalen Militäreinsatz im Kosovo mit 14 Kampfflugzeugen vom Typ Tornado beteiligen. Einen entsprechenden Beschluß faßte am Mittwoch in Bonn die noch amtierende Regierung unter der Leitung von Bundeskanzler Helmut Kohl.
     Sollte die politische Entscheidung für eine Intervention in Kosovo fallen und ein Kampfauftrag an die deutschen Streitkräfte ergehen, so müßte auch das Parlament in Bonn hierüber abstimmen.
     Da der am Sonntag gewählte neue Bundestag sich noch nicht konstituiert hat, müßte unter Umständen das alte Parlament noch einmal zu einer Sondersitzung zusammentreten.
     Der designierte sozialdemokratische Bundeskanzler Gerhard Schröder hatte nach seiner Wahl deutlich gemacht, daß er davon ausgeht, über den Entscheidungsprozeß in bezug auf den Kosovo informiert zu werden.
     Umstritten ist auch innerhalb der Regierung Kohls die Frage, ob eine Intervention von einem Mandat des UNO-Sicherheitsrates abhängig ist. Diese Position vertritt Außenminister Klaus Kinkel, während Verteidigungsminister Volker Rühe davon ausgeht, daß auch der Beschluß eines anderen Gremiums ausreichen könnte.
     Schröder und die Sozialdemokraten würden ebenfalls ein Mandat der UNO bevorzugen, jedoch hat Schröder sich auch gesprächsbereit über andere Lösungen gezeigt.
© dpa
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Meldung vom 30.09.1998 11:36  http://seite1.web.de/show/3611FBB4.NL1/
Referendum gegen verschärftes Asylrecht in der Schweiz
Bern (dpa) - Die Schweizer sollen über das vor drei Monaten eingeführte verschärfte Asylrecht abstimmen. Wie die Asylkoordinaton Schweiz am Mittwoch in Bern mitteilte, wurden die für eine entsprechende Volksabstimmung notwendigen 50 000 Unterschriften bereits gesammelt.
     Seit dem 1. Juli können Ausländer, die ohne Papiere einreisen oder sich illegal in der Schweiz aufhalten, keinen Asylantrag mehr stellen. Sie haben 48 Stunden Zeit, ihre Identität nachzuweisen. Gelingt ihnen dies nicht, können sie theoretisch innerhalb von 24 Stunden ausgewiesen werden - sofern die Polizei weiß, woher sie gekommen sind.
     Gegen diese Maßnahmen wehrt sich das Schweizer «Komitee gegen die Aushöhlung des Asylrechts». Es wird von verschiedenen Parteien, Organisationen und Institutionen unterstützt. Die meisten Asylanträge werden in der Scheiz zur Zeit von Kosovo-Albanern gestellt.
     Ob die Revision des Asylgesetzes etwas gebracht hat, läßt sich nach Auffassung von Jean-Daniel Gerber, Direktor des Bundesamts für Flüchtlinge (BFF), noch nicht beurteilen.
     Fest stehe immerhin, daß die Zahl der Asylsuchenden ohne Papiere seither um acht Prozent zurückgegangen sei, sagte Gerber in einem Interview mit der «Neuen Luzerner Zeitung».
© dpa
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Meldung vom 30.09.1998 10:43  http://seite1.web.de/show/3611EF36.NL1/
Deutschland stellt 14 Flugzeuge für mögliche Kosovo-Intervention
Bonn (dpa) - Die deutschen Streitkräfte werden sich an einer möglichen internationalen Militär-Intervention im Kosovo mit 14 Kampfflugzeugen vom Typ Tornado beteiligen.
     Das beschloß die noch amtierende Regierung unter der Leitung von Bundeskanzler Helmut Kohl am Mittwoch in Bonn. Auftrag der Luftwaffe wäre ein Angriff auf serbische Militäreinrichtungen im Kosovo gemeinsam mit den 15 anderen NATO-Staaten.
© dpa
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Meldung vom 30.09.1998 09:58  http://seite1.web.de/show/3611E4B0.NL1/
Bonn entscheidet über möglichen Tornado-Einsatz im Kosovo
Bonn (dpa) - Die noch amtierende deutsche Regierung ist am Mittwoch in Bonn zusammengetreten, um über die Bereitstellung von 14 Tornado-Kampfflugzeugen für einen möglichen NATO-Einsatz im Kosovo zu entscheiden. Die deutschen Streitkräfte wollen für Luftschläge der NATO gegen serbische Militär-Einrichtungen im Kosovo insgesamt 14 Tornado-Maschinen zur Verfügung stellen.
     Die NATO hatte die 16 Partner der Allianz gebeten, bis zu diesem Mittwoch die Zahl der Flugzeuge zu nennen, die sie einsetzen könnten, wenn eine politische Entscheidung zu der militärischen Aktion gegen die Serben gefallen ist. Für den Einsatz der deutschen Maschinen muß die Zustimmung des Parlaments eingeholt werden.
     Sozialdemokraten (SPD) und Grüne als mögliche Partner der künftigen deutschen Regierung erklärten, sie würden die Antwort des scheidenden Kabinetts von Bundeskanzler Helmut Kohl an die NATO in bezug auf die 14 Tornados mittragen. Die Grünen bestehen aber für einen Militär-Einsatz im Kosovo auf einem Mandat der Vereinten Nationen. Bislang vertrat die SPD einen ähnlichen Standpunkt.
     Der noch amtierende Verteidigungsminister Volker Rühe vertritt dagegen den Standpunkt, daß aus humanitären Gründen ein Einsatz auch ohne ein solches Mandat möglich sein müsse. Es sei lediglich eine ausreichende rechtliche Grundlage nötig. Auf jeden Fall müsse eine Katastrophe für die Flüchtlinge im Kosovo vermieden werden.
© dpa
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Meldung vom 30.09.1998 08:46  http://seite1.web.de/show/3611D3AD.NL1/
Rühe: Keine Unsicherheit über Kosovo-Einsatz aufkommen lassen
Bonn (dpa) - Der deutsche Verteidigungsminister Volker Rühe hat an die künftige deutsche Regierung appelliert, keine Unsicherheit über die deutsche Beteiligung an einem NATO-Einsatz auf dem Balkan aufkommen zu lassen.
     «Wir werden auf Bitten der NATO 14 Flugzeuge und weitere Luft- und Seestreitkräfte zur Verfügung stellen. Bevor Kräfte aber in die Region verlegt werden, brauchen wir den Kabinetts- und den Bundestagsbeschluß», sagte Rühe am Mittwoch im Morgenmagazin des Ersten Deutschen Fernsehens (ARD).
     «Ich finde es wichtig, daß wir Herrn Milosevic nicht darüber spekulieren lassen und das Deutschland nicht abbremst.» In Bonn soll an diesem Montag über den Kosovo-Einsatz beraten werden.
© dpa
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Meldung vom 30.09.1998 07:59  http://seite1.web.de/show/3611C8B4.NL1/
«Berlingske Tidende»: Milosevic gewann mit simplem Schachzug
Kopenhagen (dpa) - Die konservative dänische Tageszeitung «Berlingske Tidende» (Kopenhagen) kommentiert in ihrer Mittwoch- Ausgabe die Entwicklung im Kosovo-Konflikt:
     «Durch einen simplen, aber wirksamen Schachzug hat die serbische Führung mit Präsident Slobodan Milosevic an der Spitze allen Drohungen der NATO und der UNO mit einem militärischen Eingreifen die Grundlage entzogen.
     Milosevic will die Forderung nach mehr Autonomie für die Albaner im Kosovo nicht erfüllen, kann sich aber erlauben, den Griff um die Provinz, in der er die Lage jetzt wesentlich besser unter Kontrolle hat, so weit zu lösen, daß die Länder hinter der UNO-Resolution sich kaum auf ein gemeinsames Vorgehen einigen werden. (...)
     Zumal die Präsidenten der USA und Rußlands als die beiden Länder mit dem stärksten Einfluß in der Region sich so sehr mit anderen Problemen herumschlagen, daß sie höchst bereitwillig alle Probleme im Kosovo sich selbst überlassen werden.»
© dpa
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Meldung vom 30.09.1998 02:44 http://seite1.web.de/show/36117F08.NL1/
Disput um neue Angriffe im Kosovo - Berichte über Massaker
Pristina/Belgrad (dpa) - Die Angriffe serbischer Einheiten auf Dörfer in der südserbischen Provinz Kosovo gehen offensichtlich unvermindert weiter. 25 Albaner seien dabei in den vergangenen zwei Tagen getötet worden, berichtete das kosovo-albanische Informationszentrum am Dienstag abend in der Provinzhauptstadt Pristina.
     Die serbische Regierung hatte zuvor bestritten, daß ihre Militäroperationen im Kosovo fortgesetzt werden. Der amerikanische Sondergesandte für das Kosovo, Christopher Hill, sagte dazu im Fernsehsender CNN, es sei noch «zu früh», um beurteilen zu können, ob Belgrad seine Truppen tatsächlich zurückziehe. Westliche Journalisten berichteten am Dienstag von einem Massaker an 19 Zivilisten in der Drenica-Region im Zentrum des Kosovo.
     Der jugoslawische Botschafter bei der UN in Genf, Branko Brankovic, wies am Dienstag Berichte des UN-Flüchtlingshilfswerks (UNHCR) über eine Fortsetzung der Kämpfe zurück. Laut UNHCR hatten serbische Einheiten ihre Angriffe in der Region Suva Reka, rund 20 Kilometer südwestlich von Pristina, am Montag fortgesetzt. Nach albanischen Angaben fielen der serbischen Offensive seit Mittwoch vergangener Woche 150 Menschen zum Opfer.
     Korrespondenten der britischen Zeitungen «Times» und «Financial Times» berichteten am Dienstag übereinstimmend, sie hätten westlich von Pristina in einer Schlucht die Leichen von 19 Zivilisten gesehen. Sie seien nach Aussage Überlebender am Samstag mit Schüssen aus nächster Distanz getötet worden, offenbar als Vergeltung für tödliche Anschläge auf sieben serbische Polizisten. Mehreren Menschen seien die Kehlen durchschnitten worden. Ein totes Kleinkind habe neben seiner getöteten schwangeren Mutter gelegen.
     Der US-Gesandte Hill sprach sich in dem CNN-Interview in der Nacht zum Mittwoch dafür aus, Gerichtsmediziner zu entsenden, um die Opfer des Massakers zu untersuchen. Die Zusammenstöße im Kosovo bezeichnete er als «sehr brutalen Konflikt». Es müsse jetzt unbedingt ein «politischer Prozeß» in Gang kommen und die Gewalt gestoppt werden.
     Die Kosovo-Albaner lehnen die von Belgrad geplante, provisorische Regierung für ihre Provinz ab. Das Mitglied der politischen Führung der Kosovo-Albaner, Fehmi Agani, sagte am Dienstag nach Angaben der Belgrader Agentur Beta: «Wir werden mit dieser Übergangsverwaltung nicht zusammenarbeiten, da sie nur ein ausführendes Organ der serbischen Machthaber ist.» Das Parlament der jugoslawischen Teilrepublik Serbien hatte am Vortag beschlossen, im Kosovo eine provisorische Regierung einzusetzen.
© dpa
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zurück zu  TEIL 1

30 September 98
The Times

Tom Walker in the village of Gornji Obrinje yesterday stumbled upon the scene of one of the worst atrocities committed by Serb forces
Hidden horror betrays the butchers of Kosovo

I DISCOVERED the bodies of 16 Albanian civilians massacred by Serb forces in a remote village in Kosovo yesterday. The mutilated men, women and children were still lying in the open five days after they were killed.
The mass murder, one of the worst single acts of butchery in a decade of Balkan conflict, bore all the hallmarks of the bloodiest chapters of the Bosnian war and prompted fresh calls for Nato to intervene militarily to halt the Serb offensive.
Paddy Ashdown, the visiting Liberal Democrat leader, who was given a Contact Group report about the killings in the village of Gornji Obrinje, called on Nato to launch pinprick airstrikes against Serb targets in Kosovo.
"I have no doubt whatsoever that what we have seen is a crime against humanity," he said. "It is a deliberate and systematic policy of scorched earth, using weapons of total war against innocent victims.
There is no way that commanders on the ground and the politicians who instigated these policies are not in line for The Hague."
Unlike the angry response of Western politicians, the Albanian villagers who survived the attack were muted, probably because they were still in shock after seeing the butchery.
The first body was revealed by pushing apart the scrub of dwarf oak and thorns: a girl of maybe four or five, with her throat ripped open by a knife wound that stretched to the edge of her mouth.
A few yards higher up a narrow ravine were four women, all killed with close-range shots to the head. One was pregnant. Next to her was a baby girl about 12 months old, her dummy lying in the undergrowth. Her head was still covered by a purple anorak, soaked on one side by the blood from her mother's shattered skull.
We pushed on, bent double, stepping over corpses and into a thicket from where there had been no escape. There was another woman, then another two children, with their heads blown apart. We breathed through our mouths to avoid the stench; tears rolled down the cheeks of an Albanian cameraman.
A young farmer, Hamidi Delija, said his family were among the dead. Speaking in a voice devoid of emotion, he said his wife, Lumlije, and two children, were the group of three at the top of the ravine.
The baby girl was Valmiri; the woman next to her was his brother Adem's wife. Adem and the men had escaped before the Serbs arrived: he had no idea if they were still alive.
In a small clearing with a makeshift shelter of wooden struts and green tarpaulin were mattresses sodden with blood. Beneath them was an elderly man who had been shot in the head, and his wife, also shot and with her left foot nearly severed at the ankle. Around them were some of their possessions: a tray of wild apples and a makeshift iron stove.
The path moved back into the dappled light of the wood and there, on a small rise, was the body of an elderly man with his throat cut and half his head removed.
Blood coagulated in the sheepskin collar of his jacket and caked the rusty blade of a wooden-handled kitchen knife perched on his chest.
Hamidi said it was his father, Ali Delija.
Back in the open, three women and two children hobbled towards us across a field of stubble. One of them wore a dirty red T-shirt bearing the legend "Bad Company". They clutched plastic bags and wailed. The middle woman was supported by the other two and shook from Parkinson's disease.
Hamidi said they were the family's only female survivors.
At the top of the next slope we reached the Delija homestead, a group of four houses and barns gutted by shellfire.
A young man crunched through the roof tiles and rubble of a room blackened by heat and flame. In the corner lay a torso, its flesh baked brown. "My father", said the man. Fazli Delija, we were told, had been 95. We walked through a garden of unpicked peppers and a field of marrows. In the adjacent wood we followed tank tracks. Ahead, in the twisted mass of broken trees and vegetation, lay two more Delija men, both shot in the head.
In the distance we could hear the rumble of tanks. Then a sudden burst of gunfire had us hurrying down the slope and into a verdant glade where the Delija bodies were being carried.
In the wood above we were shown another body, the sixteenth in an hour of base horror. Zelir Delija lay face down; he had been rolled over to reveal the bullet wounds in his side that had sapped his lifeblood as he attempted to crawl to safety. Hamidi's story was that his father Ali had returned to the family's ruined home, only to be forced at gunpoint by Serb special forces out to his family who had camped out in the woods across the valley. "We heard the shooting and screaming," he said.
The Serbs have given no official reaction, but their press centre in Pristina says that seven policemen were killed in or around Gornje Obrinje on Friday - the day before the massacre. Five of the officers were reservists, blown up by a landmine. Blind vengeance might be one explanation for the massacre; the Serbs might also suggest that the Kosovo Liberation Army killed their own people.
On Saturday, as the Delijas were being butchered, just a few miles away the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Sadako Ogata, was touring the devastated landscape.

The Daily Telegraph
Serbs murder fleeing families

SLOBODAN Milosevic claims the Serb offensive in Kosovo has ended, but villagers say they have seen his troops murdering women and children.
PhilipSmucker reports from Donje Obrinje

The Albanian women lay alongside their children in a line along the narrow ravine they had run down in a futile attempt to escape their killers. Even in death the fear was still visible on their faces.
One boy had his throat cut. A woman had her stomach ripped open. A pregnant mother lay with a dead child at her feet. Villagers huddled beneath the treeline with blank, stunned faces and told a tale of slaughter more harrowing than any other heard or seen in Kosovo's seven- month guerrilla conflict.
>From the evidence at hand, it was clear that the refugees, who had been living under plastic sheeting since being driven from their homes by Serb shelling, had been deliberately murdered. Most of them had been shot in the head at close range.
The villagers had no doubt who was responsible for the bloodbath. It was the work of Serbian security forces, as the killers were dressed in police and army uniforms, they said.
We found the first bodies under the green tarpaulins the refugees had stretched over branches in a little encampment near the village of Donje Obrinje. It would have been their only protection against the advancing winter.
A man of about 65, apparently too weak to flee, lay sprawled on his back with the top of his head blown away by a bullet. A women, presumably his wife, lay next to him, with a deep stab wound to her chest. One of her feet had been hacked off.
A little way off, along a narrow ravine, lay the bodies of five women and four children who appeared to have been fleeing along the defile to escape the murderers. The heavy brush had hampered them. Their corpses lay in a straggling line amid the undergrowth in the hot, morning sun.
The villagers said that the refugees had set up the camp the day before.
Further along the ridge two elderly Albanian men lay in a smashed swathe of trees demolished by a Serb tank. They had been shot in the head at close range. This massacre gave the lie to Serbia's claims that its forces were acting with restraint in their war with the Albanian separatist guerrillas of the Kosovo Liberation Army.
The slaughter took place on Saturday, the day that Sadako Ogata, the UN's High Commissioner for Refugees, visited the area and then complained to Western reporters that she had gained "no guarantees" from President Slobodan Milosevic of Yugoslavia that "repressive measures" would be ended in Kosovo.
The killings also came shortly after a Nato defence ministers' meeting that warned Serbia of possible air raids if its security forces did not end their offensive in Kosovo. Members of the six-nation Contact Group for Kosovo visited the region yesterday, a day after American observers discovered the scene of the massacre.
Western powers are trying to decide how to put an end to the grinding guerrilla conflict in Kosovo, which pits small bands of lightly-armed ethnic Albanian separatists against the Serbian security forces commanded by President Milosevic.
Near the ravine lay the body of an old man, shot in the back of the head and with his throat slit. His son crept down from the forest to explain how his father had been killed. "The Serb forces took him down from the village at gun point to show them the refugees," he said.
"When they had discovered the group, they shot him and slit his throat," he said, as he closed his father's eyes. A rusty blade lay across the dead man's chest.
Another man said that Serbian security forces had - by constant shelling - pushed the victims out of a refugee encampment only a day before and in the direction of the homes from which they had fled. "We couldn't return, though, because they were shelling the village," said Sadri Delije.
"We were turned back here," he said, pointing to the encampment in a wooded area at the base of a small hill. "We couldn't move all day on Friday because of the shelling and then on Saturday at 10am the Serbs came." Mr Delije said that the Serbian forces had been mixed. Some of them had worn green military uniforms and others were in blue police uniforms.
There were no direct eyewitnesses to the massacre. One man who had fled up the side of the hill had been chased by machine-gun fire and had crouched in the mud to escape it. A villager said: "Everyone who could have told you more is dead."
As the sun began to climb in the sky, the villagers began to bundle the bodies into blankets and carry them away on wooden stretchers for burial.

Financial Times
Massacre overshadows Serb ceasefire claim
By Guy Dinmore in Gornje Obrinje, Serbia

Evidence came to light yesterday of one of the worst atrocities committed against ethnic Albanian civilians in Serbia's Kosovo province.
The massacre of women and children, allegedly committed by special police units on Saturday, has overshadowed the government's announcement of a ceasefire and, diplomats said, would add to calls for Nato intervention.
Senior western envoys, who toured Kosovo yesterday to see refugees and their ruined villages, were visibly shocked when handed a report written by the Kosovo Diplomatic Observer Mission on the latest atrocity.
In a thickly wooded gully near the village of Gornje Obrinje, some 15 miles west of Pristina, the provincial capital, diplomats and reporters found the bodies of five women and four children. The youngest was 18- month-old Valmiri Delija.
It was not clear how the infant had died but the others had been shot at close range in the back of the head as they tried to flee up the muddy slope.
Up the valley, the charred remains of 95-year-old Fazli Delija lay in the ruins of his burnt-out house. Two dead men were found close to a trail of trees that had been destroyed by a tank.
Altogether reporters found 19 bodies. All were in civilian dress. Villagers said they were all from the Delija clan. One six-month-old baby survived, found next to the body of its mother.
Sadri Delija said he was with the women and children hiding in the woods last Friday when police attacked their village.
On Saturday morning he saw police, in various kinds of uniform, approaching their shelter. As he fled he heard screams and gunfire. Serbian officials had no immediate comment. Diplomats noted that seven policemen had been killed in the same area on Friday and that it was possible the massacre had been carried out in retaliation.
Envoys touring Kosovo said the killings and the worsening humanitarian crisis would add to pressure on Nato to intervene, although they admit it is not clear how planned air strikes would end the violence. Kosovo Albanians yesterday rejected Serbia's new provisional government for the province and official Serb claims that its offensive against KLA "terrorists" was over.
A heavy artillery bombardment continued on Monday evening in southern Kosovo. Yesterday diplomats were stopped by police from approaching the area but could see villages burning in the distance.
Zivadin Jovanovic, Yugoslav foreign minister, speaking at the UN in New York, insisted that the fighting had stopped and that "anti-terrorist actions have been completed - this is a clear, very responsible statement of policy from the highest levels."

The Independent
Serbs butcher Kosovo children
By Marcus Tanner

The horrific evidence of mass murder lies mangled and twisted in the bushes of the Drenica region of the devastated Serbian province of Kosovo.
The massacred bodies of children - backs arched and mouths stretched open in terror - lie sprawling on the ground, victims of Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic's "war against Albanian terrorists" in the province.
Some were shot in the back of the head. Others have throats cut or mutilated limbs. The killers slit the throat of one 10-year-old boy, blew out his mother's brains, cut open the stomach of another female relative and shot a pregnant woman in the head.
Two days later they remained unburied, sprawled in the forest where they died.
The massacre came a day after Serbia's Prime Minister, Mirko Marjanovic, boasted to the Belgrade parliament that "peace reigns today in Kosovo", and amid promises that Serbian security forces in the province will be pulled back to their bases.
The gruesome evidence of just what Serbia's "war against terrorism" is costing the Albanian civilian population of Kosovo - so reminiscent of the Serbs' campaign of ethnic cleansing in Bosnia in 1992 - was discovered near the village of Obrinje by a group of European diplomats representing the six-nation Contact Group. Diplomats from the group - including Britain - are meeting in London today to discuss the Balkans.
"The Serb police executed everybody," said an old man, one of the few surviving witnesses.
Both sides have accused the other of torture. The Serbian government says at least 39 Serbs were tortured, mutilated and killed near the village of Glodjane earlier this month.

The Guardian
Among the 16 victims was a baby, beneath her mother's corpse, and a boy, his throat cut
Jonathan Steele reports from Obrinje, scene of the biggest single atrocity of the war in Kosovo

Wednesday September 30, 1998
The young woman lay on the ground, her green dress swollen with a pregnancy that had been close to term. A ray of autumn sun filtered through the oak trees, lighting up the bloodstained remains of her head.
Half the skull was split open, apparently from a bullet or bullets fired at close range. Valmiri, her 18-month-old daughter, was sprawled beside her. The hood of the baby's purple anorak still shielded her face, but the lower half of her tiny body was hidden, covered by her mother's corpse as she fell.
Nearby, a few feet up the narrow gully, lay a boy aged about six or seven; his throat cut from the right ear in a sickening curve of gore.
Three more women, their limbs contorted by the stiffness of death, were sprawled a few feet away, all shot in the head.
Even before we reached the glade in the woods, we knew it was going to be a gruesome sight. Word of this massacre of innocents filtered out on Monday afternoon when a team of Western monitors was directed to the scene by an ethnic Albanian human rights group. A local Albanian newspaper carried the story yesterday morning and reporters hurried to the village of Gornje (Upper) Obrinje, about 20 miles west of Pristina, the capital of the Serb-run province.
The journey along dirt roads from Glogovac took us through the burnt-out villages and homes shattered by Serb artillery, which have become a routine sight as the late-summer Serb offensive has moved on. But we did not yet know we were going to see the biggest single atrocity that independent witnesses have come across in the six-month war. A local farmer took us on foot down a muddy lane where the tracks of a heavy vehicle, a tank or an armoured personnel carrier, still scarred the soil. Then we crossed a field into a copse of oak. Half a dozen men stood under the trees, looking as blank and ashen as a series of shrouds. "Massacre?," we asked pathetically, using a word that seems to be the same in almost every European language. They pointed to a steep- sided path meandering uphill.
Beyond the first group of corpses we found three more. A mother with two children aged 10 and four had managed to run a little further up the gully. Their extra speed had not helped. They, too, had been shot at short range. It was clear that this group of people - by now we had counted five women and four children among them - could not have been "killed in crossfire" or "accidentally hit by an artillery round".
Without a shadow of doubt this was murder at close range.
"They spent the night in the shelter," said Hamidi Delija, standing by the trees. His parents, his wife, and two children were among the corpses. He pointed to the bodies of a couple of elderly relatives lying under a primitive tent of tarpaulin stretched across a wooden frame. The woman's left foot had been cut off. Part of the man's brain had been removed and placed beside his wife's corpse.
Wood for cooking, a small stove and two teapots stood at the edge of the shelter. The extended Delija family often hid here during offensives in the Drenica region. "They all fled to Cirrez when this offensive started," said Sadri Delija, referring to a nearby village. "They were under siege there. Then the Serbs told them to go home to Gornje Obrinje, but when they got there it was under shellfire so they hid here."
We walked out of the wood to a field where men with spades were starting to dig graves in the damp ground, and on up the hill to Gornje Obrinje.
The first family compound we reached was still smouldering. In a charred living room littered with tiles from the collapsed roof, a villager pointed out the thin torso of a 95-year-old family elder.
In a blackened outhouse the villager showed us a stool where a farmer used to sit sharpening his knives. "The police found the man and asked him where the rest of the family had gone," said the neighbour, who apparently hid while the murderous raid was under way. The farmer took the police into the wood. After they had finished with the children, they killed him too. Among the 12 corpses we counted in the gully and under the make-shift shelter, he and the other elderly man were the only males. Neither of them was of fighting age.
The villagers insisted on showing us more horror. Half a mile away in another wood, where a tank had smashed down a swath of oak saplings as it churned through the brush, Habib Delija, aged 55, and Hysen Delija, aged 40, lay dead. It was not clear whether they had tried to run from the tank or whether they had met their deaths later. The top of the younger man's head had been shot off.
By the time we turned back, the row of graves was growing in the clearing, as the silent diggers dug on. The villagers took us to one last corpse, a man in his 50s who lay on a hillside where he apparently had been trying to flee. Of the 16 victims of Obrinje, he was the only one who might have been shot from a distance.
Why such ferocity, when the Serbs' onslaught in Kosovo is now meeting only minor and increasingly desperate resistance? Earlier in the summer the ethnic Albanian guerrillas of the Kosovo Liberation Army appeared to have turned about a third of the province into no-go areas for the Serbs. But since early August the Serbs have swept all before them.
According to the Serb Media Centre in Pristina, two policemen were killed last Friday "in an attack by a heavily armed group of Albanians at about 2pm in Donje (Lower) Obrinje". The centre also reported that three hours later near Likovac, a village less than two miles away, five policemen died when their vehicle ran over a mine.
So the massacre of Obrinje, which took place around 10am the next morning, was perhaps some wild retaliation. But when has the murder of mothers and children been a justified response for men who claim to be a security force?

We must use force
By Paddy Ashdown

Wednesday September 30, 1998
The woman is using a branch as a broom to sweep away the leaves from the front of her shelter. She carefully arranges the muddy threadbare shoes of her family, left at the entrance, in accordance with Albanian custom.
Inside the air is fetid and damp. Last night it rained, soaking them all and turning the ground to a muddy mess. She and her extended family of 15 have lived here under a plastic sheet since they fled from their villages under Serb shellfire 10 weeks ago. There are 700 people in this wooded valley, the entire population of just one of the hundreds of burnt out villages which are now scattered across central and western Kosovo. Their shelters are camouflaged with branches so that they stay hidden from the Serbs. It was merely by chance that they were discovered by a sharp-eyed UNHCR official two days ago. Until then they had stayed hidden, too frightened to emerge, living off wild peaches, raw berries and whatever they could gather from the forest. Almost no one has a decent pair of shoes and many of the children are barefoot and showing the early signs of malnutrition. Chest diseases are already beginning to carry off the elderly.
I ask one man what they will do when the fierce Kosovo winter comes. "We will die where we are, rather than return to our villages if the Serbs are still there. And anyway, what is the point? They have looted and burnt our houses; they have killed our cattle and destroyed our stocks of grain."
No one knows how many camps like this there are still in the forests, undiscovered.
Next day President Milosevic tells me no one is left living in the open.
I tell him his officials are lying to him. Aid workers say that there are 100,000 Albanians still living in the open, and that 25,000 lives are in jeopardy over the winter if things stay as they are.
I ask one of the children to tell me what happened when the Serbs came.
I know what she is going to say before she says it because I have seen it for myself in these past few days. First comes the ultimatum, delivered by the Serb police. "Give up your weapons or we will destroy your village."
After the deadline comes the shelling. Heavy artillery and 120-millimeter mortars and heavy-calibre machine guns and T55 tanks. The weapons of total war, against defenseless villages. One after the other, I watched them.
Next come the soldier looters with heavy articulated lorries, into which are loaded the meagre valuables of a peasant population. And finally the soldiers who systematically burn the houses one after the other up the valley. I watched them; three days after the Security Council had passed a resolution saying this must stop and at the same time as the Yugoslav government had assured the world that it had stopped. I counted 17 villages in flames and countless individual farmhouses.
I spoke to the terrified human flotsam of this medieval barbarism.
Cartloads of women and children being driven from place to place by the shelling and the soldiers under the relentless rain. One grandmother holding her five-month-old grandchild and comforting her nine-months- pregnant daughter, as yet another deadline approached. She told me they had been on the move for four nights. Where should they go to now? No doubt they will join the thousands hidden in wooded valleys where the Serb authorities say they don't exist.
An old woman I meet in another burnt-out village tells me she had finally dared to come back to her burnt-out house, but only during the day. Three of her friends tried to stay the night, but were found with their throats cut in the morning. In another village an old man tells me that when they returned, they found a body burnt beyond recognition, decapitated and with its arms and legs cut off in one of the ashes of one house. "It's their calling card," he says.
What should we do? First we have to be prepared to use force to stop this, if it continues. Air power is the only option and I remain convinced it is a viable one. Second, we must insist on free, urgent and unfettered access to refugees wherever they are. Third, the West must come up with its own solution. We cannot wait for the opposing parties to come up with theirs. It should be based around a transitional period for Kosovo leading to large-scale autonomy, with independence as an option in the long term.
Lastly, we must understand that Kosovo is a regional problem that requires a regional solution. Kosovo is, more dangerously even than Bosnia, the unstable detonator of the wider Balkan conflict that we have all feared for so long.
Like the villages of western Kosovo, the fuse is burning. It will require urgent and decisive action to put it out.

Paddy Ashdown MP is leader of the Liberal Democrat Party

Kosovo ceasefire
But Milosevic sets the agenda
Leader

Wednesday September 30, 1998
Nato last week warned Slobodan Milosevic he must cease military operations in Kosovo. This week the Serbs duly announced that those operations were over. A case of a succesful display of Nato muscle?
Hardly, and not only because operations are in fact still continuing.
Milosevic's plan for the winter is becoming clearer. The Serbian forces have battered the Kosovo Liberation Army, uprooted a fifth of the Kosovo population and laid waste at least 200 villages.
His next move will almost certainly be to half comply with the demand that operations end, while withdrawing only a few of his units, and prevaricating on negotiations with the Kosovans and on a ceasefire. At the same time he will offer to co-operate with the West in looking after the very people he has deliberately displaced. The likelihood is that every roof his forces have shelled to bits will be put back in place by Western governments and charities, and every acre of wheat his forces have burnt will be replaced by sacks of flour from the agencies. He destroys, we pay. This is already happening to some extent. Milosevic will accede to the request of organisations like the UNHCR, whose head he recently received to allow a more comprehensive aid effort to get under way to rescue the endangered civilians now living on the hillsides. The result will be that these people, or some of them, will be spared the worst rigours of the winter. It will almost certainly also be to bring them back under Serbian control, because the agencies will have to work on Serbian sufferance.
If the Serbian leader plays his cards in this manner, he will have achieved three aims. The KLA has been badly damaged and probably reduced, at least for a while, to a level where what some will call terrorist operations are its only option, a fact which Milosevic will exploit. The Albanian population of Kosovo has been cowed, again at least for a while, and much of it thrust into a situation where survival will depend on returning to areas controlled by Serbian forces, albeit with some protection from humanitarian agencies. And the threat of Western military action has probably been averted, because Europe and America, whatever they say at Nato meetings, are deeply reluctant to put in the ground troops needed to truly protect the Kosovo Albanians from Serbian action. The fact that civilians, aid workers and Serbian forces will be intermingled on the ground will add to that reluctance. This is the sad prospect that seems to be unfolding in Kosovo.

ITN News
Serb forces accused of atrocities in Kosovo

Serbian forces are being accused of murdering men, women and children in their southern province of Kosovo.
The victims, who were bayoneted and shot in the back of the head, were among a quarter of a million refugees displaced by the fighting since February.
The bodies of Kosovo villagers were strewn in the wooded gully where Albanian neighbours said they were massacred by Serb troops.
Eyewitnesses say that at least 10 of 16 corpses left near the central Kosovo village of Gornji Obrinje were those of children, women or old people.
All 16 were wearing civilian clothes and most appeared to have been killed at close range with force.
The discovery of the site, among the most damning evidence yet of the methods used in the conflict by Serbian forces, came as Western ambassadors met in Kosovo on Tuesday for talks intended to show Belgrade the threat of NATO air strikes is real.
Weeping relatives and neighbours, digging graves for the dead, said most of the victims - nine of them members of the same extended family, the Delija clan - had taken refuge in the gully after Serbian police and troops surrounded their village.
Like thousands of ethnic Albanians in the southern Serbian province terrified by a Serbian military offensive, they had built a crude shack a few hundred metres from their home, as a refuge whenever troops were in the area.
Neighbours and members of the Delija family who escaped the attack said they believed Serb troops had caught an old man of the clan, Ali Delija, still at his home and forced him to lead them to his kinsfolk's hiding place.
"I heard screaming and shooting," said Sadri Delija, a middle-aged man of the clan. "When the troops left we found them dead."
He said the killers wore the uniforms of both police and Yugoslav army.
Ethnic Albanian reports said they belonged to special forces.
Meanwhile the US Pentagon says that Serb authorities are running out of time to comply with a NATO demand to pull out of Kosovo and stop fighting.
"At this point, I think we've got a lot of rhetoric and not much action," US Navy Capt Michael Doubleday said.
"By that I mean there certainly have been statements made by Serb officials that their activities, their military actions, are over and done with at this point, but that is not what we have seen on the ground."
Yugoslav security forces have pulled out of a section of southern Kosovo in an apparent move to back up government claims of an end to its offensive.
But ethnic Albanians reported new, large-scale deployments and fresh fighting elsewhere.
Serbian Premier Mirko Marjanovic said government forces had crushed the secessionist Kosovo Liberation Army and that special police units would be returned to their barracks.
But Doubleday noted an international diplomatic observer mission in the region "has seen military activities take place after those statements were made."
"It's probably going to be a day or two before we can make a full assessment as to whether this, whether any of the statements, had any meaning at all," Doubleday said.
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization is in the last stages of planning for possible military intervention in Kosovo. But US and other Western officials are still holding out hope that Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic will halt his assault on ethnic Albanian separatists, who seek independence.
"What we have right now is still a desire, a hope, that the diplomatic process will result in some concrete actions ... which will enable these internally displaced persons ... to return to their homes and get into a position where they can support themselves and feed themselves during the winter ...," Doubleday said.

BBC News
Wednesday, September 30, 1998 Published at 08:46 GMT 09:46 UK
Massacre evidence in Kosovo

BBC journalists have seen first-hand evidence of a massacre of ethnic Albanian civilians, including women and children, in Kosovo. Local villagers said the killings had been carried out by Serbian police.
Eighteen people were killed with knives, or shots to the head. Some were mutilated. Two had been decapitated.
One child survived, protected by the body of its mother.
Correspondent David Loyn says those who died were refugees who had been living in makeshift shelters in the village of Gornje Obrinje.
The leader of the British Liberal Democrat Party, Paddy Ashdown, who is visiting Yugoslavia, said he saw "weapons of total war" being used against villagers by Serbian forces fighting pro-independence ethnic Albanians.
He said what was happening in Kosovo may amount to genocide.

Withdrawal claims dismissed
Ethnic Albanians in the province have dismissed statements made by Yugoslav leaders that the offensive against them is over.
Serb and Yugoslav officials say their forces are withdrawing from Kosovo. But ethnic Albanians argue that the withdrawals are actually troop rotations.
They say the troop movements are an attempt to deflect threatened Nato air strikes against Serbia.
Western journalists reported that a large column of vehicles and tanks had been seen moving towards barracks in the provincial capital, Pristina.
But other reports from correspondents in Kosovo said Serb forces had continued to attack ethnic Albanian civilians.

Pentagon watching and waiting
The US Government says it has seen no evidence of Serb authorities keeping to their withdrawal promise.
Pentagon spokesman Captain Michael Doubleday said: "It's probably going to be a day or two before we can make a full assessment as to whether any of the statements had any meaning at all."
Diplomats from the Contact Group on former Yugoslavia consisting of the US, Russia and several European powers, have travelled to Kosovo to look into reports of civilian massacres.
A UN resolution, voted on last Thursday, calls for a ceasefire in Kosovo and warns the Yugoslav Government of "additional measures" against it if it fails to comply.
Belgrade says the resolution has "no judicial or political basis," but on Monday the Serbian Prime Minister, Mirko Marjanovic announced that government forces were returning to barracks.
On Tuesday the Pentagon said a list of American military units to be put at Nato's disposal for any intervention in Kosovo would be ready "in the coming days".

Wednesday, September 30, 1998 Published at 09:02 GMT 10:02 UK
Serbs accused of ''medieval barbarity''

The leader of Britain's Liberal Democrat party, Paddy Ashdown, has warned Serbia that air strikes are imminent unless it stops attacks in Kosovo.
The Liberal Democrat, an ex-Royal Marine, met Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic on Tuesday after witnessing Serb attacks in Kosovo the previous day.
He said he saw Serbs flout UN peace calls by using "weapons of total war against defenceless villagers" and he accused Serbia of involvement in acts of "medieval barbarity".
Mr Ashdown said the Serbian action was a scorched earth policy that might legally be considered genocide.
He said he had assurances from Mr Milosevic that the campaign was over.

"Systematic looting"
Mr Ashdown warned that air strikes could follow within two weeks if the fighting did continue.
Ethnic Albanians in Kosovo are fighting for independence but have been met with the full might of the Yugoslav armed forces.
Mr Ashdown said: "The activities I witnessed in the Suva Reka area are not a response to terrorism which a civilised nation should be allowed to, or should wish to take.
"Villagers are required to move, then there is heavy shelling and a very systematic looting of the valuables from each house.
"The booty is then driven away before the villages are set on fire."
The UN Security Council last week ordered Mr Milosevic to seek a ceasefire and open talks with the ethnic Albanian majority in Kosovo.
Nato has stepped up plans for air strikes.
Mr Milosevic said the campaign against Kosovo Liberation Army guerrillas was over.
But Mr Ashdown said he saw continued action in Kosovo at the same time as a Serbian announcement on withdrawing forces was being made in the Yugoslav parliament.
Mr Ashdown said it was important not only that the offensive had finished but that refugees should be allowed to return to their homes.
--
Kosova Information Centre - London

FINAL WARNING or FINAL SOLUTION
BY Eric Margolis  24 Sept 1998

Six months ago, NATO ordered Serbia to halt ethnic cleansing in Kosova or face heavy air attacks. This was `the final warning,' thundered the world's most powerful alliance.
Six months later, ethnic cleansing continues unabated in the rebellious,  Serb- controlled region, with three new offensives launched in the past week alone by the Serb army and paramilitary police.
Serb forces are using heavy artillery, tank fire, and heavy automatic weapons to raze villages and kill livestock.  This scorched earth policy  has driven 300,000 Albanian civilians into the forests and hills, where temperatures are already dropping to freezing at night, and snows will begin in another month.  A third of all Albanian Kosovars are now refugees, living in the open like animals.  So much for NATO's `final warning.'
As in Bosnia, Serb strongman Slobodan Milosevic knows just how to play NATO.  While NATO members fret and debate over Kosova, Serb forces press  ahead with their campaign to drive most of Kosova's 2.1 million Albanians - 92% of the total population - out of the province and into neighboring  Albania, Macedonia, or Montenegro.  When NATO threatens military action to halt Serb savagery, Milosevic wrong-foots the alliance by quickly offering empty peace talks.  Russia runs interference for Serbia's Slavic nazis at the UN.
Washington's foolish hopes that Serbia would merely crush lightly-armed Albanian independence fighters, and then halt operations, have been dashed by Milosevic's relentless attacks on Kosova's civilians.  As a vast human tragedy engulfs Kosova, NATO and the UN Security Council are muttering again this week about air strikes against Serb forces.
Meanwhile, NATO's stage-managed election in Bosnia just went terribly wrong. Hard-line Serbs defeated the west's hand-picked `moderate' Serb candidate.  The phony Dayton peace accords that suspended the war in Bosnia are unraveling.
Events in Albania were even more ominous.  The leader of Albanian resistance fighters in Kosova, Ahmet Krasniqi, was murdered in Tirana, Albania's capital. The killers were either from Serbia's notorious intelligence service, or former Sigurimi agents, the brutal secret police who terrorized Albania during five decades of Stalinist rule.
Albania's government is now entirely controlled by old Stalinist communists.  Sigurimi agents have returned from exile and are now waging a war of terror against former president Sali Berisha's pro-western democrats, and other anti- communists.  Last week, Sigurimi assassins murdered a leading Democratic leader, Azem Hajdari, provoking massive anti-regime protests in Tirana.
Little Albania has splintered along tribal lines. In the south, Tosks, who dominated the old communist party, now run the regime in Tirana.  The north belongs to Ghegs, fierce, anti-communist mountaineers.  Sali Berisha, a Gheg, and Albania's most capable leader, is aiding Kosovar resistance forces.  The communist in Tirana are stabbing their Albanian Kosovar compatriots in the back by trying to cut off their arms and supplies - and, now, killing Kosovar leaders.
Albania's neo-Stalinist regime was engineered into power by the west when Berish's government collapsed after financial scandals. Today, the communists are sustained by aid from the western powers and Italy's powerful communist party, which is seeking to restore marxism in the Balkans.  Better the communists than anarchy, argues the west, completely ignoring Albania's democrats.
The communists in Tirana are doing NATO's bidding by sabotaging Kosova liberation fighters and helping keep Serbia-Yugoslavia together.  So western money keeps flowing to these `reformed' murderers and torturers who ran postwar Europe's most nightmarish totalitarian regime. The west sinks deeper each day into the Balkan morass, a victim of its own cowardice, indecision and contradictory policies.
Senator Bob Dole, just returned from Bosnia and Kosova, summed up the situation with his usual clarity and honesty. The most urgent issue was not President Clinton's flawed character, Dole said, but the questionable character of the United States. Two American presidents had vowed the horrors of Bosnia would not be allowed to happen in Kosova. But they are.
Copyright   eric margolis   1998

Taken without permission, for fair use only.

KOSOVA  September 29, 1998

Kosovo Albanians reject provisional government
Serb Attacks Reported after Milosevic Pledge to Withdraw Police
Ashdown Says Serbs Use ''Weapons of Total War''

KOSOVA  September 28, 1998

WPOST: To Rescue Kosovo Now
Serbia claims victory in Kosovo
Albanians Fear New Attacks despite Serb Pledge
NATO Says it Wants to See Proof of Calm in Kosovo
Papandreou: Council of Europe Must Continue Efforts
Serbia seeks investment to revive Kosovo
WP;09/27;Why 'Later' Won't Do for Those in Kosovo
Serbs Attack More Kosovo Villages
Serbian Police Kill Over 100 Kosovo Fighters

FYROM  September 29, 1998

Russia Criticises Balkan Peacekeeping Force Plans

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Kosovo Albanians reject provisional government
International monitors tour region
September 29, 1998
Web posted at: 10:39 a.m. EDT (1439 GMT)

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia (CNN) -- Kosovo Albanians on Tuesday rejected Serbia's new provisional government for the province, along with claims that the rebels had been defeated.
     Fehmi Agani, chief negotiator for the Democratic League of Kosovo, the leading ethnic Albanian party, said it would not join the provisional government and did not expect other Albanian parties to do so.
     "There is absolutely no possibility of us participating in the work of the provisional executive council because this is an organ of the Serb authorities," he told the Belgrade news agency Beta. "I do not expect any party in Kosovo will agree to take part in the work of that body."
     The separatist ethnic Albanian majority in Kosovo has boycotted all direct contact with Belgrade while the population of the southern Serbian province is under attack by security forces.
     Serbian Prime Minister Mirko Marjanovic announced the Serbian-led provisional government on Monday, adding that police and troops would withdraw to their barracks now, having defeating a seven-month insurgency by the Kosovo Liberation Army.
     In a statement Tuesday, the KLA, which is fighting for independence from Serbia, warned the world to act "more justly, swiftly and energetically, or the consequences of the Kosovo war would be reflected in the whole of Balkans and wider."
     The rebels pledged to fight on despite a string of defeats that have driven them from many of their former strongholds in the province. Hundreds of thousands of mainly ethnic Albanian refugees have been displaced by the fighting, which began in February.
     On Tuesday, envoys of the six so-called Contact Group countries dealing with former Yugoslavia were touring Kosovo in order to see whether Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic was living up to his pledge to withdraw Serbian-led special police, as demanded by NATO and the U.N. Security Council.
     Delegates of the group met Milosevic on Monday and warned him to honor demands for an immediate cease-fire in the Serbian province, according to a statement by the French embassy in Belgrade.
     Following the meeting, the diplomats from the United States, Russia, Britain, France, Germany and Italy headed off for Kosovo.
     The Serbian media center in Pristina said that Yugoslav army troops and special police had already begun to withdrawing from Djakovica in western Kosovo on Tuesday.
     But Western eyewitness said Serbian attacks continued south of Pristina on Monday despite Marjanovic's statement, and Agani rejected claims that the offensive had ended.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.
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Serb Attacks Reported after Milosevic Pledge to Withdraw Police
AP  29-SEP-98

OBRINJE, Yugoslavia (AP) -- A day after the Serbian premier promised to withdraw special police units from Kosovo as demanded by NATO, Serb forces launched new attacks today south of the provincial capital, ethnic Albanian sources said.
     Serbian Premier Mirko Marjanovic said Monday that government forces had crushed the secessionist Kosovo Liberation Army and that special police units would be returned to their barracks. It was unclear if any police had done so today.
     The Kosovo Liberation Army is fighting for Kosovo's independence. Kosovo is located in southern Serbia, Yugoslavia's dominant republic. Most ethnic Albanians, who make up 90 percent of Kosovo's 2 million inhabitants, favor independence.
     Marjanovic warned that troops could be sent back to the field if rebels resumed attacks on Serb police.
     NATO recently stepped up plans for airstrikes against Serb forces after repeated warnings that it would attack unless violence ends in the province.
     The Albanian-run Kosovo Information Center reported heavy Serb attacks today around the towns of Stimlje and Urosevac, about 18 miles south of Pristina, Kosovo's capital.
     The Information Center said smoke billowed from several villages and that 700 civilians were trapped in at least one village near Stimlje.
     There was no statement from Serb sources. The Information Center reports could not be independently confirmed.
     The attacks were reported as diplomats from the United States and other countries visited some of the estimated 275,000 refugees driven from their homes in the seven-month Serbian crackdown.
     At this Kosovo village, the diplomats saw evidence of the carnage: the bodies of 15 ethnic Albanians, all shot in the back of the head at a makeshift camp in the woods where they had sought shelter.
     The bodies of the six women, four children and five men lay unburied on the ground today, two days after Albanians said they were massacred by the Serbs.
     In addition to the gunshots, two of the bodies had been decapitated. One woman was missing her foot. An elderly man's throat had been cut.
     Residents of a nearby village said masked Serb police forced one villager to show them where the refugees were hiding, then shot the villager and the others.
     Both sides have blamed the other for massacres. Serbs have said that at least 39 Serbs were tortured, mutilated and killed earlier this month near Glodjane in western Kosovo after they were "kidnapped by the terrorists."

Copyright 1998& The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
__________________________________________________

Ashdown Says Serbs Use ''Weapons of Total War''
Reuters  29-SEP-98

BELGRADE, Sept 29 (Reuters) - British politician Paddy Ashdown said on Tuesday he saw Serbs flout U.N. peace calls by using "weapons of total war against defenceless villages" in ethnic Albanian areas of Kosovo.
     Ashdown, a former professional soldier who leads the opposition Liberal Democrat party, told reporters after touring Kosovo's battlefields that he watched Serb tanks and artillery pound villages that were then "systematically looted."
     "I cannot think of any provocation which justifies such an appalling, excessive use of force," he added.
     Ashdown said he warned Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic that his forces in Kosovo were waging a scorched earth policy that the international community could not ignore.
     "I told him it was absolutely vital that the Yugoslav government should not miscalculate in believing...that the international community will (not) be forced to use some sanctions, including the sanction of military force," he said.
     The U.N. Security Council ordered Milosevic last week to seek a ceasefire in Kosovo and open talks with separatist leaders of the ethnic Albanian majority in Kosovo.
     Although no deadline was set, the U.N. move was followed by an increase in NATO preparations for possible air strikes against Yugoslavia which Serb politicians have vowed to resist.
     Belgrade says a two-month offensive in its southern province was aimed at crushing a insurgency by ethnic Albanian guerrillas of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA).
     KLA gains in the conflict were rolled back weeks ago and international eyewitnesses said the Serb had used their military superiority to raze villages across western Kosovo and cause an exodus of civilian refugees.
     At least 800 people have died in seven months of fighting and around 300,000 made homeless. Some 50,000 are living in the open without proper supplies of food, shelter or medicine.
     Western reporters who visited the village of Gornje Obrinje in western Kosovo on Tuesday were shown the mutilated bodies of 16 members of one family, including women and children, slain in a Serb attack at the weekend.
     Ashdown saw 10 villages in flames in the Suva Reka area south of Pristina on Monday when Serbian Prime Minister Mirko Marjanovic was telling parliament the offensive had already stopped.
     "We saw many refugees who had left these villages, some of them in a most desperate and awkward state, women, young children, a nine months pregnant mother bouncing around on the back of trucks which had been moving for three or four nights," he said.
     "The activities which I witnessed in the Suva Reka area yesterday, and I speak as an ex-soldier who has fought in three terrorist campaigns...using the weapons of total war against defenceless villages is not a response to terrorism which a civilisd nation should be allowed to or should wish to take."

Copyright 1998 Reuters Limited.All rights reserved.
__________________________________________________

To Rescue Kosovo Now
By Fred Hiatt
Monday, September 28, 1998; Page A25

Four months and 400,000 refugees ago, President Clinton received -- and made a number of promises to -- a delegation from the independence-minded Yugoslav province of Kosovo. He promised that the United States would not permit Serbian strongman Slobodan Milosevic to commit the kind of atrocities in Kosovo that had been perpetrated in Bosnia, recalled White House guest, editor and political leader Veton Surroi during a visit to Washington last week. But as he left the White House that day, Surroi learned that 10,000 to 15,000 of his countrymen were fleeing their homes after Serb attacks near Decani. That was just the beginning.
     Today, Surroi reports, more than 400,000 Kosovars -- about one fifth of the population -- have been forced from their homes. Between 50,000 and 100,000 are living without shelter in woods and mountains. Milosevic's police have destroyed 14,000 homes, razed 400 villages, slaughtered about one-quarter of Kosovo's livestock and burned 10 percent of its arable land.
     Surroi recites these statistics with a journalist's dispassion. But behind the dry numbers lies incipient disaster for the ethnic Albanians who make up 90 percent of Kosovo's population, over whom a Serb minority rules like imperial masters. The first snow already has fallen. Milosevic has imposed a food blockade on the renegade province, so that even those with shelter are in jeopardy. As winter sets in, Milosevic could accomplish genocide without shooting anyone (though his troops have, Surroi notes, killed about 1,000 people, most of them civilians).
     Throughout this offensive, Clinton's principal response has been to send an ambassador to Belgrade to ask Milosevic, please, to stop. Sometimes the ambassador has asked nicely. Sometimes his tone has been firm.
     Meanwhile the attacks have continued: Shell a village, loot the houses, burn the crops. Last week, another 10,000 civilians were flushed from their homes as Serb troops shelled a dozen villages at the foot of the Cicavica hills.
     Clinton and his team have concocted one pretext after another for inaction. But, as Bob Dole said last week, "the situation is not complicated. Indeed, it could not be clearer. This is a war against civilians, and we know who is responsible: Slobodan Milosevic."
     Last week the United Nations Security Council demanded a cease-fire. NATO defense ministers threatened military action. Outsiders have been demanding and threatening for so long that no one -- certainly not Milosevic -- could have been expected to take much notice.
     But there are signs that the administration, realizing how tattered its credibility has become, actually may be moving toward action. In that case, the question will be whether Clinton wants face-saving cosmetics or a real solution. Will he fling a few million-dollar missiles in the Serbs' direction and then resume negotiating with Milosevic? Or will he realize that Milosevic himself is the problem?
     To win Milosevic's cooperation in ending the war in Bosnia, the West sacrificed Kosovo and looked the other way as Milosevic tightened his police-state grip on Serbia. But the strategy cannot work -- not even for Bosnia, where anti-Western nationalists triumphed in recent elections. As long as the chief war criminal wields power from the center, democracy cannot take root in any place under Serb sway.
     This was the conclusion of a long list of Washington foreign-policy luminaries who wrote, in an open letter to Clinton, that "after seven years of aggression and genocide in the Balkans, the removal of Milosevic provides the only genuine possibility of a durable peace." It is also the conclusion of democratic-minded people inside Serbia -- people such as Surroi and Veran Matic, founder and editor-in-chief of Serbia's independent radio station B92.
     The Dayton peace accords, by making Milosevic a guarantor, helped him retain power, Matic says. Now, having destroyed much of Kosovo, he might welcome a pact that would make him the guarantor again and buy him more time -- while he happily allows the West to provide food for the Kosovars he has impoverished and plastic sheeting to replace the walls and roofs he has bombed.
     "Then he'll produce a conflict in Montenegro," Matic says. "This isn't just a question of Kosovo. In Albania, in Macedonia, in the whole region -- there can be no democracy as long as Milosevic is in power."
     That doesn't mean NATO troops should go after Milosevic himself. It does mean the West should support democracy and civil society within Serbia. It does mean investigating Milosevic for war crimes, particularly within Kosovo, and arresting his agents in Bosnian war crimes such as Radovan Karadzic.
     And it means, in Kosovo, marshaling NATO forces in a serious enough way to ensure the immediate withdrawal of Serb troops. Negotiations, if any, should not depend on Milosevic's goodwill, but should take as their starting point -- a NATO-enforced starting point -- the return of self-administration to Kosovo, the return of all refugees to their homes and the return of fundamental human rights to every resident, Serb and Albanian.
     Given the destruction of the past four months, it's too late for Clinton to talk of keeping his promises. It's not too late to minimize the damage from his having broken them.

The writer is a member of the editorial page staff.
© Copyright 1998 The Washington Post Company
__________________________________________________

Serbia claims victory in Kosovo
September 28, 1998
Web posted at: 11:11 a.m. EDT (1511 GMT)

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia (CNN) -- Serbia claimed victory on Monday in its military campaign against ethnic Albanian separatist guerrillas in Kosovo.
     "I wish to declare that with this day ... the armed terrorist groups have been defeated," Prime Minister Jirko Marjanovic told members of the Serbian parliament meeting in a special session called to condemn international "pressures, threats and blackmail."
     The statement follows a major campaign against the Kosovo Liberation Army and its alleged supporters that began in February. The crackdown left at least 800 people dead and about 300,000 mostly ethnic Albanians displaced, according to official figures.
     The United States and its allies have threatened with NATO air strikes if Serbia does not call a cease-fire in the conflict and open peace talks with Kosovo Albanian political leaders, some of whom want outright independence.
     Mirjanovic said the presence of police and troops would be reduced and security forces would be withdrawn to their bases "but will remain in a state of alert for a certain time in case the creation of the terrorist organization is renewed."
     He denied that Serbia had used excessive force against the Kosovo guerrillas, who won loose control of about half of the province before security forces launched a counter-offensive in July.
     Marjanovic made his remarks as he introduced a resolution declaring that stamping out ethnic Albanian resistance in Kosovo -- where ethnic Albanians form about 90 percent of the population -- is Serbia's top priority.
     He also proposed setting up an executive council led by Serbian government ministers to take responsibility for the administration of Kosovo while a political agreement on its autonomy was worked out.
     The fighting in Kosovo has left the province a near-empty wasteland of deserted villages and wrecked houses.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.
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Albanians Fear New Attacks despite Serb Pledge
Reuters  28-SEP-98

BELGRADE, Sept 28 (Reuters) - Serbia claimed victory over ethnic Albanian separatists in Kosovo on Monday and said its forces would return to barracks, but sceptical Albanian sources warned Belgrade's offensive in the province was not over.
     Prime Minister Mirko Marjanovic told a special session of parliament: "Peace reigns in Kosovo today ... As of today all anti-terrorist activities have ended. They will be renewed only if any new bandit and terrorist activity reappears."
     His announcement followed heavy Serb attacks on ethnic Albanian villages south of Pristina, the Kosovo capital, on Sunday when Western reporters saw homes burning and civilians fleeing under artillery bombardments.
     Enver Maloku, head of the ethnic Albanian information centre (KIC) in Pristina, said:
     "It would be a great mistake to believe the Serbian prime minister because every time there is such a declaration, the offensive goes on, dozens more Albanians are killed and thousands forced from their homes."
     Edita Tahira, a member of the ethnic Albanian team for eventual peace negotiations, added: "We want the international community to view the situation in real terms. Unless the aggressive activities of Serbia are stopped, there will be no successful negotiating process."
     The United States and its allies have threatened Belgrade with NATO air strikes if it does not call a ceasefire in the seven-month conflict and open peace talks with Kosovo Albanian political leaders.
     The government called the parliament session to condemn international "pressures, threats and blackmail" and lay out its own proposals for a settlement.
     Marjanovic proposed setting up an executive council led by Serbian government ministers to take responsibility for the administration of Kosovo while a political agreement on its autonomy was worked out.
     Deputy Prime Minister Vojislav Seselj said the council, in which the ethnic Albanians would be invited to take part, would act as a provisional government in Kosovo until elections could be called with the agreement of all sides.
     Marjanovic said the police and military presence would be reduced and personnel withdrawn to their bases "but will remain in a state of alert for a certain time in case the creation of the terrorist organisation is renewed."
     He denied Serbia had used excessive force against separatist guerrillas of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) which won loose control of around half the province before security forces launched a counter-offensive in July.
     Official figures show at least 800 people, but probably many more, have been killed since the conflict began in February. More than 300,000, mostly ethnic Albanians, have been driven from their homes.
     Aid organisations believe up to 50,000 people are hiding in the open in fear of Serb attacks and have warned of an impending humanitarian catastrophe as winter approaches.
     Marjanovic's claim that the fighting was over came after a week of intense activity by heavy forces of Serb police and Yugoslav army units north and south of Pristina.
     Albanian sources said at least 100 ethnic Albanian villagershad been killed in the north last week.
     Marjanovic told parliament: "I don't want to say that all the problems in Kosovo have been resolved but everything that has happened confirms that political means are the only way to resolve problems in Kosovo.
     He offered an amnesty to all ethnic Albanians who turned in their weapons within 10 days and could prove they were innocent of rebel activity.
     "Life has been normalised; Serbia has thwarted the secessionists' attempt to realise their aims by terror," Marjanovic said. "The terrorist bands are destroyed and a great number of terrorists have been arrested and disarmed."
     He promised full protection for ethnic Albanians who returned to their villages, scores of which have been destroyed in western Kosovo and in the areas north and south of Pristina.

Copyright 1998 Reuters Limited.All rights reserved.
__________________________________________________

NATO Says it Wants to See Proof of Calm in Kosovo
Reuters  28-SEP-98

BRUSSELS, Sept 28 (Reuters) - Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic must provide solid evidence in the form of significant troop withdrawals before the West accepts that fighting in Kosovo province is over, a NATO official said on Monday.
     "It would be good to believe that the strong pressure from the international community has been received with the seriousness with which it was issued," he said, reacting to an announcement by Serbian Prime Minister Mirko Marjanovic.
     The premier told a special session of parliament in Belgrade on Monday that "peace reigns in Kosovo today...As of today all anti-terrorist activities have ended. They will be renewed only if any new bandit and terrorist activity reappears."
     The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation official said the Brussels-headquartered alliance would be vigilant and cautious.
     "Milosevic is not off the hook with this declaration," he said. He should withdraw Yugoslav army troops and reduce the numbers of special police to levels consistent with normal policing.
     If the fighting really were over, the allies would expect to see rapid moves to resettle ethnic Albanian refugees in their homes and more determined efforts to start talks on a political settlement in Kosovo, the official added.
     The United States and its allies have threatened Belgrade with NATO air strikes if it does not call a ceasefire in the seven-month conflict.
     Marjanovic said numbers of police and troops would be reduced and units withdrawn to their bases "but will remain in a state of alert for a certain time in case the creation of the terrorist organisation is renewed."
     He denied Serbia had used excessive force against separatist guerrillas of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) which won loose control of around half of the province before security forces launched a counter-offensive in July.
     Official figures show at least 800 people, but probably many more, have been killed since the conflict began in February. More than 300,000, mostly ethnic Albanians, have been driven from their homes.
     Aid organisations believe up to 50,000 people are hiding in the open in fear of Serb attacks and have warned of an impending humanitarian catastrophe with winter nearing.

Copyright 1998 Reuters Limited.All rights reserved.
__________________________________________________

Papandreou: Council of Europe Must Continue Efforts
Xinhua  28-SEP-98

ATHENS (Sept. 28) XINHUA - President of the Council of Europe George Papandreou stressed Monday that the organization must continue its efforts to help end the crisis in the Yugoslav province of Kosovo.
     Addressing the meeting of the organization's council of ministers and parliamentary assembly on the Aegean island of Santorini, Papandreou, also Alternate Foreign Minister of Greece, said that the council of Europe had to continue its efforts to bring an end to hostilities and in support of dialogue between Belgrade and the ethnic Albanians in Kosovo.
     As for Yugoslavia's application for the council of Europe membership, which was made in March, he said that the council of Europe was not seriously considering Belgrade's inclusion in the organization at this time.
     Leni Fischer, council of Europe parliamentary assembly president, warned last week that the organization would bar Belgrade's application if the latter did not stop its military action in Kosovo where ethnic Albanians make up 90 percent of its nearly 2 million population and have been demanding independence.
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Serbia seeks investment to revive Kosovo
01:45 p.m Sep 28, 1998 Eastern
By Gordana Kukic

BELGRADE, Sept 28 (Reuters) - Serbia said on Monday that economic revival spurred by foreign investment would help to build permanent peace in Kosovo.
     ``The priority task will be to restart economic capacities in the province,'' said Zoran Andjelkovic, head of a new Kosovo executive council set up by parliament to administer Serbia's southern province, whose ethnic Albanian majority are seeking independence.
     Dusan Matkovic, a member of the Economic Council of the ruling Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS), said the development of the economy would be the engine of a long-term solution for Kosovo.
     ``I believe that the solution lies in activating the enormous economic resources in Kosovo. We must open the door to new economic programmes and foreign investment if we want to stabilise the province for good,'' he told Reuters.
     ``The first inflow of foreign capital to Kosovo will mark the beginning of a definite and a permanent stabilisation in this part of Serbia,'' he said.
     By investing to create new jobs in the province, Western countries would contribute more to a peaceful solution of the crisis than by exerting pressure or sending humanitarian aid, Matkovic added.
     The Ferro-nickel factory in Glogovac, a lead and zinc mining complex Trepca and Serbia's power company capacities in Kosovo have already attracted the interest of a few potential investors from abroad, he said.
     The executive council will administer Kosovo while a political agreement on its autonomy is worked out.
     Andjelkovic is expected to nominate council members within seven days and the Serbian government said it would secure funds needed for financing the work of the body.
     Deputy Prime Minister Vojislav Seselj said the council, in which the Albanians would be invited to take part, would act as a provisional government until elections could be called with the agreement of all sides.

Copyright 1998 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
__________________________________________________

Why 'Later' Won't Do for Those in Kosovo
By James S. Gordon and Susan B. Lord
Sunday, September 27, 1998; Page C01

PRISTINA, Kososvo—We stood outside the state hospital here, in the capital of Kosovo, listening to the boom of artillery shells being launched in the distance by the Serbian army. It was Aug. 30. We were planning to visit 14 ethnic Albanians severely wounded two days before during a Serbian attack on the village of Senik, east of Malisevo, less than an hour away. As many as 17 people--no one is as yet sure--died that day.
     We wanted to see those injured in the attack to make sure they were being properly cared for. We traveled here after a week in Sarajevo, where at the invitation of the Bosnian Ministry of Social Welfare we worked with physicians and religious leaders who wanted to heal themselves and their wounded country. We had taught them the kinds of skills--self-awareness, meditation, guided imagery, biofeedback--that our Center for Mind-Body Medicine teaches physicians, cancer patients and schoolchildren in the United States.
     During that week, we had heard our colleagues speak, often for the first time, of the almost unendurable physical and emotional pain of the war in Bosnia. We had come to Kosovo to see if here we could, in some small way, help avert the kind of mass suffering that still filled the lives and scarred the bodies of our Bosnian friends and colleagues.
     It wasn't easy to gain access to the Serb-run hospital. While we waited in filthy, badly lit hallways, the American diplomat who brought us spoke persistently and firmly with the guards who denied us entry. He asked to see and then negotiated with the hospital's director and repeatedly phoned the Serbian foreign minister. " 'No,' he told us, "is not an acceptable answer."
     Waiting again, outside this time, our translator, an Albanian philosophy graduate student, pulled her coat around her. "A special kind of cleaning," she said, reminding us, as the chill reminded her, that winter is coming. In just a few weeks, below-freezing temperatures at night may kill many of those refugees still in the hills outside Malisevo, "cleansing" the area of Albanians--who make up 90 percent of the population in Kosovo--as effectively as Serbian bullets could.
     Back inside the hospital, upstairs, we found a woman and a boy in intensive care; they were not expected to survive. In a ward nearby, an old woman didn't want to. She was still in traditional skirts, a scarf wrapped around her head. "Why couldn't they have killed me instead of my grandson? He was only 11," she said, over and over. The young woman in the next bed was as pale as the sheet we had pulled down to examine her. There were wounds on her chest, above breasts swollen with milk: Her 8-month-old son had had his head blown off as she suckled him. "Are we terrorists?" she asked, so softly our translator could barely hear her.
     Two days later, we drove up into the hills with a convoy of relief agency trucks bringing food. At times it felt more like a cortege, moving through villages in which every house had been bombed and, for good measure, burned. Corn stood unharvested. Cows roamed or lay dead, legs up and stiff. Dogs were everywhere. There were no people, except for purple-uniformed Serbian police with automatic weapons whose muzzles strayed toward our faces.
     We turned onto a dirt road and climbed for half an hour, past thick knots of children, men selling cigarettes to one another, and an occasional Albanian guerrilla cleaning his automatic rifle. We entered a tiny village in a high valley. There was an empty barn, a few standing houses and, as far as we could see, campsites scattered across the valley. Thousands of people hid among the trees; hundreds moved slowly toward us.
     A crowd of men and boys surrounded us, clamoring for us to listen and to come see their village, convinced we could not possibly imagine the extent of the destruction. Some had ventured back to their homes, allegedly encouraged by the Serbian police, only to be shelled again.
     A tall, dark-haired man in his forties, in slacks and a cardigan sweater, took us in hand. His face was long, handsome and pained. He showed us the modest farmhouse where 200 or more people spend each of the progressively colder nights. He took us past four newly dug graves--for three adults and a small child--down to the river where groups of women and children clustered around fires.
     All these people had fled their homes, grabbing whatever they could in several panicked minutes. Some were in traditional peasant clothes; others, who lived in the country but worked in Pristina, were dressed in long fashionable skirts and platform heels. Many of them had traveled for weeks, just ahead of the shelling; others were newly evicted from villages like Senik, where fires still smoked.
     It is estimated by diplomatic observers and relief agencies that perhaps 300,000 people are now "displaced" in Kosovo.
     In a makeshift clinic there were crowds, not lines, of people. We saw still-chubby babies with the diarrhea that had already killed some and, if inadequately treated, would kill many more; frail, elderly people; a teenager with an abscess as big as a fist in her jaw. The doctor, who had been displaced from his own village, told us that at least 300 patients had come to the clinic that day. He gestured hopelessly toward the few antibiotics he had, held up syringes for which he had no needles and put his head in his hands. In the next room, two babies with IVs were glassy-eyed and lethargic, and a pregnant woman was in premature labor.
     The older children in this high valley have dark circles under their eyes and wake, we were told by their mothers, at the slightest sound. When we asked them to draw pictures of themselves--a technique we use in groups of patients in Washington--they crayoned only houses, some neat and intact, others in flames. "Where are you in this picture?" we asked. "I'm not there," they said.
     Some intellectuals in Pristina suspect the fact that they are Muslims is the roadblock to more definitive U.S. or NATO intervention. Serbian physicians whom we met in Belgrade insisted that America is neglecting their people's suffering. We listened as carefully as we could to all of their concerns, but our minds and hearts were outside Malisevo with the tens of thousands of the displaced. When Slobodan Milosevic, president of Yugoslavia, talks about establishing "humanitarian centers" while his troops systematically destroy humans, we can only be appalled.
     The people of Kosovo need massive humanitarian intervention now: food, building materials and medicine and skilled people to organize construction, sanitation and health care. They need an end to the ongoing attacks that make a mockery of all humanitarian efforts. They need the United States and our NATO allies to help them return to their homes and, quite literally, to shield them with our bodies. The U.N. Security Council resolution of Sept. 23, calling for an immediate cease-fire and the resumption of peace talks, is a belated step in the right direction. The American diplomat's reminder should be our watchword. "No" is not an acceptable answer and, we would add, "later" is not an acceptable time.
     James Gordon is a psychiatrist and director of the Center for Mind-Body Medicine in Washington. Susan Lord is a family practitioner and coordinator of the center's nutrition programs.

'I'M NOT THERE':

While authors James Gordon and Susan Lord were in Kosovo, they asked some displaced children in an encampment outside Malisevo to express how they were feeling by drawing pictures of themselves.
     Here is what Agon Lumi Bllac, a 14-year-old who had been wandering the countryside with his family for weeks, gave them:

© Copyright 1998 The Washington Post Company
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Monday September 28 7:16 AM EDT
Serbs Attack More Kosovo Villages
By Andrew Roche

STUDENCANE VILLAGE, Yugoslavia (Reuters) - Serb troops bombarded and burned villages in southern Kosovo in what diplomats said seemed to be a new phase in an offensive that threatens to trigger NATO retribution.
     Frightened ethnic Albanians in Studencane stood and watched thick pillars of smoke rise from burning villages on mountainsides a few miles (km) to their east. They listened to the artillery explosions and said they feared they would soon be next.
     Serb forces say they are mopping up ``terrorists'' of the separatist Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) guerrillas who gained a brief ascendancy in the southern Serbian province earlier in the year. Villagers say the gunmen have long gone.
     ``The Serbs have given us an ultimatum to hand over guns they say we are hiding by tomorrow (Monday),'' said one Studencane man. ``They summoned four senior men from Studencane and said if we don't they will do the same to us.
     ``But we don't have any guns. We are collecting money to try and buy some tonight, we don't know where. If we give them 10 guns, will they be satisfied? Maybe they will just demand more,'' he said.
     His and other families in the village packed their belongings into tractor carts, expecting to have to flee Monday when the deadline expires.
     Most had only just returned after spending weeks living under plastic sheeting in forests, driven there by an initial Serb onslaught in August.
     ``Some of our houses are still standing. So they want to finish the job now,'' said the man, whose own business was torched by Serb troops in August. ``But the last KLA guerrillas left in August. We really don't have guns. If I had one I would fight them.''
     His wife, trembling, said armed Serbs had visited Studencane Sunday morning. ``They said they would cut the children to pieces,'' she added.
     Artillery could be heard pounding homes in Recane and other burning hamlets east of the town of Suva Reka, tightly controlled by armed Serb police who ordered journalists away from the area.
     ``This seems to be a definite new phase in the offensive,'' said a Western diplomat visiting the area. ``It's moved down from north and central Kosovo.''
     Further north, two farmhouses on a stretch of the highway between the Kosovo capital Pristina and the northwestern town of Pec were ablaze Sunday. Tanks and armored police vehicles were rumbling through the area as dusk fell.
     Across rural Kosovo, scores of villages have been wrecked by Serb tanks, artillery or arson in a campaign that international observers say seems to defy purely military logic.
     ``What the Serb forces are doing goes far beyond the need to mop up the KLA. It looks more like collective punishment,'' said another diplomat who watched the hamlets burning east of Suva Reka Sunday.
     Serbian authorities said thousands of refugees visited by U.N. refugee chief Sadako Ogata in the north Kosovo village of Resnik Saturday had all since left, calling her encounter a ''stage-managed catastrophe.'' Ogata spoke angrily of their plight Saturday, saying the refugees had converged on Resnik after fleeing in terror from Serb attacks on their own villages.
     ``The alleged refugees dispersed immediately after Mrs. Ogata's departure,'' the Yugoslav news agency Tanjug quoted local Serb official Slobodan Doknic as saying.
     Staff of an international organization which visited Resnik Sunday said, however, the refugees had left only because Serb armed groups had entered the village after Ogata's visit and ordered them to get out.
     Aid workers say hundreds of thousands of Kosovo Albanians, who make up 90 percent of the province's population, have been driven from their homes and tens of thousands live in the open.
     Defense Secretary William Cohen warned Sunday that NATO would take ``very strong'' action against Yugoslavia unless it complied with U.N. demands to withdraw some forces from Kosovo, ensure refugees can return home and begin negotiations with ethnic Albanian leaders seeking more self-rule for the province.
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Russia Criticises Balkan Peacekeeping Force Plans
Reuters  29-SEP-98

MOSCOW, Sept 29 (Reuters) - Russia on Tuesday criticised plans by seven countries in southeastern Europe to create a joint peacekeeping force, describing it as an attempt to limit Moscow's role in the Balkans.
     Albania, Bulgaria, Greece, Italy, Macedonia, Romania and Turkey agreed to set up the force at a meeting in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia on Saturday. The United States and Slovenia will act as observers.
     "In Moscow it is noted with regret that despite assertions of the importance of Russia's stabilising influence in the Balkans, attempts are being made to limit our participation in considerations of the military-political problems of the region," Russia's Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
     "We would like to point out again that we cannot regard such behaviour as anything but a display of insincerity and double standards on the part of the participants of such actions."
     The statement, read to reporters at a briefing by Foreign Ministry spokesman Vladimir Rakhmanin, said such a selective approach to the make-up of multinational forces would not serve the interests of peace in the region.
     "We are convinced this line does not serve the interests of reducing tensions in the region or strengthening the atmosphere of good neighbourliness and cooperation, and contradicts efforts by the international community to maintain a solid peace and the stable development of the Balkans," the Russian ministry said.
     The new force, intended to be a symbol of cooperation in an area torn by conflict, was agreed as a meeting of regional defence ministers in the Macedonian capital Skopje.
     U.S. officials have said the force, called the Multinational Peacekeeping Force for South Eastern Europe, will have between 3,000 and 4,000 troops divided into 11 mechanised companies and three light infantry companies.
     The force could deploy anywhere in the world under the umbrella of NATO, the West European Union, the United Nations or any other multilateral organisation.
     Russia has often been at odds with its Western partners over the Balkans, where it has underlined its traditional ties with fellow Orthodox Christian Slavs in Serbia.

Copyright 1998 Reuters Limited.All rights reserved.

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