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BosNet KOSOVA UPDATE: Kosova in the Press

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vfil...@haverford.edu

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Jul 5, 1998, 3:00:00 AM7/5/98

From: Filipovic Vanja <vfil...@haverford.edu>
Subject: BosNet KOSOVA UPDATE: Kosova in the Press

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B o s N e t - July 05, 1998
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New Battle Breaks Out In Kosovo
Fighting on City Outskirts Raises Fears of Mass Exodus of Civilians

By R. Jeffrey Smith
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, July 5, 1998; Page A13

PRISTINA, Yugoslavia, July 4ÑFresh fighting erupted today between Serb
and ethniAlbanian military forces on the outskirts of Suva Reka, the
center of a region with 60,000
residents south of here.

The fighting raises the prospect of a new, large-scale exodus of
civilians from their homes and a further widening of the ethnic conflict
here in Kosovo, a Serb province with a majority ethnic Albanian population.

The chatter of machine-gun fire and the sound of mortar shells could be
heard this afternoon in a neighborhood north of Suva Reka's center, as
residents rushed to close their shops, and vans and cars carried panicked
civilians away from the fighting. Several residents said the violence
had spread to civilians among the two ethnic groups and that Serb
sharpshooters had occupied a wine factory near the city's center, forcing
many people to remain indoors.

It was unclear which side initiated the latest fighting. Suva Reka is
south of a large military base, where the Yugoslav army has deployed
scores of tanks and other armored vehicles, and east of "free territory"
claimed by guerrillas of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA).

In the last four months, the ethnic Albanian rebel group has battled with
increasing fervor to gain Kosovo's independence from Serbia, the more
dominant of Yugoslavia's republics. Serb forces have tried to quash the
group by destroying scores of villages where its supporters
reside, but their blunt and often brutal tactics have substantially
increased public support for the group.

Control over sections of a highway that passes through Suva Reka between
Pristina and the city of Prizren has changed hands between the two groups
almost daily in the past week, but until now the gun battles had not
spread to the edge of Suva Reka. While Serb police remain in
control of the center, rebels have established checkpoints north of the
town and claimed today to be preparing for additional military action
closer to Pristina, about 25 miles away, according to ethnic Albanian
sources.

The gun battles came a day after Serb forces had gained control of
portions of another highway west of Pristina, near a town called Kijevo.
Today's fighting occurred as U.S. envoy Richard C. Holbrooke conducted
day-long meetings in Pristina with ethnic Albanian political leaders as
part of a shuttle diplomacy aimed at pushing both sides closer to a
cease-fire and subsequent negotiations about Kosovo's future. He met with
the elected leader of the Albanians, Ibrahim Rugova, with former
political prisoner Adem Demaci and with Rexhep Qosja, another former
political prisoner and leader of a new rival political party.

But several sources said Holbrooke was frustrated by the leaders'
inability to develop a common position for the negotiations and by the
isolation of the leaders of the Kosovo Liberation Army, which controls
more than a third of Kosovo's territory and has shown little interest in
a cease-fire. Washington wants the talks focused on gaining
administrative autonomy for Kosovo within Yugoslavia, but many Albanians
say the aim must be outright independence. Some Kosovo Liberation Army
leaders are demanding that Kosovo become part of Albania, which borders
the province to the south.

This afternoon, Holbrooke returned to Belgrade for a dinner meeting with
Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. Holbrooke said he would return
Sunday morning to Pristina for more talks with the ethnic Albanians.

"We are trying to prevent a general war" that could eventually include
ethnic Albanians and others in neighboring nations such as Macedonia,
Albania and Greece, Holbrooke said.

But in Suva Reka -- with tanks moving through the streets, shelling
underway nearby and scores of suburban homes burned -- residents said the
prospects for a peaceful settlement seem remote.

"It is very bad here. A lot of people have left town, about 60 percent.
You hear the shelling at night. Military forces and civilians are moving
through the villages," said an ethnic Albanian who called himself
Ballana. "I think there will be war" because the two sides do not
understand each other, he added.

A man named Todor, one of the area's estimated 3,000 Serbs, said many
Serb children and women already had been evacuated and that "people are
very scared" because of recent ethnic Albanian kidnappings of Serbs. "The
KLA is everywhere," he said. "You cannot travel to surrounding villages."
He added that a political solution is unlikely because "the Albanians
don't want that."

"You should know it's very hard to be an optimist here," said Zoran,
another Serb. "Almost everyone has abandoned the town."

According to witnesses and sources here in the capital, Serb troops
attacked ethnic Albanians in the Suva Reka suburb of Recan last night and
later celebrated with singing in the city center. The sources also
reported that fighting had occurred in outlying villages such as Budakovo and
Krushice, and that at least one rebel soldier was killed.

One elderly man, an ethnic Albanian, hurriedly moved items to the floor
of his small kiosk on the north side of Suva Reka, hoping none would be
destroyed in the fighting. "I want to close it forever," he said of the
kiosk. Pointing to an armored personnel carrier at a bend of the road, he
warned an American visitor, "Don't go there. They will kill you."

As he spoke, several Serb soldiers alongside the vehicle fired long
bursts from their Kalashnikov rifles at distant targets. "I don't want
them to see me talking to you. They will do you no harm, but they will
kill me," he said.

Los Angeles Times

Sunday, July 5, 1998

Efforts Intensify to Head Off Kosovo Crisis
Balkans: Holbrooke shuttles between opposing sides. Russian joins effort.
By DAVID HOLLEY, Times Staff Writer

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia--Efforts to head off worsening conflict in
Yugoslavia's breakaway Kosovo region intensified Saturday,
with U.S. envoy Richard C. Holbrooke shuttling between opposing
sides while another American official warned of possible NATO
action.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Nikolai Afanasievsky also
arrived here Saturday to join the diplomatic effort to find a
peaceful solution in the strife-torn region, where more than 300
people have died since late February in the conflict between the
90% majority Albanian population and the Serbian-controlled
security forces.
After returning from half a day of talks in Kosovo, Holbrooke
said Saturday evening that Afanasievsky will join him in a second
round of discussions today with ethnic Albanian leaders in
Pristina, the region's capital.
Holbrooke and Afanasievsky met earlier Saturday with Yugoslav
President Slobodan Milosevic. Holbrooke also met with Milosevic on Friday.
Fears are widespread internationally that failure to
peacefully resolve the Kosovo crisis could drag neighboring
countries into a broader Balkans war or trigger NATO intervention
with unpredictable consequences.
In London, Robert Gelbard, a special U.S. envoy on Kosovo,
warned Belgrade on Saturday that NATO is drawing up contingency plans on
"an accelerated basis."
"We are keeping all options open," Gelbard said. "We are not
being cute when we say that. We are very serious about it. . . .
The planning process in NATO is not a fiction. It's being pursued
very aggressively. Contingency planning is real and it's quite
advanced."
Gelbard also expressed optimism that diplomacy is making
progress.
"We know that this is going to be hard, but we're confident
it's going to work," he said.
British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook also warned Saturday
that Milosevic "must know that if there was any return to that
kind of heavy military offensive against civilian people [such as
occurred in early June] we would certainly return to the
possibility of military intervention."
Milosevic claims that his crackdown has been aimed at ethnic
Albanian terrorists who have attacked Serbian police.
Yugoslavia's Tanjug News Agency on Saturday quoted Yugoslav Deputy
Prime Minister Zoran Lilic saying that Belgrade wishes to avoid war in
Kosovo.
"Loudly and clearly we want to convey to the entire world
that we will not and do not wish to wage a war," Lilic said.
With international diplomatic efforts now focused on setting
up a cease-fire in the embattled region, Holbrooke spent six hours
Saturday in a series of talks in Pristina with leaders of various
ethnic Albanian factions.
Those meetings were held at the United States Information
Service office in Pristina and at the offices of the Democratic
League of Kosovo, which is headed by the region's top moderate
politician, Ibrahim Rugova.
The talks in Pristina appeared aimed in part at establishing
a broad umbrella grouping that could assert authority over the
Kosovo Liberation Army. That loosely organized guerrilla force has been
rapidly gaining support in Kosovo at the expense of Rugova, who seeks
independence for Kosovo but opposes the use of violence to achieve it.
Asked whether representatives of the Kosovo Liberation Army
should be included in talks between ethnic Albanians and the
Serbian leadership in Belgrade, Holbrooke said Saturday that
Washington wants "everybody who has a legitimate role in the
destiny of Kosovo" to have a place in the negotiations.
Speaking to reporters with Rugova at his side, Holbrooke
stressed that "the U.S. believes that the solution of the Kosovo
problem must be peaceful."
"We do not support or encourage in any way action by security
or military forces or violent means to solve these problems,"
Holbrooke said.
Holbrooke also met Saturday with Rugova's more radical rival,
Adem Demaci, president of the Parliamentary Party of Kosovo.
Holbrooke "plainly demanded the Albanians to unite their
position and act united and agree on a joint stand," said Kaqusha
Jashari, who heads a faction of the Kosovo Albanian Social
Democratic party.

Copyright Los Angeles Times
=====================================================================
Philadelphia Inquirer
07.05.98.

Attacks by Serbs root out Kosovo rebels

Guerrillas scurry from village to village. A full-scale battle could
bring a tide of refugees.

By Jeffrey Fleishman
INQUIRER STAFF WRITER

SUVA REKA, Yugoslavia -- The old man with the creased, brown face was
shaking.

He rushed to close his kiosk. There was a burst, then another. Automatic
gunfire filled the bend in the road. Three dogs scampered through the
dust. The old man looked up and pointed.

"The tanks went that way," he said. "Don't go or they'll kill you."

Two Serbian military policemen with Kalashnikov rifles stepped into
sight. A second of silence. Another burst. The old man ran across the road.

The old man, who was too rushed and too scared to give his name, began
moving cigarettes, lighters and candy bars from
the windows of his kiosk. Another burst of gunfire. Then another.

"I'm closing," he said. "I want to close it forever."

Sporadic battles between Serbian forces and the Kosovo Liberation Army
whirled across these rain-swept hills yesterday.
Artillery ripped cleanly through houses. Confused cows and donkeys
wandered through dying wheat fields. Smoke spiraled
above empty villages, and little moved on roads dotted with mortar
casings, splintered wood and tank tracks.

Ethnic Albanian KLA guerrillas in recent weeks have dug into this region
of Kosovo, near the Albanian border. Serbian offensives to rout them have
skipped from village to village, as hundreds of families flee on tractors
and horse carts. The separatists have become like pesky horseflies being
shooed from one village only to hunker down in another as the superior
Serbian military rings the hilltops.

The Serbs' most decisive assault in recent days came on Friday, when
their forces pushed back ethnic Albanian separatists
surrounding the town of Kijevo, freeing scores of Serbian villagers and
policemen.

Serbian offensives yesterday were targeted at the villages of Krusica and
Recane. By late afternoon, fighting appeared to
have spread across the larger Suva Reka region, southwest of the
provincial capital, Pristina.

If the region, with a population of 60,000, explodes into battle, it
could create thousands of new refugees. International officials estimate
that since March more than 300 people, mostly ethnic Albanians, have been
killed and at least 50,000 have been chased from their homes.

U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke made little progress yesterday in meetings
with ethnic Albanian leaders in Pristina. Holbrooke has been frustrated
by a split between ethnic Albanian politicians and members of the KLA.

No single voice has emerged to bridge the gap between the two sides,
making it difficult to negotiate peace with Yugoslav
President Slobodan Milosevic.

Another U.S. envoy to the region, Robert Gelbard, recently held talks in
Switzerland with two exiled ethnic Albanians
claiming to represent the political wing of the KLA.

But it remains unclear whether the men speak for the guerrillas, who have
limited arms and no overall strategy of how to
defeat more than 50,000 Serbian troops and police.

Popular support that has swelled behind the rebels in recent months has
marginalized Kosovo's ethnic Albanian political
leader, Ibrahim Rugova. For eight years, Rugova has unsuccessfully
recommended peaceful civil disobedience for the 1.8 million ethnic
Albanians who make up 90 percent of the province's population.

"We do not support or encourage in any way action by security or military
forces or violent means to solve these problems,"
Holbrooke said yesterday before flying to Belgrade for more meetings with
Milosevic. "They're long-standing and they're
deep, but they will only get deeper if force is their solution."

The road from Pristina to Suva Reka was full of signs of past and present
battle. The dome at the mosque in Crnoljevo was
splintered, and roofs of homes had been torn away by mortars. Shell
casings were scattered farther up the road, and at a
curve four scared guerrillas crouched behind pines. As the road crested a
hill, Serbian forces peered from camouflage
netting, and a tank barrel poked from the brush.

"I think there will be a war," said a man in Suva Reka who gave his name
only as Ballana. "I don't think that [ the two sides] will understand one
another."

Ballana, an Albanian who wore a Chicago Bears windbreaker, is a physical
education major at Pristina University. Fighting
has kept him from traveling to his exams. Now, he said, Serbian snipers
are camped in the town's wine factory, and the
shelling is coming to close to his home.

"It's very bad here," said Ballana, standing in the shadow of a mosque.
"A lot of people have left town. About 60 percent.
You hear shelling. . . . The fighting will come here. What can I do? I
will fight back. But at this moment I have no weapons."

______________________________________________________________________
Opinions expressed/published on BosNews/BosNet-B DO NOT necessarily
reflect the views of (all of the members of) Editorial Board, and/or
moderators, nor any of their host institutions.
______________________________________________________________________

vfil...@haverford.edu

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Jul 6, 1998, 3:00:00 AM7/6/98

From: Filipovic Vanja <vfil...@haverford.edu>
Subject: BosNet KOSOVA UPDATE: Kosova in the Media

----------------------------------------------------------------------
B o s N e t - July 06, 1998
______________________________________________________________________

KOSOVA NEWS nr. 20, 5 July 1998
---------------------------------------------

HOLBROOKE MEETS KOSOVA ALBANIAN LEADERS
PRISHTINA, July 4,5 (ARTA) - The U.S. ambassador-designate to the UN,
Richard Holbrooke, met today in Prishtina with President Rugova of Kosova,
Adem Demaci, chairman of Parliamentary Party /PPK/, Rexhep Qosja and Hydajet
Hyseni, leaders of the Democratic Movement of Albanians /DMA/, and a number
of other leaders of the Albanian political parties.
Ambassador Holbrooke and President Rugova made brief remarks to reporters in
Prishtina at the end of his trip today.
"We had a very intense day of discussions here in Prishtina", Holbrooke
said, adding that he and his colleagues would be going to get back to
Belgrade and see 'FRY' President Milosevic. "We are going to come back
tomorrow morning and continue our discussions.", the U.S. envoy said.
He went on to say: "We have met with most, if not all, of the political
parties and movements here in Kosovo. We had a wide range of views, on some
issues everyone is in agreement, on others there are internal political
factors that are not. The United States is concerned. We are here to help
the Albanian people of Kosovo, and all the people of Kosovo, in their search
for human dignity, peace and security. Just to repeat, the United States

believes that the solution of the Kosovo problem must be peaceful. We do not

support or encourage in any way action by security or military forces's
violent means in solving problems. The wall we are standing is deep, but it
will only get deeper, if force is the solution." Meanwhile, President Rugova
had a very succinct statement to make. "Thank you very much for your coming,
and for your efforts and involvement here. I asked for more U.S. involvement
in the solution of the Kosova question."
PRISHTINA, July 5 (KIC) -President Rugova received today (Sunday) in
Prishtina U.S. President's envoy for the Balkans and Ambassador-designate to
the UN Richard Holbrooke, and Deputy Foreign Minister of Russia, Nikolai
Afanasyevsky.
Ways to de-escalate it and create a climate conducive to a substantial
dialogue between Prishtina and Belgrade were discussed in the meeting.
The senior U.S. and Russian Diplomats briefed President Rugova on the Kosova
Observer Mission, which will start work tomorrow, and will be chaired by
U.S., Russian and British diplomats accredited to Belgrade.

SENIOR SWEDISH, ITALIAN AND GERMAN DIPLOMATS IN PRISHTINA
PRISHTINA, July 4 (KIC) - President Rugova, Adem Demaci, chairman of the
PPK, Rexhep Qosja and Hydajet Hyseni, leaders of the DMA, had today separate
meetings in Prishtina with Ulf Hjertonsson, Director General for Political
Affairs in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Sweden; Ambassador Guiseppe
Baldocci, Political Director in the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
accompanied by Riccardo Sessa, Italy's ambassador to Belgrade; and German
Ambassador to Belgrade, Wilfried Gruber.
The current developments in Kosova, ways to bring about an end to Serbian
violence and create a climate conducive to a negotiated settlement to the
Kosova issue, were discussed in the meetings.

WAR-CRIME SUSPECT, SESELJ IN GJAKOVA. HEAVY ARTILLERY USED FROM CABRATI
Gjakovë, 5 July (ARTA): Fighting along the border between Kosova and Albania
has not ceased. Detonations caused by the heavy artillery that Serb forces
used could be heard even in the town of Gjakovë, frightening the local
population of a possible unexpected attack against them.
Serb forces, which are stationed at Kodra e Çabratit, Qafa e Osekut, Pllanik
and Baba i Bokës, attacked the villages of the municipality continuously.
Sources claim that armed Albanian forces suffered only material damage,
despite the intensity of the attacks that they were subjected to.
Large military forces, which are stationed in the village of Devë and Suka e
Biteshit, shelled the nearby villages in the municipality of Deçan.
There were frequent police\military movements in Gjakovë after the arrival
of Serb radical leader, Seselj.
On the other hand, food provision in Gjakovë, still represents a major
problem of the people. No contingent of food items has been able to reach
Gjakovë so far.

VOLATILE SITUATION AROUND KIJEVA
PRISHTINA, July 4 (KIC) - The situation in Kijeva and adjacent villages of
Bubavec, Mlecan and Stopanica which were targeted by a huge Serb offensive
yesterday morning, has been sharply escalating. Heavy Serb forces backed up
by tanks, artillery and helicopters launched yesterday at down a huge
offensive against Albanian positions around Kijeva.
The Serb offensive lasted until 13:30, sources said, adding that the
villages were pounded for hours by Serb tanks.
The villages of Bubavec, Llazice and Mlecan were mostly bombarded yesterday.
Serb mortars hit these villages in every 30 seconds, sources said.
It has been reported that Malisheva and adjacent villages were not targeted
during yesterday's Serb offensive, excepting Stapanice village where a house
was burned as a result of shelling.
Some 16 Yugoslav military vehicles, including tanks and trucks, drove across
the checkpoint in Kijeva at around 9 a.m. The army vehicles were seen
leaving Kijeva and heading for Klina a couple of hours later. It is believed
that part of local Serbs were evacuated from Kijeva.
The situation in and around Kijeva and other village in the region remains
very tense. Despite the strong offensive by the Serb forces on Friday
morning, members of the local Albanian resistance units were not pushed
further of Bubavec village, 3-4 miles away from the Kijeva.

SERB FORCES ATTACK SUHAREKA AND VUSHTRI VILLAGES
PRISHTINA, July 4 (KIC) - At 18:30 hrs yesterday, Serbian police forces and
local Serb bands from Muhlan and Recan, backed up 3 armored vehicles, 2
tanks and 4 APCs, attacked the villages of Krushice e Ulet and Krushice e
Eperme.
In the two-hour attack, Kadri Kokollari (30) was killed. Three farmhouses
were reported burned completely, whereas 24 badly damaged.
The 'Yugoslav' miliary helped Serb police and civilians by firing heavy
artillery from its position at Birace of Suhareka.
Meantime, at 18:10 hrs, Serbian military forces positioned in the village
of Brusnik in the municipality of Vushtrri ('Vucitern') shelled the villages
of Brusnik, Kolle and Shallc lying in the foot of the ciqavice mountains,
whereas two shells were thrown on the other side.
It is believed that the targets of Serb military shells were the water wells
from which the population gets its drinking water. Also at 18:45 hrs, Serb
military forces positioned at Frasher ('Svinjare') pounded with heavy
artillery the village of Pantine.
The sound of heavy detonations could be heard in the town of Vushtrri.

INDICTED FOR BEEING IN THE SCENE OF CRIME
Mitrovicë, July (ARTA): The first session of the trial against six Albanians
accused of terrorism began yesterday, in the Municipal Court of Mitrovicë,
administrated by Serbia. According to the Criminal Code of Serbia, dr.
Nuredin Fazliu, Ilir Xhemajli, Abaz Deliu, Rrahman Beka, Haxhibajram Beka
and Imer Hoti, have been indicted as accessories to murder and withholding
information on the planned crime. The accused, were arrested on 6 May.
These persons, according to the accusation, have been implicated in the
killing of a Serb policeman, when a young Albanian from Mitrovicë, Artim
Jashari, was also killed.
The accused, which are held in detention since 6 May, have been interrogated
and according to defending attorneys, Ismet Kabashi and Shyqyri Syla, there
are no material grounds for the indictment. The attorneys claim that the
accused were in no way implicated in the killing of the Serb policeman nor
have they assisted the crime. The accused were found near the scene of the
crime accidentally, except for Rrahman and Haxhibajram Beka, who were
arrested in their homes after Artim Jashari, who was wounded, jumped over
the fence and into their garden, where he later died. The accused, Rrahman,
and his son, Haxhibajram, were not aware that Artim Jashari had sought
shelter in their garden, when the police brutally broke in the home and
arrested them. They had been sleeping in their house and therefore had no
possibility to be implicated in the clashes.

BUJA: "I AM A KLA SOLDIER NOW..."
Prishtina, 4 July (ARTA): Member of the Albanian Democratic Movement (LDSH),
Ramë Buja, made a public statement from the front-line.
"I am a KLA soldier now and as such, I do not have the need nor do I find
it reasonable to be appointed anything, but what I am now, which is more
needed and more valuable - to be a soldier of the people, fighting face to
face with the occupier, in KLA units".
KLA member, Ramë Buja, who was a former LDK leadership member, and just
recently appointed member of the LDSH leadership, offered his resignation to
the LDSH, through the exclusive public statement he made by telephone from
the front-line.
He commented the KLA, saying that "this army, which belongs to the people
fighting for freedom, is the only legitimate representative -- a legitimacy
which has been created, not through rumors and press conferences, but
through sacrifices and blood that was spilled on the altar of freedom every
day".

KOSOVAR REFUGEES ARRIVE IN BUJANOVC, SOUTHERN SERBIA
PRISHTINA, July 4(KIC) - The most recent escalation of Serbian violence in
Kosova has produced new Albanian refugees, some of whom have arrived in the
municipality of Bujanovc, in southern Serbia. The arrivals are mostly from
the village of Sllatina e Madhe and the small town of Fushe-Kosova ('Kosovo
Polje'), the Presheva-based Party for Democratic Action (PVD) said.
The Kosova Albanians have mostly found shelter with relatives there.
The Bujanovc chapter of the Albanian party, the PVD, called on the local
Albanian population to show solidarity with the Kosovars.

MORE MONTENEGRIN DESERT FROM MILITARY BASES IN KOSOVA

PRISHTINA, July 4 (KIC) - At least 105 conscripts from Montenegro have
deserted from the Yugoslav Army bases in Kosova since the breakout of
conflicts in late February this year, the Belgrade media reported.
Rifat Rastodor, vice-speaker of the Montenegrin Parliament, was quoted as
saying that out of the 105 soldiers who abandoned military ranks in Kosova,
50 were of Montenegrin and Slavic Muslim background, while the rest were
ethnic Albanians from the republic. Mr. Rastodor told the press in Podgorica
on Friday that there is an ever increasing number draft-age men in
Montenegro refusing to join the Yugoslav Army. At least 104 refused
conscription in June alone, he said.

KOSOVA CATHOLIC DIOCESE RAISES DEM 30.000 AS HUMANITARIAN HELP
PRISHTINA, July 4 (KIC) - The Prizren-based Kosova Catholic Diocese has in
the past few days raised DEM 30.000 to help the Albanian population in the
war-torn regions in Kosova.
"During the services, as well as other meetings, we appeal on Catholics to
show solidarity with all those in danger, regardless of their religious
background", Monsignor Mark Sopi, Bishop of Kosova, was quoted as saying.

================================================

Shuttle Diplomacy Drags in Kosovo
Rebels, Yugoslav Government Refuse Talks

By R. Jeffrey Smith
Washington Post Foreign Service

Monday, July 6, 1998; Page A11

PRISTINA, Yugoslavia, July 5ÑU.S. envoy Richard C. Holbrooke slumped into
his seat on a military plane at an airport here and described his
frustration at being unable to get ethnic Albanian leaders to begin a
meaningful dialogue with the Yugoslav government about Kosovo.

Taking care to apportion blame to the Serbians, who dominate Yugoslavia,
as well as the ethnic Albanians who make up 90 percent of Kosovo's
population, Holbrooke said Yugoslavia's
refusal for a decade to allow self-governance in Kosovo had robbed its
people of political experience. The result, he said, is that "as they
confront twin crises of possible war and an opportunity to negotiate,
they can't seem to get their act together." Kosovo is a province of
Serbia, the dominant republic of Yugoslavia.

After concluding 2 1/2 days of shuttle diplomacy between ethnic Albanians
here in Kosovo's capital and Serbian officials in the Yugoslav capital,
Belgrade, Holbrooke said he has learned
how hard it will be to settle the crisis soon through dialogue. "We are
clearly in the early stages of a long, difficult negotiation [that is]
more complicated than [achieving a peace accord in] Bosnia" -- a task
that required months of preparation and three weeks of hard bargaining
under Holbrooke's prodding. Holbrooke is now the Clinton administration's
nominee to become ambassador to the United Nations.

Holbrooke acknowledged that the administration has not found a formula
for achieving a settlement once negotiations begin in earnest. "I've
always said that negotiating is like jazz: It's an improvisation on a
theme," he said. One pressing question is what form of political autonomy
Kosovo should have. Another is whether military leaders of the ethnic
Albanian insurgency, known as the Kosovo Liberation Army, will accept an
agreement calling for less than outright independence for Kosovo -- a
goal no foreign government supports.

Later today, Holbrooke's plane took him back to Belgrade, where he had
his third dinner in as many days with Yugoslav President Slobodan
Milosevic. The two men enjoy good working relations, even though Serbian
military assaults in Kosovo have earned worldwide condemnation and led
President Clinton's chief Balkan specialist, Robert S. Gelbard, to
criticize Milosevic for not seeing him.

Holbrooke was guarded about his discussions with Milosevic, but said two
of his aims are to win an "adjustment" in Serbian military activities and
Belgrade's approval of eventual "adjustments" in Kosovo's political
status. Specifically, Holbrooke said, Serbian roadblocks should be
eliminated and special security forces should be withdrawn from the
province. He also complained about kidnappings of civilians by Serbian
and rebel forces.

Holbrooke and Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Nikolai Afanassyevsky, who
traveled to Pristina with Holbrooke today, said Serbian forces have not
been committing the abuses they
did earlier. "It's obvious, everyone recognizes it. Now, to fix the
problem, it is important that the Albanian side show the same restraint,"
Afanassyevsky said.

Since March in Kosovo, fighting among Serbian forces, the Kosovo
Liberation Army and armed civilians of both ethnic groups has killed more
than 300 people and left at least 80,000
homeless, according to humanitarian groups. But Washington's approach to
the issue -- which initially was only to pressure Belgrade -- has shifted
since the rebels started fighting more
aggressively.

Holbrooke said Washington is eager to get a dialogue started partly to
stop the fighting from expanding outside Kosovo's borders. The United
States also is concerned that the rebels'
success and popularity are robbing the moderate ethnic Albanian political
leadership of its legitimacy.

The point is to keep the insurgents -- a group of disparate military
units that includes recruits who support creation of a single Albanian
nation incorporating Kosovo -- from becoming the
sole voice of the province's citizens. The problem Holbrooke encountered,
however, is that the fractured ethnic Albanian leadership is unable to
assume that role.

Ibrahim Rugova is recognized by Washington and its allies as the ethnic
Albanians' chief leader because he was elected "president" of Kosovo
several months ago and has moderate views. But many others here blame
Rugova's policy of passive resistance for encouraging the formation of
the Kosovo Liberation Army and fomenting the current crisis.

Holbrooke's chief critic during discussions here was Adem Demaci, a
political dissident who was imprisoned for 27 years and has ties to the
rebels. He has called Rugova a traitor for failing to press harder for
independence, refused to recognize Rugova's presidency and declined to
participate with him in negotiations with Serbians if Rugova is in
control. "These guys have all learned the Lenin-Trotsky dictum [that]
you've got to get control of the revolution before going after the czar,"
said one Western official. "They stand for revenge, not reconciliation."

Another prominent Albanian intellectual and former political dissident is
Rexhep Qosja, who formed a political party a week ago with the idea of
supplanting Rugova's party. But he favors
a single nation for all Albanians and dislikes Rugova.

As he left Pristina for New York, Holbrooke said he was convinced that
"there is no viable negotiating team" on the ethnic Albanian side and
that he is unsure how quickly one will be put
together. Chris Hill, the U.S. ambassador to neighboring Macedonia, will
hold meetings in Pristina later this week to continue pressing for progress.

================================================

Los Angeles Times
Monday, July 6, 1998

Diplomatic Observers to Patrol in Kosovo

Balkans: Effort to bring calm to besieged province begins today with tour
of trouble spots. Envoy says U.S., Russia are working together and that a
change of region's status within Yugoslavia is essential.

By DAVID HOLLEY, Times Staff Writer

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia--International efforts to broker peace in
Yugoslavia's strife-torn Kosovo region will enter a new stage
today with the launch of diplomatic observer patrols, U.S. and
Russian diplomats said Sunday.
U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke and Russian Deputy Foreign
Minister Nikolai Afanasievsky, speaking to reporters after a joint
meeting with moderate ethnic Albanian leader Ibrahim Rugova in
Kosovo's capital, Pristina, stressed that Washington and Moscow
are working together to defuse the crisis.
"Our goals are the same: a negotiated peaceful settlement to
the Kosovo problem," Holbrooke said.
Today's initial "symbolic" patrol will include the American
charge d'affaires in Belgrade, Richard Miles, and the Russian and
British ambassadors, Holbrooke said.
"We look forward to that launch tomorrow, and we spent a lot
of time this evening going over the details of that," Holbrooke
said late Sunday after returning to Belgrade, the capital of both
Serbia and Yugoslavia, for more than three hours of talks with
Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic during which the patrols
were a key topic.
Holbrooke stressed that in the talks with Rugova and at an
earlier news conference in Pristina, he and Afanasievsky "spoke
with one voice on the core concepts: that Kosovo is a part of
Yugoslavia, that peaceful settlement is essential and that Dr.
Rugova is the main Kosovo leader with whom we all deal."
"It's not my job here to outline a specific solution,"
Holbrooke added. "But some change in the current status of Kosovo within
the international boundaries of Yugoslavia is essential in our view."
The patrols, which are expected to visit scattered trouble
spots, are a key feature of an agreement reached by Milosevic and
Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin in Moscow on June 16.
The joint Yugoslav-Russian declaration was first seen as
potentially undercutting U.S.-led efforts to press Milosevic to
withdraw his security forces from the troubled region.
But since mid-June, U.S. attention has shifted toward the
more immediate goal of a cease-fire between the Serbian-dominated
Yugoslav forces and the ragtag but rapidly growing Kosovo Liberation
Army, or KLA, which demands independence for the region. One key purpose
of the diplomatic observer patrols will be to deter attacks on civilians
by either side.
"Those patrols will become routine, integrated multinational
efforts for a long time," Holbrooke said.
Launch of the observer patrols "is a concrete result and
important part of the Yeltsin-Milosevic talks," Afanasievsky
added. "I think that this will be important for peace, stability
and security in the region."
* * *
More than 300 people have died since late February in clashes
between Serbian forces and the 90% majority ethnic Albanian
population of Kosovo, which is a province of Serbia, the larger of
the two republics that remain in the Yugoslav federation since it
splintered in the early 1990s. Sentiment among ethnic Albanians
leans strongly toward independence, but Milosevic has vowed to
allow no further breakup of Yugoslavia.
Concerns are widespread that all-out war in Kosovo--an area
about the size of Los Angeles County--could spread to neighboring Albania
and Macedonia, which has a large ethnic Albanian minority with similar
secessionist sentiments. In worst-case scenarios, even Greece and Turkey
could be drawn into a spiraling Balkan conflict.
The broad outlines of an international strategy for peace in
Kosovo have become clearer in recent days. Holbrooke's focus is to push
ethnic Albanian leaders toward uniting sufficiently to exert
authority over KLA fighters and engage in negotiations with the
leadership in Belgrade.
A key problem, however, is that it might not be possible for
anyone to control all the independence fighters now in the field.
"It's clear that some of the people [with guns] are local and
some are organized in various ways," Holbrooke explained. "But we don't
know what the organizations are, and no one has yet stepped forward who
says, 'We have control over these groups.' "
The "so-called KLA . . . may or may not be a single
organization," he added. "I think somebody used the phrase 'many
KLAs.' "
As part of the effort to strengthen the authority of civilian
Albanian leadership, Holbrooke met over the weekend with
representatives of all 16 ethnic Albanian political parties,
urging them to form a more unified stance in preparation for
possible peace talks.
The so-called Contact Group of countries dealing most
directly with the crisis--the United States, Russia, Britain,
France, Germany and Italy--is pressing both the ethnic Albanian
side and the Yugoslav government to accept some kind of settlement that
would give genuine autonomy to Kosovo but not outright independence.
One possible solution that would fit U.S. goals would be for
Kosovo to be separated from the Serbian republic and become one of three
republics in Yugoslavia along with Serbia and Montenegro. Ethnic Albanian
leaders--not to mention the KLA--reject such a solution, but some
observers believe that they might be persuaded to accept it as part of a
peace settlement.
In Berlin on Saturday, German Foreign Minister Klaus Kinkel
said the Contact Group should draw up an autonomy proposal for
Kosovo and present it to the embattled sides.
"We should draw up an outline within the Contact Group for
autonomy because it is apparent that neither side is in a position
to do this," Kinkel said. "We then have to consider in the Contact
Group how we can guarantee autonomy."
The Contact Group is scheduled to meet Wednesday in Bonn.
* * *
Meanwhile, the threat of force by the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization or of other intervention hangs over those unwilling
to accept a peace deal. That threat has been mainly directed
against Belgrade. But Robert Gelbard, a special U.S. envoy on
Kosovo, said Saturday in London that action could also be taken
against the guerrillas if they refuse to talk peace.
"If certain conditions were not met, we would oppose them and
could oppose them all through their whole chain of supply," said
Gelbard, who recently talked with KLA representatives.
Holbrooke said he will return to Washington today and that
his talks here "neither succeeded nor failed."
The effort to achieve a peaceful settlement in Kosovo "will
continue intensively," he added. "We are not going to give up."
* * *
Times special correspondent Dejan Pavlovic in Pristina
contributed to this report.

vfil...@haverford.edu

unread,

Jul 7, 1998, 3:00:00 AM7/7/98

From: Filipovic Vanja <vfil...@haverford.edu>
Subject: BosNet KOSOVA UPDATE: Kosova in the Media

----------------------------------------------------------------------
B o s N e t - July 07, 1998
______________________________________________________________________

KOSOVA NEWS nr. 21, 6 July 1998

SESELJ: HOLBROOKE IS NOT WANTED
Prishtina, 6 July (ARTA) - "Richard Holbrooke's mission is not welcome",
stated the Radical vice-president of the Serbian Government, Vojislav
Seselj, who was in Prishtina today, after visiting Pejë and Deçan.
He also stressed that he is completely indifferent towards international
monitors, which are scheduled to begin work in Kosova on Monday.
"I am not interested in them at all. As for American diplomats, and others,
the Serbian people is aware that they cannot expect anything good from
them", Seselj claimed.
"When Holbrooke met with Albanian terrorists, he de-stabilized Rugova's
position, who now talks only about the independence of Kosova, even though
he used to be ready for a more rational solution before", Seselj commented
the US Ambassador's meeting with KLA soldiers in Junik.
"Holbrooke is unwanted", said Seselj, "for me personally and for the Radical
Party".
Seselj stated that Western countries would not send their soldiers to
Kosova. "They might send their troops if we guarantee not to attack them,
but we say that we will shoot at every foreign soldier that comes to
Yugoslavia", Seselj threatened.

BUBAVEC, MLECAN, CERROVK AND RIGJEVE SHELLED
Malishevë, 5 July (ARTA) - Albanian sources say that Serb snipers, stationed
near Kijevë, shot in the direction of the village of Bubavec at around
1800CET, yesterday. These sources notify that five grenades were launched in
this direction at around 2300CET. On the other hand, they say that the
village of Mleçan and neighbourhood Burim (in Kijevë), were subjected to
constant shelling for one hour, during which Serb forces also used
automatics, APCs and heavy artillery.
The villages of Cerrovik and Rigjevë were also shelled.
Albanian sources from Bubavec, claimed that Serb snipers shot in their
direction since 1000CET, adding that police reinforcements were seen going
through Bubavec, to the police checkpoint in Kijevë.

SERBIAN FORCES ATTACK LOXHA, NEAR PEJA
PRISHTINA, July 6 (KIC) - Many houses in the village of Loxhe, four km away
from Peja ('Pec'), have been smouldering in the wake of a Serbian attack
which started in the morning today (Monday).
Around 6:45 a.m. today, Serbian military and police forces headed towards
the village of Loxhe. They started shelling farmhouses from some distance.
Various arms were reported used.
Local Albanians have been resisting the Serbian attack.
At least five Albanian houses in the outskirts of Loxhe have been burned
down, reports said.
Joining the Serbian army and paramilitary police forces have been local
Serbs from the neighboring village of Gorazdec, sources said. It all started
yesterday, when Serbs entered the village with two Niva-made cars and
arrested an Albanian surnamed Shala. Local inhabitants resisted the Serb
move. In an exchange of fire, Tahir S. Shala (34) was badly wounded. He died
later. A police officer was wounded yesterday too, eye-witnesses said.
Women, children and the elderly have been evacuated from the villages of
Loxhe and Raushiq.
A source told the KIC at 14:35 hrs, the armed confrontation between
attacking Serbian forces and local Albanians was still going on. The extent
of damage and the possible casualty-toll is impossible to determine as the
area has been sealed off.

BODIES OF THREE KILLED ALBANIANS FOUND AT PIRANE
PRISHTINA, July 6 (KIC) - Bodies of three killed Albanians were found today
morning at the village of Pirane, municipality of Prizren, in southern
Kosova.
The body of Muhamet Elshani (56), his son Afrim, in his mid- twenties, and
Sali Gashi, around 20 years of age, all residents of Pirane, were found
today in a cornfield they had gone last evening to irrigate.
Muhamet had a bullet past his ear and a round of bullets on the chest. The
bodies of Afrim and Sali were mutilated, the sources said. Muhamet Elshani
was owner of an electric wheat mill in the village, and Salih was an
employee there.

SERBS KIDNAP TWO ALBANIANS, ILL-TREAT TWO OTHERS IN SUHAREKA
PRISHTINA, July 6 (KIC) - Around 14:00 hrs yesterday (Sunday), Serb
civilians kidnapped Halim Bytyçi (39), a teacher with the "Bajram Curri"
elementary school in Nishor. On Saturday, Serb police abducted Ekrem
Veselaj, resident of the village of Reçan, Veselaj's family said.
Likewise on Saturday, Serb police detained Eshref Mazreku (30) and Idriz
Kryeziun (25), gravely ill-treating them.
They both had to seek medical treatment for injuries. They have been
hospitalized in the Peja hospital.

SERB CIVILIANS BEEING ARMED-TENSION RISES
Gjilan, 5 July (ARTA) - The local Serb authorities have started the
mobilization of people and vehicles belonging to the state structures,
meanwhile an increasing movement of police\military movements has been also
noticed.
The municipalities of Gjilan, Kamenicë, Viti and Novobërdë are not part of
the war seized areas, however the Serbian authorities have started arming
Serb civilians in the towns and villages of the respective municipalities.

BBC - Mr Holbrooke (left) and Mr Afanasyevsky (right) offered support to Mr
Rugova. Foreign observers, drawn from the international diplomatic corps in
Belgrade, are to begin patrols of the Serbian province of Kosovo on Monday
in a bid to reduce tension.
The group, comprised of diplomats from the United States, Russia, Poland and
the European Union, plan to visit several flashpoints in Kosovo.
The US envoy, Richard Holbrooke, announced the patrols as he emerged from a
meeting with ethnic Albanian leaders in Kosovo's capital, Pristina, on
Sunday.
Mr Holbrooke said they had come to Pristina as part of a continuing
initiative designed to find a peaceful settlement for Kosovo, which is 90%
ethnic Albanian.
The first patrol will include the Russian and British ambassadors to
Belgrade, Yuri Kotov and Brian Donelly, and the American charge d'affaires,
Richard Miles.
Mr Holbrooke said: "Those patrols will become routine, integrated
multinational effort for a long time."
Mr Afanasyevsky said the patrols would mark an "important point" in the
efforts to end violence in Kosovo.
Earlier Mr Holbrooke said he hoped the Kosovo Albanians could speak with one
voice and he urged the guerrillas of the KLA to support a cease-fire. "We
are working with the Albanians to strengthen their cohesiveness for the
negotiations. They are having a little bit of trouble getting their
political act together," he said.

THE TIMES - WHILE fighting in Kosovo has so far involved one-street towns
and battles in which body counts can be measured in single figures, beyond
the mountain borders to the south and east the creeping fuse to a regional
war has been set.
Swaths of territory in northern Albania have been appropriated by the Kosovo
Liberation Army (KLA) for base areas and infiltration routes, many set up
under the eyes of Serb special forces deployed for aggressive observation
tasks in the forested peaks.
"The Serbs can see, man for man, each KLA fighter that enters Tropoje," said
a European observer sent in to report on the situation around the northern
Albanian town used as a KLA supply depot. "They watch these fighters come
into the town, go to their headquarters, then leave again for Kosovo with
mule trains of weapons. It's only a matter of time before they hit Tropoje."
The KLA has made no secret of its ambition: the unification of all Albanians
in the Balkans. Jakup Krasniqi, the KLA spokesman, told Der Spiegel: "We
want more than independence." Asked if the KLA was preparing insurgent
activities in Macedonia and Montenegro, he said: "That depends on our
brothers and sisters in those countries. The KLA is already active in
Macedonia."
In Albanian villages inside the Macedonian border, menfolk seemed more angry
than afraid, as much with their own Government as with the Serbs. "Our
Government is collaborating with the Serbs in Kosovo," said one man, his
family of Kosovan origin. "We Albanians are beginning to feel very alone
here, and are starting to think that the future of the Albanian people
everywhere can be guaranteed only in one extended Albanian nation."

=====================================================================

| Orig. From: Ikaj...@afsc.org (Indira Kajosevic)

VANESSA REDGRAVE'S BENEFIT FOR THE PEOPLE OF KOSOVA

ONE EVENING ONLY

Performing with HER MOTHER & HER GUESTS

Poetry, Songs, Monologues & Music

"The greatest actress of our time" said Tennessee Williams.
Vanessa Redgrave has been acclaimed for her work on the stage and
in the movies for over 30 years.

A courageous and passionate human rights activist, she stands up
once more for the right cause against the oppression, violence,
and injustice in Kosova.

Albanian/American Women's Organization "Motrat Qiriazi" in
collaboration with LDK (Democratic League of Kosova), invite you
to enrich this special night with Vanessa Redgrave and her guests
to help us raise funds for food, clothing and medicine to support
the people in Kosova.

The performance takes place on: Monday, July 20th, at 8.00p.m.
at The Cathedral St. John the Divine, 1047 Amsterdam Ave. & 112th
St., New York City. Reserved Seating $50.00

For information please call: (212) 662-2133 or (718) 933-6202

Introduction & Host: Shqipe Malushi

Come & bring a friend and do not miss this rare one life-time
experience of the international artists along with Albanian
performers united for the cause of Kosova.

==========================================================================

>* News Release Issued by the International Secretariat of Amnesty
>International *
>TUESDAY 7 JULY 1998
>
>KOSOVO PROVINCE: WHERE FOOTBALL IS A POLITICAL CRIME
>
>Whilst attention is focused on the World Cup, football is being turned
>into a political crime in Kosovo province, said Amnesty International
>today. The punishment for a footballer or a football fan can be jail, a
>beating, or both.
>
>Over the past several years, Amnesty International has received numerous
>reports about ethnic Albanians sent to prison simply for organizing a
>football match.
>
>On 24 February 1997, Esat Leku, aged 24, was sentenced to 60 days'
>imprisonment by the local Court for Petty Offenses in Glogovac for
>organizing a football game without the prior consent of the local
>authorities.
>
>On 13 March 1997, Bajram Axemi, aged 37, was summoned before the Court for
>Petty Offenses in Gnjilane for organizing a football competition in July
>1996. He was sentenced to a fine of 300 dinars [at that time, about Pounds
> Sterling30] or a 15-day prison term.
>
>On 16 December 1997 in Lipljan, Ali Stublla, the former chairman of the
>"Ulpiana" football club, was arrested and sent to serve a 30-day prison
>term. He had reportedly been convicted in 1995 of failing to report games
>organized by "Ulpiana".
>
>Ill-treatment by police has been all too common when ethnic Albanians have
>been detained by the Serbian police in Kosovo province. Football players
>have not escaped this.
>
>On 11 April 1997, a police squad intervened during a football match in
>Muhadzerov Prelaz between teams representing the ethnic Albanian villages
>of Prelezi and Rakaj. The police broke up the game and confiscated the
>football gear from the players. The players themselves were ordered to
>appear at the police station the following day, and Nazim Rekaj, Sabri
>Mihalica, Heset Mihalica, Milazim Ferati, Fatmir Lalinovci, and Abdyl
>Lalinovci were reportedly ill-treated by the police. Heset Mihalica
>reportedly suffered severe physical injuries because of the ill-treatment.
>
>BACKGROUND
>Since 1990, the majority of ethnic Albanians in Kosovo province refused to
>recognize Serbia's authority in the province and so a number of
>"parallel" institutions were established -- government, an education
>system. The "parallel" structures were extended to an alternative football
> league. To the Serbian authorities, this has been intolerable.
>
>Kosovo province has been a human rights crisis waiting to happen. The
>abuses of basic human rights have led to frustration and anger which have
>culminated in the present armed confrontation.
>Amnesty International believes that any lasting solution to the present
>crisis must ensure guarantees for human rights protection, and that those
>responsible for past and present human rights violations by police and
>security forces will be brought to justice.
>ENDS.../
>
>
>****************************************************************
>You may repost this message onto other sources provided the main
>text is not altered in any way and both the header crediting
>Amnesty International and this footer remain intact. Only the
>list subscription message may be removed.
>****************************************************************

=================================================================

The Christian Science Monitor
Ę

WEDNESDAY, JULY 8, 1998

'Unsolved' Kosovo Plays To Survival of Milosevic

Yugoslav president keeps fading political options open as world powers
meet June 8 for likely cease-fire call.

Justin Brown
Special to The Christian Science Monitor

BELGRADE, YUGOSLAVIA

For Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, Kosovo cuts both ways.

Turmoil in the independence-minded province is necessary for his
political survival. On the other hand, Kosovo could lead to his political
demise.

"His survival hinges upon keeping Kosovo in limbo," says a Western
diplomat in Yugoslavia, which is made up of Serbia and Montenegro.
"That's why I don't think he's in a position to bargain with Kosovo."

Mr. Milosevic has ruled Yugoslavia like a dictator for the past decade,
during which time he has accelerated the breakup of the country, lost
wars in Croatia and Bosnia, and plunged his people into poverty. Although
a "Greater Serbia" has been his driving force, the country has only
shrunk under his helm. Now he may lose Kosovo.

Nevertheless, through his deft control of state media and the
ineffectiveness of opposition politicians, Milosevic last summer won a
four-year term as president of Yugoslavia. Previously the president of
the Republic of Serbia, he successfully towed
his power to the federal post.

Shortly thereafter, he began his campaign in Kosovo, the southern Serbian
province where a 90 percent ethnic Albanian majority is calling for
independence. On Feb. 28 he launched a bloody attack aimed at a
burgeoning separatist guerrilla movement known as

the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA).

By killing women and children and making a martyr of KLA
leader Adem Jashari, Milosevic fueled the rapid growth of
the armed ethnic-Albanian independence movement. As one
Albanian put it, "When the police come to your house to kill
you, you have no choice but to fight."

Today, with the KLA controlling an estimated 40 percent of
Kosovo and more than 300 dead, all-out war seems inevitable.

"I think that Belgrade is primarily responsible here," President Clinton
said last week, referring to the Yugoslav capital from which Milosevic
governs.

While Milosevic sometimes appears to be a blundering
politician, most analysts say he knows exactly what he is
doing. It was in 1987, as a relatively unknown politician,
that he first used Kosovo to serve his political aims. "No
one should dare beat you," he told a crowd of Kosovar
Serbs in his most famous words. Soon thereafter he became
president of Serbia and pushed Yugoslavia into Europe's
bloodiest war since World War II.

In an ironic twist, the war ended with Milosevic negotiating in America
on behalf of the Bosnian Serbs - as a peacemaker.

But will he play that role again? Shortly before a recent meeting with US
envoy Richard Holbrooke, Milosevic informally offered Kosovo the same
kind of autonomy it had before he rose to power in 1989. Autonomy is
supported by the international community,
but not by the ethnic Albanians, who are clinging to dreams of independence.

Western diplomats say Milosevic's offers of autonomy are not genuine
because the ethnic Albanians cannot accept them with "a gun to their head."

Furthermore, it seems unlikely that Milosevic is ready to close the
Kosovo book at this time.

With autonomy, some 2 million Albanians would suddenly join the political
process, and Milosevic would probably lose his slight majority of
parliamentary seats. Milosevic would also become an easy target for
opposition parties, who could cast him as the man
who lost Kosovo. Finally, without a war, Milosevic could not use
nationalism to gain support - and he would have to concentrate on other
issues, such as the economy.

Milosevic stands to gain much more by keeping Kosovo open. If he
continues to do so, he may eventually draw international intervention to
Yugoslavia, and use the Americans
as a scapegoat - like he did in Bosnia. International intervention could
also save the ethnic Albanians by allowing them to accept something other
than independence and by saying, "the Americans made us do it."

Yet Milosevic is walking a fine line. He is already losing political
influence in Belgrade, Montenegro, and the Serbian half of Bosnia. And,
though many Serbs see Kosovo as their Mecca, most are neither emotionally
nor economically prepared to fight for it.

Finally, the more Milosevic stalls, the stronger the KLA becomes. They
are now the ones calling the shots for the ethnic Albanians - and they
have not indicated that they will settle for less than independence.

Should he fall from power, Milosevic's very survival could be in jeopardy.

There is growing speculation that he could become a target for The
Hague's war-crimes tribunal. Or, people in Belgrade are increasingly
saying, he could find himself in a situation like that of former Romanian
dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, who died at the hands of his own people after
he was violently toppled from power.

"Deep down, Milosevic does not care about Kosovo," says Sonja Biserko of
the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Serbia. "His only interest is
to survive."

======================================================================

Los Angeles Times
Tuesday, July 7, 1998

Convoy of Envoys Starts Off Kosovo Monitoring
Balkans: U.S. diplomat, Russian ambassador join tour of devastated
region. Official patrols to begin this week.

By DAVID HOLLEY, Times Staff Writer

PRISTINA, Yugoslavia--A high-profile diplomatic convoy on
Monday toured areas of Kosovo hit by fighting earlier this
year, kicking off an international monitoring program aimed at
helping bring peace to this strife-torn region.
"The real patrolling will start toward the end of the week. .
. . And at that point, it will be on a daily basis, and there will
be many patrols each day," said Richard Miles, the U.S. charge
d'affaires in Belgrade, the capital of both Yugoslavia and Serbia,
the larger of its two republics. Miles, together with Russia's
ambassador to Yugoslavia, headed the convoy in a bulletproof
Chevrolet bedecked with American and Russian flags.
The nine diplomatic cars and more than 20 vehicles carrying
journalists passed through three government roadblocks guarded by
nervous Serbian police officers armed with AK-47 semiautomatic
rifles. The convoy also passed by assorted government weaponry,
including at least two armored personnel carriers and a heavy
machine gun. But in its largely symbolic, 100-mile round-trip
tour, it did not enter territory held by the Kosovo Liberation
Army, the rebel group that is demanding independence for Kosovo.
That loosely organized ethnic Albanian guerrilla force
controls about one-third of the territory of Kosovo, a southern
Serbian province about the size of Los Angeles County that has a
90% ethnic Albanian majority.
At least 40 diplomatic and military experts who nominally
will be attached to embassies in Belgrade are due to be stationed
in Kosovo by mid-July to monitor the conflict between
secessionist-minded ethnic Albanians and the Yugoslav government's
primarily Serbian security forces. These monitors are expected to
include about 12 to 15 Americans, four of whom have already
arrived here.
The more serious patrols with military experts are expected
to enter rebel-held territory. A key purpose of the patrols will
be to deter attacks on civilians by the forces of either side.
The diplomats in Monday's convoy stopped at the village of
Donji Prekaz for a firsthand look at the kind of destruction the
observer mission is hoping to prevent. A March assault on the
village by Serbian police killed about 80 ethnic Albanians,
including children.
That action sent a wave of fresh recruits into the rapidly
growing Kosovo Liberation Army, or KLA, and helped ignite a wave
of nearly daily skirmishes between the group and government
forces. At least 300 people have been killed in the fighting, and
tens of thousands have fled their homes.
Donji Prekaz, 20 miles southwest of Pristina, the provincial
capital, has changed little since the March fighting ended, except
that new grass and weeds cover the hillside graves of some of
those who were slain. The village remains a ghost town of ruined
houses and overgrown fields.
* * *
In addition to Miles and Russian Ambassador Yuri Kotov,
Monday's convoy included ambassadors or other high-level diplomats
from France, Italy, Norway, Poland and other countries. Most
viewed their effort as a success.
Kotov said he was "satisfied with the mission, and I believe
it will be better next time." The patrols will be a "stabilizing
factor" in Kosovo, he added.
French Ambassador Stanislas Filliol said that the role of
diplomatic observers "has been well understood by the two parties,
which is very encouraging. . . . And I think they will gradually
reduce the fighting."
In other parts of Kosovo, however, clashes continued Monday,
according to conflicting reports.
The ethnic Albanian-run Kosovo Information Center, for
example, said that Serbian forces had shelled the village of
Lodja.
The Serbian-run Media Center in Pristina countered that "this
morning at 6:30, a heavily armed group of Albanians fired
automatic weapons against the houses of . . . families in Lodja
village."

* * *
Times special correspondent Dejan Pavlovic in Pristina
contributed to this report.

Radenko

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Jul 8, 1998, 3:00:00 AM7/8/98

Once again I have to remind the author of this article to use the original
and internationally accepted name Kosovo ( and Metohija).

The title of this article reveals just about everything about it...

vfil...@haverford.edu

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Jul 8, 1998, 3:00:00 AM7/8/98

From: Filipovic Vanja <vfil...@haverford.edu>
Subject: BosNet KOSOVA UPDATE: Kosova in the Media

----------------------------------------------------------------------
B o s N e t - July 08, 1998
______________________________________________________________________

The Washington Times, 7 July 1998, p. A15
PEACE THROUGH FORCE IN KOSOVO

By Norman Cigar and Paul Williams

If, as one suspects, Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic
stonewalls Richard Holbrooke's diplomatic efforts just as he
backtracked on his vague commitments made in Moscow, NATO has
said it will not exclude the use of force to deal with the Kosovo
crisis. The question being asked is: Will force work? A more
realistic question might be: Can a meaningful solution be
achieved without the willingness to use appropriate force?

If there is one lesson that ought to have been learned from
Bosnia it is that only a firm policy will stop the bloodshed and
that U.S. leadership within NATO is vital in shaping and
implementing such a policy. After the NATO air strikes which
helped make the Dayton negotiations possible, the West should
understand that NATO's ability to use discrete force can
contribute to --not hinder or replace-- diplomacy. Unless there
is a more pro-active NATO policy, the situation in Kosovo could
deteriorate into a worse repetition of Bosnia: European
indecision, repeated but empty verbal American warnings,
Serbian stonewalling, the slaughter of civilians, and ethnic
cleansing as a prelude to genocide. At best, there will be a
festering insurgency like that in Algeria under the French, and
one whose spillover could easily destabilize the entire region.

But what can NATO do? To be successful, any policy
must have a clear political goal, a military goal which will
contribute to reaching that goal, and a plan on how to implement
military power to achieve the desired military goal.

The immediate political goal should be to prevent the ethnic
cleansing in Kosovo and to forestall the regional upheaval it
could spark by convincing President Milosevic that he cannot
"win" against the insurgency and that he needs to enter into
meaningful political talks leading to a new arrangement.
Specifically, the West must set a deadline for the withdrawal of
the Yugoslav Army and special police from Kosovo, the
implementation of promises of unrestricted access by humanitarian
organizations to all parts of the province, and internationally
supervised negotiations between Belgrade and the Kosovo
Albanians. The West must also make it clear to President
Milosevic and other high-ranking Serbian officials that they will
be held responsible for any war crimes committed by forces under
their command and control.

NATO can support this political goal by its unique ability
to address the key security problem -- Serbia's intention and
ability to carry out military operations and engage in ethnic
cleansing within Kosovo. To have a decisive impact in the
security sphere, however, NATO would not have to deploy ground
forces to Kosovo, but can rely upon its aymmetric superiority in
airpower. Kosovo provides a suitable environment for the use of
airpower in support of peace enforcement and in this case can
achieve a presence so pervasive and dominant that one can term
it nothing short of "air occupation."

A demonstration of force nearby, no matter how impressive,
is simply not likely to have the desired effect. Instead, a
first step needs to be to proclaim a no-fly zone (including for
helicopters) over the skies of Kosovo. A second step would be to
make Yugoslavia's air defense system ineffective. This would not
only send a concrete message of resolve but increase the ability
of NATO to neutralize Belgrade's war making effort in Kosovo
subsequently, if needed. Targeting facilities and capabilities
needed by Serbia's military and police and striking the fielded
forces themselves may be necessary to convince Belgrade it cannot
wage war. If the heavy Yugoslav Army forces are neutralized,
Serbia's police would lose its ability to impose its will and
Milosevic would have to either negotiate in good faith with the
Kosovo Albanians or suffer unacceptable losses. Serb forces in
Kosovo are even more vulnerable than they were in Bosnia. They
cannot stay in defensive positions, but must maneuver in road
columns and mass in order to be effective, making them easy
targets for airpower. Collateral damage related to military
targets in Kosovo can be expected to be minimal.
If credible, an extensive use of force by NATO might not
even be necessary, as the Serbian public and security forces have
little taste for a costly war. Military service in Kosovo is
already unpopular, and morale and cohesion would plummet if those
assigned to Kosovo believed they would face the full strength of
NATO's airpower. In recent days, over 300 policemen --
Milosevic's Praetorian guard-- in Belgrade alone have resigned to
avoid being deployed to Kosovo. Serbia's Ministry of the
Interior has had to set up a special medical board before which
policemen must appear in order to validate bouts of current
"illness" before they can be exempted from duty in Kosovo.
Montenegro has declared its recruits in the Yugoslav Army will
not fight in Kosovo. Parents of draftees from Serbia and
Vojvodina have begun to protest. The opposition parties,
students, and even the usually militant Serbian Orthodox Church
have expressed reservations about war. A realistic threat from
NATO would raise the specter of severe consequences and reinforce
such domestic opposition. Faced with a resolute NATO, Milosevic
might even find it easier to withdraw his forces from Kosovo
without losing face, claiming he could not stand up against the
great powers.

Ultimately, military steps will be successful only if
integrated with a political goal capable of providing a long-term
solution. Reestablishing the status quo in Kosovo is clearly not
feasible. Even Belgrade sees this only as an interim step. The
Serb elites are deeply worried that the Serbs, who have a
negative population growth trend and the highest abortion rate in
Europe, will be outnumbered throughout Serbia within a generation
by the Albanians, Romanys, Bosniaks, Hungarians and other
non-Serbs. As a result, many nationalists, including Serbia's
Deputy Premier, Vojislav Seselj, have talked of getting rid of a
good part of the Albanian population, in what is sometimes called
"population balancing" in Belgrade, no matter what-- by pressure
and harassment if possible, violently if need be. Such a
"solution" would be tantamount to massive ethnic cleansing and
genocide. Partition, which is periodically proposed in Belgrade,
is also an unworkable option, as it would require ethnic
cleansing of both Albanians and Serbs on a large scale and would
lead to even more instability.

Instead, what must be done is for the international
community to oversee a negotiated settlemeent for a new
arrangement, where Kosovo regains control over its affairs,
perhaps as Yugoslavia's third republic, and is insulated from
Belgrade's use of force, while deferring a final disposition for
a specified --even a long-- period of time, as in the case of
Chechnya. With such an agreement, Kosovo's political leaders
would be in a position to calm the situation since they would
have something tangible to show to their community, they would
take control of the local police and government, and Albania
would end its support for the insurgents. Any such agreement
would have to include a detailed commitment to protect the rights
of Kosovo's Serb minority, perhaps under international
supervision, with mutual commitments for the Albanian minority in
Serbia proper.

Time, however, is crucial. Dragging out the crisis without
a firm proactive NATO policy will not only mean more victims, but
will also make a negotiated political solution more difficult as
positions harden, more innocent civilians are killed or pushed
out of their homes, moderate leaders lose their credibility, and
neighboring countries involve themselves in the conflict.

Dr. Norman Cigar is a Senior Associate with the Public
International Law and Policy Group, and a former Professor of
National Security Studies at the Marine Corps School of Advanced
Warfighting and senior analyst with the Army Staff at the
Pentagon.

Professor Paul R. Williams is a Senior Associate at the Carnegie
Endowment for International Peace and a former Department of
State official.

==========================================================================

KOSOVA NEWS nr. 22, 7 July 1998

OVER 5000 KLA SOLDIER HEADED FOR LOXHE...
Prishtina, 7 July (ARTA) - Sources say that Serbs living in Pejë and the
village Gorazhdec, went to the village of Loxhë, the night before last, to
look for a young Albanian KLA member. The sources add that the Serbs had
been drinking and celebrating the visit made by the Radical vice-president
of the Serbian government, Vojislav Seselj, to the Orthodox Monastery in
Deçan. The real reason why the Serbs headed for Loxhë, in fact, seems to
have been to provoke Albanians, and if possible, torture and kill them.
The conflict began following the arrival of armed Serb civilians, escorted
by the police, in the village that night.
The local population in Loxhë, refused to hand the young Albanian to the
drunk and armed Serb civilians and the police.
35 year-old Tahir Shala, was wounded during the conflict that began in the
middle of the village, during an attempt to break into a house belonging to
an Albanian family. Tahir died a short time after, from the inflicted
wounds.
Albanian villagers barricaded themselves in their own houses, while armed
Serb civilians and the police, marched through the village trying to take it
under siege.
"Over 5,000 KLA soldiers headed for Loxhë when they found out what
happened", said a witness from "Berzhenik", a suburb of Pejë, which lies
very close to Loxhë. "The police and armed civilians had entered the
village, as the Albanian population began to flee, leaving to village to KLA
units", he adds.
"It is not true that only three Serb policemen were killed in the clashes.
They were killed in the very beginning of the clashes. The fighting became
more intense as KLA surrounded the village. KLA forces killed at least 12 of
them, and wounding tens of others, until Serb army units arrived - and
sanitary helicopters, which evacuated the victims and the wounded", the
witness confirmed.
Even today's news on Serb state-run TV and the press confirmed the large
losses of the Serb police\military forces close to Pejë. Serb media, though,
still repeat the names of the three policemen killed, stressing the
"serious" wounding of nine others.

A `DIPLOMATIC CIRCUS`, `OBSERVERS WATCHING LEAVES OF GRASS...`
PRISHTINA, July 7 (KIC) - The so-called Kosova Observer Mission (KOM)
started work yesterday (Monday) in Kosova.
The KOM was born as a result of the Yeltsin-Milosevic meeting in Moscow in
June, which has been seen here in Kosova as a dilution of the international
resolve to act on Kosova.
The three Albanian-language daily newspapers in Kosova - "Informatori",
"Bujku", and "Koha Ditore" - carry leading articles/features on the first
day of the KOM.
"Observers/viewers of the leaves of grass in burned out houses",
Enver Maloku, the editor-in-chief of "Informatori":
This is how the "Informatori" writer describes yesterday's mission: "Today's
journey was somewhat weird. It resembled a media show.", and then the
comment on the photos of reporters: "In one of them you can see clearly the
thin leaves of grass which have grown on the floors of the burned houses.
The grass has grown quicker in houses than upon the earthen graves".
No living people were encountered in Prekaz, the village destroyed by
Serbian artillery on 5 March, an action diplomats have had the face to call
an
'excessive use' of force by Serbian forces.
The "Bujku" newspaper carries today a long feature article, entitled "The
caravan of OSCE observers and journalists toured Skenderaj, Polac, and
Prekaz".
Bujku reporters, just like the KIC ones, describe in detail what they saw as
the remains of a destroyed and a deserted village, Prekaz, and the Jashari
family compound.
A Serb who infiltrated the convoy punched and kicked the reporter of The
Times of London, Anthony Lloyd, Bujku writes.
The other Kosovar daily in Albanian, "Koha Ditore" refers to this incident
by identifying those who bore the brunt of Serb security officers as Reuters
reporters and a cameraman. (In fact, it was Times and Reuters reporters,
Lloyd and Schork, the KIC learned.)
A red "Opel Kadet", known to all as the car of the Serb security, had got in
the middle of the convoy, said "Koha" reporters, adding that three Serb
security in sports clothes punched the reporter of the Reuters news agency,
Kurt Schork. His colleague, the cameraman, did not fare better, either,
because he was hit several times by the plain-clothes Serb security
officers, "Koha" says.
"A diplomatic circus across police checkpoints", "Koha" entitles its article
today, quoting a diplomat as saying the ruins of the village of Prekaz were
something deja-vu: "I've seen this in Vukovar".
The motorcade of the Kosova Observer Mission did not set foot on territory
controlled by local Albanian resistance forces yesterday.
It was the Russians who refused to proceed beyond Polac, to come across UçK
checkpoints, "Koha" writes, quoting diplomats.

SERBIAN TROOPS ATTACK BORDER VILLAGES
PRISHTINA, July 7 (KIC) - Overnight and today morning, Serbian military
mounted attacks on the villages of Reka e Keqe region. There have been no
immediate reports on the casualty-toll, but damages are reported to be
enormous.
The local Albanian resistance forces have been returning fire. The sound of
heavy detonations last night and today morning till 10 o'clock could be
heard in the town of Gjakova itself.
Eye-witnesses said fire and columns of smoke could be seen in villages of
Smolice, Stubell, Berjah, Morine, and Nec.
In the Has region of Gjakova, the village of Goden, Zylfaj and Prush, along
the border belt with Albania, have become the scene of fighting between
Serbian troops and local Albanians.
Yesterday and today, as a result of the Serb attacks, the population of
these villages, mainly children and women, have fled homes seeking shelter
in other villages or in Gjakova itself.

THREE SERB POLICEMEN KILLED, SEVERAL WOUNDED
PRISHTINA, July 7 (KIC) - Around 13:00 hrs yesterday, in clashes with
Albanian forces, three Serb policemen were killed: Mirko Radulovic, Dejan
Preleviq, and Milan Rajkoviq. Four more policemen were wounded in the
ongoing fighting at Loxhe, 3 km near Peja, the Belgrade pro-government
"Politika" daily reported.
Meanwhile, the Dnevni Telegraf daily said at least 5 policemen have been
killed and 15 others wounded during the fighting.
This Serb newspaper said Serb military units have taken part in the
fighting.

AT LEAST 10 ALBANIANS KILLED IN KOSOVA DURING THE LAST WEEK
PRISHTINA, July 7 (KIC) - According to reports by the chapters of the Kosova
human rights Council (CDHRF), at least ten Albanians were killed and many
others wounded from 30 June through 6 July this year.
Following are the names of the last week's Albanian victims, identified by
Albanian sources on the ground:
Jakup Agushi (around 30 years of age) from Drenoc of Klina, killed in his
native village by Serb forces on 30 June; Haxhi Syle Ukaj (61) from Cerovik
of Klina, died on 2 July. He sustained gunfire wounds from a Serb police
helicopter on 25 June. Kadri Sadri Kokollari (30) from Budakova of Suhareka,
killed on 3 July, during a Serb forces attack on Krushica village. On 4
July, the dead body of Ali Hasani (75), resident of Prejlep of Deçan, was
found in the vicinity of Hereq village. The late Albanian was killed with
sniper rifle bullets. Daut Islam Pllana (25) was killed on 5 July during a
Serb forces shelling of his Bardh i Madh (Bellaçevc) village.
Jahir Shala, an immobile old Albanian was shot dead by the Serb forces
advancing in his Hade village on 29 June. Tahir S. Shala (35) was killed by
Serb forces in Loxha village of Peja on 5 July. Muhamet Sefer Haxha (38)
from Gllareva village of Klina was killed last Friday during a huge Serb
forces operation in Kijeva and the adjacent villages.
The dead bodies of Muhamet Elshani (56), his son, Afrim Elshani, 25, and
Salih Gashi (around 20 years old), all of them from Pirana village of
Prizren, were found on 6 July in their cornfield.

THEY KIDNAPPED, BEAT AND CHARGED MY SON WITH 20 YEARS.THEY STILL TORTURE HIM
Prishtina, 7 July (ARTA) - "He gets mistreated every day by the personnel of
the prison. All of his body is covered with bruises from the beating",
says Nait Hasani's father, who was granted the right to see his son, in the
presence of the police.
Nait Hasani, was sentenced in December last year, along with 18 other
Albanians, under the charge of "terrorist activities and membership in the
Kosova Liberation Army". He was sent to the prison in Sremska Mitrovica
(Vojvodina).
It seems that Nait Hasani, student of Serb language and literature, is still
being tortured. His father told this astonishing fact when he visited
Albanian daily "Koha Ditore" editorial board. He said that his son is being
mistreated "only because he is Albanian".
"They did everything to my son, they kidnapped him and tortured him", he
says, with his voice trembling in pain and revolt towards the bestial
conduct
of the Serb police towards his son.
"A terrorist must be beaten", he is told when he is mistreated, his father
conveys.

SERB POLICE SET ABLAZE SCHOOL BUILDING IN GLLOGOC

PRISHTINA, July 7 (KIC) - Today morning, Serb police forces set ablaze the
building of a primary school in the Feronikeli neighbourhood in Gllogovc,
local sources said.
The compounds of the (Ferrous-Nickel) Feronikeli plants in the outskirts of
Gllogovc have been for over two months now turned into a huge base of
Serbian forces.

UN: APPALLED BY THE SITUATION IN KOSOVO
Secretary-General Kofi Annan has reported that the deteriorating situation
in Kosovo could potentially destabilize the entire Balkan region.
In a new report to the Security Council, the Secretary-General says that a
new outbreak of violence in Kosovo caused some 6,900 refugees to flee to
Albania by the end of June. In addition, over 10,000 people have been
internally displaced within the FRY, while approximately 45,000 have been
displaced within Kosovo. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
(UNHCR) does not have access to the internally displaced persons.
"The international community is appalled by the situation in Kosovo... I am
increasingly concerned that, unless hostilities in Kosovo are stopped,
tensions could spill across borders and destabilize the entire region." the
Secretary-General writes.

========================================================
July 8, 1998.
Journal: Kosovo War's Glittering Prize Rests Underground

NYT -- By CHRIS HEDGES

STARI TNG, Yugoslavia -- The metal cage tumbled to the guts of the Stari Tng
mine, with its glittering veins of lead, zinc, cadmium, gold and silver, its
stagnant pools of water and muck, its steamy blasts, its miles of dank, gloomy
tunnels and its vast stretches of Stygian darkness.

As the iron box rattled and squealed on the ear-popping journey, dropping at
18 feet a second, it left behind the potent symbols of nationalism and ethnic
identity scattered in disarray on the ground above. Instead, in the shrill
cacophony, it exposed the real worth of Kosovo.

The medieval Serbian monasteries and churches, crumbling mosques with silver
domes and spindly minarets and a dark stone tower brooding over the Field of
Blackbirds, where the Turks wiped out Serbian nobles 600 years ago and began
500 years of Ottoman rule, seemed to evaporate in the thin air.

The fighting between the rebels of the Kosovo Liberation Army, with their
intoxicating visions of an independent state, and the 50,000 Serbian soldiers
and special policemen, who rule the province of Kosovo like a plantation,
touched no one here. Neither did the rattle of gunfire, the thud of mortars,
the anguish of refugees and bodies of the recently killed.

Half a mile underground, hissing rubber air hoses were looped along tunnel
walls and small lights hooked on the hard hats of miners bobbed in the inky
universe. Worm-like diesel loaders roared through the corridors, laden with
sparkling ore, and huge drills snarled and spat at the rock.

"There is over 30 percent lead and zinc in the ore," said Novak Bjelic, the
mine's beefy director. "The war in Kosovo is about the mines, nothing else.
This is Serbia's Kuwait -- the heart of Kosovo. We export to France,
Switzerland, Greece, Sweden, the Czech Republic, Russia and Belgium.

"We export to a firm in New York, but I would prefer not to name it. And in
addition to all this Kosovo has 17 billion tons of coal reserves. Naturally,
the Albanians want all this for themselves."

The sprawling state-owned Trepca mining complex, the most valuable piece of
real estate in the Balkans, is worth at least $5 billion and has made millions
of dollars for Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, according to his
critics. Serbia and its junior partner, Montenegro, are what remains of
Yugoslavia.

In March 1989, Milosevic revoked the autonomous status given to the ethnic
Albanians, who make up 90 percent of the 2 million people in Kosovo, and he
has refused to return any kind of self-governance. He is trying to crush a
mounting armed resistance to his rule, and it appears that the mines, at least
for a while, will earn him even more money.

The Stari Tng mine, with its warehouses, is ringed with smelting plants, 17
metal treatment sites, freight yards, railroad lines, a power plant and the
country's largest battery plant.

"In the last three years we have mined 2,538,124 tons of lead and zinc crude
ore," said Bjelic, 58, "and produced 286,502 tons of concentrated lead and
zinc and 139,789 tons of pure lead, zinc, cadmium, silver and gold."

When the Nazis seized this corner of the Balkans in 1941, they handed over
the hovels in Pristina, the provincial capital, to the Italian fascists. But
they kept the British-built Trepca mines for the Reich, shipping out
wagonloads of minerals for weapons and producing the batteries that powered
the U-boats. Submarine batteries, along with ammunition, are still produced in
the Trepca mines. The mining history reaches back to the Romans, who hacked
out silver from the quarries.

In 1988, as Yugoslavia began to disintegrate, the fiercest resistance to
Milosevic's vision of a Serb-dominated Yugoslavia roared out of the shafts of
the four Trepca mines.

Angered by the growth of the Serbian nationalist movement led by Milosevic,
the ethnic Albanian miners, who made up 75 percent of the 23,000 employees,
shut down the mines and organized a 30-mile-long protest march to Pristina.
They carried photos of the late communist leader, Josip Broz Tito, and
Yugoslav flags adorned with the communist red star. The fealty shown to the
old Yugoslavia appears naive and quaint given the armed rebellion under way in
the province.

"We believed in Yugoslavia," said Burhan Kavaja, the former director of the
Stari Tng mine, who was dismissed and imprisoned after the first strike. "We
wanted to belong. You would never see an Albanian carry the state flag today.
This conflict will only end now with our independence. Until then the Serbs
will loot the mineral wealth of Kosovo."

Milosevic promised the strikers that he would respect the province's
autonomy and remove nationalist Serbs from positions of power. The miners
returned to the shafts.

A year later the miners, realizing that they had been betrayed, began a
series of hunger strikes and occupied the mines. The mine protests led to
general strikes throughout Kosovo, making Trepca the nerve center of the
resistance movement.

Serbian special policemen eventually seized the mine, carrying weakened
miners out on stretchers. When the province's autonomy was revoked, a state of
emergency was declared. The ethnic Albanian miners were replaced with Poles,
Czechs and -- later -- Muslim prisoners of war captured by the Serbs in
Bosnia.

These days, no more than 15 percent of the current 15,000 mine workers are
of Albanian origin, the government says, and most ethnic Albanians insist that
the figures vastly overestimate their numbers.

Branimir Dimitrijevic, one of the mine's managers, waded through a corridor
filled with water, slime and mud that reached up and wrapped itself around his
black rubber boots. A huge Swedish iron-cutting machine, one of four in the
mine, whirled and belched like some deep-sea monster. Spotlights mounted on
its cab lit up a vein of ore, and as the minerals oxidized, creating a
suffocating heat, the miners were left gulping for air.

The workers, bare-chested and blackened with grime in the vast sweat house,
stood aside when a trolley loaded with chunks of rock rumbled down a tunnel on
the iron tracks.

A few days ago, Dimitrijevic received the disturbing news that a factory two
miles away, where clothing for the miners is produced, had been seized by the
rebels. Armed separatist guerrillas now guard the gates, and Serbs avoid the
dirt road to the factory. No one has yet tried to take it back.

"We will never give up Trepca!" he shouted over the drilling. "Serbs will
fight to defend the mine. It is ours. We know how to make war if this is what
the Albanians want.

"When they come to take my brother, then I will take three Albanians to my
private prison until he is released. This is the only way to fight. This is
the only language the Albanians understand."

==================================================================

International Herald Tribune (Neuilly-sur-Seine, France)

July 7, 1998, Tuesday

Opinion
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR;

Military Intervention

The United States has said that it would support a UN Security Council
Resolution authorizing NATO air strikes to end President Slobodan
Milosevic's brutal repression of the Kosovo Liberation Army, which is
fighting to attain independence for the province of Kosovo.

Under Chapter 7 of the UN Charter, the Security Council clearly has
the power to sanction the use of military force if it determines that
the present situation in Kosovo constitutes a threat to the peace and
security of the Balkan region.

However, the Security Council is stymied by a lack of consensus among
its permanent members. The question then remains whether NATO alone
could legally justify military intervention.

The post-World War II legal system contained in the UN Charter outlaws
the offensive use of military force as an instrument of national
policy. Since nearly all the world's countries are now signatories to
the Charter, this proscription against the use of force is regarded as
universal. In this scheme, force may be used legally by a UN member or
group of members only in self-defense and then only until the Security
Council acts.

Since no NATO member has been attacked, even in default of Security
Council action there would seem to be no legal justification for self-
defensive use of force in Kosovo. And, unlike the Security Council,
NATO has no authority to use military force because the situation in
Kosovo presents a general threat to peace and stability in the
Balkans.

A corollary legal principle forbids a nation, or group of nations,
from intervening, militarily or otherwise, in the affairs of another
state. This legal rule is an expression of the fundamental
international legal principle that each nation state is sovereign in
its own affairs within its own borders.

In spite of the seeming clarity of these legal rules and their
application to the Kosovo crisis, other legal justifications for the
use of force may exist. Since World War II, many states have
unilaterally used military force against other states for a variety
of reasons. In these cases, states have invariably proffered legal
arguments to justify their actions.

Among the most widely accepted of them have been: 1) request for
military assistance by a recognized government (U.S. intervention in
Vietnam; 2) ''anticipatory'' self-defense to prevent future terrorist
attacks (U.S. air strikes against Libya; Israeli incursions into
southern Lebanon); 3) protection of nationals (U.S. intervention in
Grenada; British invasion of the Falkland Islands).

In almost every case, however, there has been more than one legal
justification argued for, and while some of these reasons may have
seemed flimsy, even at the time, none of them arguably applies to
Kosovo.

The only tenable reason for military intervention in Kosovo would be
for humanitarian purposes - to prevent a country from persecuting its
own citizens. This humanitarian rationale has been used before, for
example in Somalia and Haiti, but never as the exclusive basis for
intervention.

Acceptance of a humanitarian rationale for NATO military intervention
in Kosovo would establish a precedent that even the most liberal NATO
member is likely to oppose. It would mean that NATO could be called
upon to intervene any time a government uses force to put down an
insurrection within its borders, a situation that has occurred within
Russia several times since the breakup of the Soviet Union.

Inevitably, the risk of military confrontations involving NATO, Russia
and others would increase.

While the idea of an international force to police massive human
rights abuses might sound attractive, the NATO alliance is not the
vehicle to achieve that goal.

MARK A. SUMMERS. Jacksonville, Florida.

==========================================================================

The Washington Post

Rise of Kosovo Guerrillas Puts NATO Powers in a Bind

By William Drozdiak
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, July 8, 1998; Page A19

BERLIN, July 7ŃThe rapid ascendancy of Kosovo's ethnic Albanian
guerrillas, who now
control about a third of the territory in the restive Serbian province,
has greatly complicated the
political and military challenges confronting the West as it tries to
contain the conflict.

While NATO planners refine options for military action ranging from
airstrikes to ground
troops, officials from the United States, Russia and four European powers
comprising the
Balkans "contact group" will meet in Bonn Wednesday to consider drafting
their own blueprint
to restore political autonomy to the ethnic Albanians, who make up 90
percent of the population
in Kosovo.

"I think we should draw up an outline within the contact group for
autonomy because it is
apparent that neither side is in a position to do this," German Foreign
Minister Klaus Kinkel
said on German television. "We then have to consider how we can guarantee
autonomy, for
both sides."

But senior U.S. and European officials say the swiftly changing nature of
the conflict
illustrates the enormous difficulties of restoring peace in the province,
where more than 300
people have been killed in a four-month Serbian offensive against the
separatist guerrillas.

While focusing pressure on President Slobodan Milosevic of Yugoslavia to
restrain his security
forces, the contact group is also scrambling to find ways to curb the
ambitions of the Kosovo
Liberation Army (KLA), which has been described as the world's
fastest-growing guerrilla
army. Serbia is Yugoslavia's dominant republic.

The rebel group, which receives funds from Albanian exiles abroad and
arms from neighboring
Albania, has developed into a hydra-headed guerrilla force with five
regional commands that
loosely coordinate operations but do not submit to any higher political
authority, according to
diplomats.

The United States has been trying to persuade representatives of the
guerrillas to join Kosovo's
elected ethnic Albanian leader, Ibrahim Rugova, in sitting down for peace
talks with Milosevic
and the Serbian leadership. But their commanders are said to loathe the
pacifist Rugova and
believe his support is rapidly diminishing among Kosovo's 1.8 million
ethnic Albanians.

"The problem in dealing with the Kosovo Albanians is that Rugova may have
legitimacy as an
elected leader but he has very little power, while the KLA, which is
gaining power rapidly,
does not have the legitimacy," a senior European diplomat said.

The guerrillas' armed independence campaign has been emboldened by its
military successes.
Jakup Krasniqi, who was identified by NATO officials as a prominent rebel
spokesman, told
the German newsweekly Der Spiegel that the guerrillas' goal is to
establish a greater Albania
that would unite all ethnic Albanians living in the Balkans in a single
country. That would
suggest that the KLA would like to incorporate Kosovo, Albania proper,
and territory occupied
by 400,000 ethnic Albanians estimated to be living in Macedonia.

U.S. and European officials say any ambition by the guerrillas to
establish a greater Albania
would pose the greatest danger of sparking a wider Balkan war since
Milosevic's forces
launched their crackdown in late February.

American envoy Richard C. Holbrooke, the newly nominated U.S. ambassador
to the United
Nations, failed in his recent diplomatic mission to Serbia to identify
credible representatives of
the guerrillas, let alone persuade the insurgents to cease hostilities,
tone down demands and
work toward a political compromise.

U.S. and European officials say contact group efforts to conceive
something between
autonomy and independence -- by proposing, for example, to make Kosovo
the third republic
within Yugoslavia along with Serbia and Montenegro -- have foundered
because of stiff
Russian resistance. They say the Russians, feeling bruised by their own
war with separatists in
the region of Chechyna, insist that autonomy for Kosovo must be kept
within the realm of
Serbia.

Milosevic stripped Kosovo of its autonomy in 1989 and imposed direct
Serbian rule.

The attempt to draw up a settlement proposal could foreshadow the kind of
intensive
negotiations that Holbrooke orchestrated at Dayton, Ohio, in brokering a
deal that ended the
Bosnian war in 1995. "We are moving toward the stage where the only
possible solution may
be to lock up both sides and throw away the key until they agree to a
deal," the senior
European diplomat said.

That prospect has already been accounted for in the military planning at
NATO headquarters,
where the Western military alliance is bracing for another peacekeeping
mission that could be
even more tricky than its tasks in Bosnia.

After first exploring ways to contain the Kosovo conflict by shielding
Albania and Macedonia,
then brandishing the threat of airstrikes against Yugoslavia to compel
the Serbs to ease their
crackdown, NATO is now scrutinizing the possibility of air and ground
operations that would
enforce a negotiated peace in Kosovo along the lines of their mission in
Bosnia, according to
NATO officials.

"It's a very fluid situation and the priorities seem to change by the
minute, but we need to keep
a whole spectrum of military options in play," a senior NATO official
said. "We could be
called upon to use force in many circumstances, and that includes
imposing a settlement
without the consent of the parties."

______________________________________________________________________

vfil...@haverford.edu

unread,

Jul 9, 1998, 3:00:00 AM7/9/98

From: Filipovic Vanja <vfil...@haverford.edu>
Subject: BosNet KOSOVA UPDATE: Kosova in the Media

----------------------------------------------------------------------
B o s N e t - July 09, 1998
______________________________________________________________________

ALERT - FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF YUGOSLAVIA (KOSOVO)

8 July 1998

British correspondents roughed up in Kosovo

SOURCE: Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), New York

(CPJ/IFEX) - CPJ has learned that on 6 July 1998, two British correspondents,
travelling with the so-called Kosovo Observer Mission in war-torn western
areas of the breakaway Yugoslav province of Kosovo, were beaten by
plainclothes Serbian police near the village of Prekaz.

Kurt Schork, of the Reuters news agency, and Anthony Lloyd, of the "Times"
of London, were roughed up by Serb security forces that were following the
convoy of international envoys and media around villages which had been
destroyed and captured by the Serbian army. As they ascended a hill
overlooking the village to survey the destruction, Schork was punched in the
face by a Serb security officer in civilian clothes and Lloyd was kicked in
the ribs.

CPJ will protest the incident, and the pattern of harassment of journalists
attempting to cover developments in Kosovo, in a letter to Yugoslav President
Slobodan Milosevic as soon as more details have been gathered.

For further information, contact Chrystyna Lapychak at CPJ, 330 Seventh
Ave., New York, NY 10001, U.S.A., tel: +1 212 465 1004 x 101, fax: +1 212
465 9568, e-mail: eur...@cpj.org, Internet: http://www.cpj.org/.

The information contained in this alert is the sole responsibility of CPJ.
In citing this material for broadcast or publication, please credit CPJ.
_________________________________________________________________
DISTRIBUTED BY THE INTERNATIONAL FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION EXCHANGE (IFEX)
CLEARING HOUSE
489 College Street, Suite 403, Toronto (ON) M6G 1A5 CANADA
tel: +1 416 515 9622 fax: +1 416 515 7879
alerts e-mail: ale...@ifex.org general e-mail: if...@ifex.org
Internet site: http://www.ifex.org/
Submitted by:
Nalini Lasiewicz (Mrs.)
Lasiewicz Foundation

===========================================================================

KOSOVA NEWS nr. 23, 8 July 1998

CDHRF APPEAL FOR THE RELEASE OF HOSTAGES
Prishtina, 8 July- The Committee for Human Rights and Freedoms in Prishtina
issued today an appeal in which it calls for the release of hostages:
The undeclared war in Kosova, which was provoked by the Serbian
authorities, has resulted with many causalities, fatalities, and with large
displacements of the Albanian population with elements of ethnic cleansing.
The massacres of the civilians, the burning, looting and ethnic cleansing
prove that the Serbian campaign in Kosova does not differ from the one
carried out in Bosnia.
The peaceful strive of the Albanians for the fulfilment of their
aspirations for freedom and equality, with which they gained the sympathy of
the entire democratic world, made the international public opinion and part
of the Serb and Montenegrin public opinion to oppose the bloodshed caused by
the ambitions and aspirations of Serb chauvinist circles.
CDHRF has expressed its discontent regarding the obstacles made by the
authorities for the burial of the killed, not allowing investigations
regarding the fate of the missing... including the concern on the fate of
those who were taken and are kept hostage.
CDHRF possesses information that more than 400 Albanians are being kept
hostage. 32 Serbs were reported as missing to the CDHRF.
CDHRF appeals to all sides not to undertake any actions in opposition with
the Geneva Convention and the additional Protocols of the Geneva Convention,
especially against people who are not directly involved in military actions.
CDHRF calls hereby for the immediate release of those who have not
committed any war crimes or crimes against humanity and who are being kept
in captivity contrary to the Law of War and Humanitarian Law.
CDHRF is willing to offer its services and its good will to co-operate with
other organizations for the release of all those who are being kept captive.
Facing insurmountable difficulties to communicate directly with those
concerned, CDHRF appeals to all sides involved to undertake concrete steps
towards the release of all hostages taken.

FIVE KILLED ALBANIANS BROUGHT TO GJAKOVA MORGUE
PRISHTINA, July 8 (ARTA) - Serbian police has taken today the bodies of five
Albanians to the town morgue in Gjakova, sources in town said.
Their identity is not known yet, but they are presumably KLA fighters killed
in the fighting in Reka e Keqe region, adjacent to the Kosova-Albania
border.
The hospital morgue in Gjakova was reported held under tight control by Serb
police today.

HEAVY FIGHTING IN REKA E KEQE REGION REPORTED
PRISHTINA, July 8 (ARTA) - Heavy fighting has been going on in the last 24
hours between Serbian military and paramilitary troops and local Albanian
resistance forces, the U^K, in the villages of the Reka e Keqe region.
Serbian forces embarked yesterday on a frontal attack against the area, the
village of Morin& being scene of the fiercest fighting.
Still unconfirmed reports indicate that in this frontal confrontation the
casualty-toll is high on both sides, and the material damage immense.
Serbian forces have been using heavy combat equipment in today's attacks in
the Reka e Keqe region, sources said.

KLA MORE PRESENT IN MITROVICE
Mitrovicë, 8 July (ARTA) - "Shala e Bajgorës is being guarded by our
soldiers. They have everything. They are ready. Even the neighborhoods that
lead in the direction of Shalë have received the order to be ready for any
kind of event", tell the people from Mitrovicë, the majority of which are
ready for anything unexpected.
Despite the lack of food items and the tense situation in Mitrovicë, the
residents cannot hide their feelings of pride largely because most part of
the surrounding villages are controlled by the KLA units.
On the other hand the Serb civilians were handed over guns, throughout last
Friday and Saturday, hence the Albanians do not feel secure to go out after
1800CET.
The Serbs even "improvised parties, just so they could try their weapons".
Shootings are heard every night after 2200CET. Shootings are also heard
coming from the neighborhood of "Tavnik", which according to the residents
is guarded by KLA forces, where they move freely.

TEN YOUNG ALBANIANS ABDUCTED BY SERB FORCES
PRISHTINA, July 8 (KIC) - On Monday, near the village of Dob&rdol in the
municipality of Klina, Serbian police and paramilitary forces abducted 10
Albanians, residents of the village of Rudic&: Nimon, Sk&nder, Nezir and
Arben Bajraktari, Shaban, Mustaf& and Bashkim Mehmetaj, as well as Luan,
Gani and Haki Ahmetgjekaj.
The abductees on their way to their relatives, local sources said.
Eye-witnesses said they saw the abducted people trailed to a tractor at
Po^est& village, apparently being driven in the direction of Gorazhdec, a
largely Serb-inhabited village.

SERB POLICE ARRESTS A LARGE NUMBER OF ALBANIANS IN GJAKOVA
PRISHTINA, July 8 (KIC) - Many Albanian citizens have been arrested by Serb
police in the town of Gjakova today.
Four Gjakova residents - Florent A. Lipoveci, Argjend M. Pulani, Bashkim
Efendiu and Burim Lleshi - have been in Serb custody since Saturday.
A large number of Albanians, mainly political activists, have been reported
detained by the Serb police over the past couple of days, sources said.

SERB FORCES ATTACK VILLAGES OF CABRA AND VEROVIK
PRISHTINA, July 8 (ARTA) - The ^abra village in the northernmost
municipality of Kosova came under heavy gunfire for over one hour today
morning, sources in Mitrovica said.
^abra is an Albanian-inhabited village in Leposaviq municipality, the only
one with a majority Serb population in Kosova.
The village which has some 133 Albanian households surrounded by Serb
hamlets on all sides.
The Serbs attacked ^abra from the neighboring village of Zup^e today.
Shootings from different weapons, including automatic and machine-guns began
at around 5 a.m. today.
A large number of ^abra residents have already fled their homes heading for
Mitrovica, sources said.
Meanwhile, Serb forces garrisoned in a checkpoint and houses in its
vicinity in Kijeva attacked for over three hours the Cerovik village on
Tuesday evening.
Cerovik, which is about two km away from the Serb bases, was bombarded with
artillery and fired upon with machine-guns from 18:00 through 21:30 on
Tuesday.
Members of the local resistance units and the U^K fired back, sources said.

NANO PROPOSES CREATION OF THE NATIONAL COMMITEE OF KOSOVA
TIRANE, July 7 (ATA) - Albanian Prime Minister Fatos Nano proposed the
creation of The National Committee of Kosova, which would bring round
President Rugova parliamentarians, politicians, the movement of resistance
and independent figures of Kosova "in order to efficiently orientate and
direct the coming actions".
The Liberation Army of Kosova was considered by the PM "a people's movement
created as a result of the right of the peoples to defend themselves from
aggressors."

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

US DEPT. OF STATE: KLA IS TRYING TO WIN BACK FREEDOMS THAT WERE LOST...
July 7: To the question what would it take for the United States to push
NATO to intervene militarily, the briefer, Mr. James Rubin, answered:
"We believe that this is a case where planning for the use of force is
justified... We believe that there is a threat to international peace and
security that has been created...
We've made very clear that this situation, depending on how it evolves,
affects the national security of the United States because it affects the
stability of Europe".
Asked if the USA views the KLA as a terrorist organization, Mr. Rubin
answered: "That is not our view of the KLA; it never has been. It is our
view that those affiliated with the KLA are engaged in an insurgency, and
they are trying to win back freedoms that were lost during the crackdown by
the Serbian authorities and were lost by the stripping of the autonomy...
There have been individuals affiliated with that organization who have
committed acts that we condemn. But, the bottom line here is that the
primary burden for the problem in Kosovo rests on the shoulders of Slobodan
Milosevic who, number one, stripped these people of their autonomy, took
away their basic rights; and number two, used heavy military equipment in a
violent crackdown that involved the killing of innocents".

===========================================================================

The Washington Times
Thursday, 9 July 1998/pg A16
Commentary Section

Another blunder in Kosovo policy?
by Gary Dempsey

PRISTINA, Yugoslavia. The Clinton Administration has just made
another foreign policy blunder in its handling of the conflict in
Serbia's Kosovo province. Its first was threatening Yugoslav
President Slobodan Milosevic with NATO intervention to end his
indescriminate crackdown on secessionist rebels. That has had the
unintended consequence of convincing Kosovo's majority ethnic Albanian
population that NATO is their ticket to independence from Yugoslavia.

In fact, one senior advisor to moderate Kosovar leader Ibrahim Rugova
says "NATO is the only force that can bring democracy and independence
to Kosovo," but getting the alliance to intervene "depends on how we
look on CNN."

The administration's latest gaffe is its demand Mr. Milosevic withdraw
his security forces from Kosovo before resuming political negotiations
with Kosovar Albanians. Following a recent meeting with Russian
President Boris Yeltsin, Mr. Milosevic agreed to resume talks, but he
rejected the Kosovar Albanian demand that he first withdraw his
internal security forces from the embattled province. He added that
if the secessionist forces in Kosovo stopped their "terrorist
activities," Yugoslav forces would spend more time in their barracks.

The Clinton administration, however, wasn't satisfied with Mr.
Milosevic's offer. But instead of advocating a cease-fire or some
other middle ground, the administration has embraced the Kosovar
Albanian demand that Mr. Milosevic withdraw his security forces before
negotiations can resume. White House spokesman Mike McCurry, for
example, stated that Yugoslavia "must immediately withdraw security
units involved in a civilian repression, without linkage to . . . the
'stopping of terrorist activities.' Similarly, Defense Department
spokesman Kenneth Bacon says, "We don't think that there should be any
linkage between an immediate withdrawal of forces by the Yugoslav, on
the one hand, and stopping terrorist aactivities, on the other. There
ought to be complete withdrawal of military forces so that
negotiations can begin."

Insisting Mr. Milosevic withdraw his security forces from Kosovo
before resuming negotiations is an especially ill-conceived policy.
The Clinton administration is demanding something Mr. Milosevic cannot
possibly agree to do. It is asking Mr. Milosevic to effectively
surrender one of Serbia's provinces to an insurgency movement. That
is a politically untenable move for Mr. Milosevic, since so many Serbs
consider Kosovo the cradle of their history and religion. In fact,
Kosovo is where Serbia's medieval Nemanjic Dynasty fell to Ottoman
forces in 1389. It is home to the Pec Patriarchete, one of Serbia's
oldest and most cherished religious sites.

Moreover, demanding that Yugoslavia withdraw its internal security
forces from Kosovo, while not simulaneously pressuring Kosovar
Albanian rebels to stop their attacks, looks like out-and-out support
for the rebels' cause. The appearnce of bias is further reinforced by
Washington's unwillingness to pressure Albania to end its omplicity in
providing weapons and sanctuary to Kosovo's secessionist forces.

That one-sidedness has led many Kosovar Albanians to conclude that the
Clinton administration -- despite its official public statements to
the contrary -- backs the secessionist. Expressing an all-too-common
sentiment, Fatos Relmendi, a medical student in Pristina, says the
Clinton administraiton is only telling the American people it doesn't
support independence so they "don't get in the way of Clinton's real
objective" -- indepencence for Kosovo.

That kind of thinking has emboldened the local population's drive for
independence. Indeed, moderate Kosovar Albanians, believing they have
the implied backing of the United States, are becoming more inflexible
in their negotiating stance.

What's more, in leading Kosovar Albanians to believe Washington backs
their demands, the Clinton administration has unwittingly altered
Kosovo's political landscape. Nearly all political discussion is now
focused on independence, ot autonomy or republic status within
Yugoslavia. And even if the administraiton were to change its tune,
it would be too late. The genie of independence is out of the bottle,
and there's no way to stuff it back in now that its appeal has been
discovered.

The result: The Clinton admionistraiton has forged a negotiating
statemale in Kosovo by demanding Mr. Milosevic make an impossible
concession and by unleashing a political agenda that the Kosovar
Albanians cannot possibly unelarn -- independence.

More worrisome than that, Kosovar Albanians could become violent in
their tactics because they expect NATO invervention. Washington could
find it has created a civilwar. On the other hand, if NATO doesn't
intervene, Kosovar Albanians could feel betrayed by the Clinton
adminsistration, hate the United States, and probably suffer more
casualties than if Washington hadn't meddled in the first place. In
short, the Clinton administration has made a difficult and dangerous
situation even worse.

Gary Dempsey is a foreign policy analyst at the Cato Institute.

===========================================================================

Sarajevo Oslobodjenje 4 July 1998

"Exclusive" interview with an unidentified UCK commander by Sandra
Kasalo "somewhere in the Kosovo borderland";

Our Goal Is the Liberation of Kosovo and Joining Albania

Somewhere in the Kosovo borderland -- In the UCK [Kosova Liberation
Army] camp, I had some 10 minutes for an "exclusive" interview with
one of the UCK commanders.

He is a gaunt young man of 28, with a face tanned by the mountain sun,
whose identity, the name of the place where we talked, and personal
information must not be published.

His family lives in the part of Kosovo under the control of the
Yugoslav police and military forces, and he believes that publishing
his name or photograph could imperil their safety. Of himself, he
says he was
an ordinary soldier, but we learned from another source close to the
UCK that he was one of those who had participated in the military
organization of the Kosovo Albanians since 1993. Is he just one of
the commanders as we were told discreetly?

Military Secret

In the interview, which lasted somewhat longer than the period
envisaged for Oslobodjenje, this "influential UCK soldier" did not
want to answer the majority of the questions, claiming that the proper
time for the
Albanians from Kosovo is yet to come. That is why, he said, we, the
journalists, had to be patient.

[Kasalo] When and where was the UCK founded?
[UCK commander] I cannot tell you anything about that.
[Kasalo] Why?
[UCK commander] That will be said publicly when our leaders decide.
[Kasalo] Who are the UCK leaders?
[UCK commander] That is a military secret.

[Kasalo] Over the past three months, serious actions have been
conducted in Kosovo, the UCK has been organizing itself militarily, US
Envoy Richard Holbrooke came to Junik for negotiations, you have your
own
spokesman.... I see no reason why the name of the commander or the
General
Staff should be a secret after all this?

[UCK commander] This is not the right time for publishing names. On
the other hand, they have families, close and distant relatives, and I
think that moves that could put those people in danger should not be
made.
[Kasalo] Ibrahim Rugova is the political leader of the Kosovo
Albanians. Does that mean he is also the commander of the UCK?
[UCK commander] No, it does not. Rugova did not believe that our
people could be organized militarily; all the time, even at this
moment, he has denied, challenged, or diminished our existence and
significance. The
UCK has no contact with him. We will see what will happen in the
future.
[Kasalo] What would happen if Ibrahim Rugova supported your military
option for resolving the Kosovo crisis? Would he be the UCK leader in
that case?

[UCK commander] Those are hypotheses, so I cannot comment on them.

[Kasalo] At the end of last week, Richard Holbrooke met with Lum
Haxniu and Gani Shehu in UCK-controlled Junik near Decani. Are they,
maybe, the UCK commanders?
[UCK commander] No, they are local commanders. That meeting took
place accidentally, and it is very important for us and our struggle.
It
showed that the United States and the international community accept
the UCK as a military force. We believe that freedom can be gained
only with
arms and through fighting. For six years, we have tried to solve the
problem peacefully, but that was impossible. The liberation of Kosovo
is
the only road we want to take now.
[Kasalo] Do you know what Holbrooke discussed with Haxniu and Shehu?
[UCK commander] I was not informed about that.
[Kasalo] Do you think that NATO should intervene in Kosovo, and how
would such an intervention affect the military plans of the UCK?
[UCK commander] It would be good if NATO comes to Kosovo and sees for
itself who the aggressor is.
[Kasalo] But you have not said what that would mean for the UCK.
[UCK commander] Simply, we are in favor of NATO coming, and we can
halt our actions for 10, 15, or 20 days to see what would change. If
there
were no change for the better, then we would continue fighting.
[Kasalo] How much territory does the UCK control?
[UCK commander] Around 40 percent.
[Kasalo] How many soldiers does the UCK have?
[UCK commander] That is a military secret.
[Kasalo] How is the UCK armed?
[UCK commander] Well.
[Kasalo] "Well," since you have to say it because of the Yugoslav
army and police, or "well," because it is really well armed?
[UCK commander] Well, because we have brave hearts and the Serbs do
not.
[Kasalo] Where do your arms come from?
[UCK commander] I do not have the answer to that question.
[Kasalo] Do you receive arms from Bosnia-Herzegovina, as well?
[UCK commander] That is a military secret.
[Kasalo] What kind of relations do you have with the Government of
Albania?
[UCK commander] We do not have any relations.
[Kasalo] What is the UCK's goal?
[UCK commander] Our goal is to liberate our country and join Albania.
[Kasalo] Does that mean that an independent republic of Kosovo is not
your goal?
[UCK commander] That, too, is our goal, and after that, to join
Albania.

UCK Program

[Kasalo] Does the government in Tirana know that you intend to join it?
[UCK commander] I do not have the answer.
[Kasalo] Do you think that the world would allow Kosovo to join
Albania?
[UCK commander] The world cannot deny us that right, because we are
one nation, we have the same tradition, culture, language.... If the
world
allowed Germany to unite, why would it not allow us the same, as we
are one and the same nation with the same root?
[Kasalo] Does this mean that you expect to join the parts of
Macedonia and Montenegro with Albanian majorities?
[UCK commander] That is also our people there, our land, and we
expect them to be joined to Albania, together with Kosovo.
[Kasalo] Is that the common stance of all UCK soldiers, or your
personal one?
[UCK commander] It is the common stance of the UCK.
[Kasalo] From the senior level to the very last soldier?
[UCK commander] Yes, that is part of our program.

===========================================================================

New York Times
July 9, 1998

Frustrated West Attacks Kosovo Stalemate

By CRAIG R. WHITNEY

PARIS -- The United States, Russia and European countries monitoring
fighting between ethnic Albanian and Serbian forces in Kosovo turned
their attention to the rebels Wednesday, condemning outside support for
the fighters and urging all countries to prevent exiles from financing
arms for the insurgents.

While the diplomats of the six countries, known as the contact group,
acknowledge that the primary responsibility for the bloodshed in Kosovo
lies with Serbia, their statement Wednesday was almost as critical of the
insurgents. The diplomats also said for the first time that negotiations
should include ethnic Albanian representatives.

Warning that chances of a peaceful settlement had deteriorated over the
last month, the diplomats, meeting near Bonn, called on Yugoslavian
President Slobodan Milosevic to live up to commitments he made in Moscow
on June 16 to stop the Serbian attacks and resume talks with Kosovo's

ethnic Albanian political leader, Ibrahim Rugova.

Kosovo is a province in Serbia; Montenegro and Serbia are the two
remaining republics in the Yugoslav federation, with Serbia by far the
dominant partner.

Like the rebels, Rugova has called for independence for the province, a
goal the contact group countries -- the United States, Russia, Germany,
Italy, Britain and France -- do not endorse. Some ethnic Albanian
fighters have complained recently that Rugova, who advocates a peaceful
approach, does not speak for them.

The diplomats said they had agreed to suggest elements of a political
settlement in an effort to speed negotiations, but they did not
elaborate. They have said that any settlement would have to restore the
autonomy that Kosovo had before Milosevic revoked it in 1989, when he was
president of Serbia.

About 90 percent of the province's 2 million people are ethnic Albanians,
and the diplomats in Bonn also expressed concern Wednesday that the
conflict could draw in Albania and Macedonia, a former Yugoslav republic
that also has a sizable Albanian minority.

NATO officials said Wednesday in Brussels that military contingency plans
could be put into effect within hours if the allies were called upon to
act in Kosovo, and the contact group states threatened again Wednesday to
consider military steps if the two sides ignored demands to stop the
fighting.

The six countries also said they would seek a United Nations Security
Council resolution calling on both sides to stop fighting, requiring
Milosevic to keep his promises to resume a dialogue and requiring both
the Serbian authorities and the rebels to ensure the safety of
international observers in Kosovo.

The statement from Bonn Wednesday reflected the frustration that the
American special emissary to the Balkans, Richard Holbrooke, said he and
other diplomats had experienced last weekend with disunity between the
Albanian political leadership in Pristina, the capital of Kosovo, and the
fighters of the rebel Kosovo Liberation Army.

As the statement put it: "It is clear that the Kosovo Albanian team for
all these talks must be fully representative of their community in order
to speak authoritatively. Although the primary responsibility for the
situation in Kosovo rests with Belgrade, the contact group acknowledges
that armed Kosovo Albanian groups also have a responsibility to avoid
violence and all armed activities."

Robert Gelbard, the Clinton administration's principal troubleshooter in
the area, said in Bonn Wednesday that the Kosovo Liberation Army
controlled more than 30 percent of the province. But if the militias did
not agree to seek a peaceful settlement, he added, "we will try to
interrupt their ability to sustain themselves through the full chain of
supply."

Copyright 1998 The New York Times Company

===========================================================================

DATE=7/9/98
NUMBER=2-235227
TITLE=KOSOVO MONITORS (L)
DATELINE=PRISTINA

INTRO: DIPLOMATIC OBSERVERS FROM FIVE COUNTRIES THURSDAY BEGAN REGULAR
INSPECTION VISITS IN YUGOSLAVIA'S KOSOVO PROVINCE. V-O-A CORRESPONDENT
ART CHIMES REPORTS FROM THE PROVINCIAL CAPITAL, PRISTINA.

TEXT: DIPLOMATS FROM THE UNITED STATES, RUSSIA, BRITAIN, BELGIUM AND THE
NETHERLANDS TRAVELLED TOGETHER IN THE FIRST WORKING VISIT BY THE NEW
INTERNATIONAL OBSERVER MISSION.

THIS GROUP INCLUDED MILITARY ATTACHES WHO ARE EXPERTS IN ASSESSING THE
SECURITY SITUATION IN KOSOVO, WHERE SEPARATIST ETHNIC ALBANIAN GUERRILLAS
HAVE BEEN BATTLING POLICE AND ARMY
TROOPS.

U-S STATE DEPARTMENT SPOKESMAN JAMES RUBIN SAID THE DIPLOMATS ARE IN
KOSOVO TO OBSERVE, NOT TO RESOLVE PROBLEMS. BUT HE ADDED THAT THE VERY
PRESENCE OF THE OBSERVERS WILL, IN HIS WORDS, "HOPEFULLY DETER PEOPLE
FROM DOING WHAT THEY MIGHT OTHERWISE DO
IF THEY WERE NOT GOING TO BE OBSERVED."

THE PROGRAM WAS INAUGURATED MONDAY IN A CEREMONIAL CARAVAN THAT INCLUDED
AMBASSADORS AND ABOUT 100 JOURNALISTS. THE REGULAR WORKING TRIPS OF THE
OBSERVER MISSION HAVE A MUCH LOWER PROFILE.

DIPLOMATS IN THE OBSERVER MISSION ARE ALL ACCREDITED TO BELGRADE
EMBASSIES ARE ADDING A TOTAL OF ABOUT 100 PEOPLE TO STAFF THE NEW
PROGRAM. THE PROGRAM CAME OUT OF A MEETING BETWEEN YUGOSLAV PRESIDENT
SLOBODAN MILOSEVIC AND RUSSIAN PRESIDENT BORIS YELTSIN IN MOSCOW LAST MONTH.

VIOLENCE IN KOSOVO HAS CLAIMED MORE THAN 350 LIVES THIS YEAR, AND TENS OF
THOUSANDS OF CIVILIANS HAVE BEEN DISPLACED FROM THEIR HOMES, MANY FLEEING
OVER THE BORDER TO ALBANIA OR MACEDONIA.

INTERNATIONAL EFFORTS TO END THE VIOLENCE HAVE HAD LITTLE EFFECT. THE
SIX-NATION CONTACT GROUP ON THE FORMER YUGOSLAVIA Đ MEETING WEDNESDAY --
CALLED FOR A CEASEFIRE AND AN END TO WEAPONS SHIPMENTS AND FUNDING FOR
THE REBELS. AND NATO HAS PREPARED
CONTINGENCY PLANS FOR MILITARY ACTION AGAINST SERB FORCES, SHOULD IT BE
NECESSARY. (SIGNED)

Source: Voice of America

===========================================================================

DATE=7/9/98
TYPE=BACKGROUND REPORT
NUMBER=5-40887
TITLE=KOSOVO / MONEY
DATELINE=PRISTINA

INTRO: HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF ETHNIC ALBANIANS LIVING IN WESTERN
EUROPE AND NORTH AMERICA HAVE FOR SOME TIME BEEN SENDING MONEY TO HELP
BUILD AND SUSTAIN ETHNIC ALBANIAN INSTITUTIONS IN KOSOVO. BUT NOW, WITH
THE RISE OF A GUERRILLA INSURGENCY AIMED
AT OUSTING KOSOVO'S SERBIAN RULERS, MUCH OF THAT MONEY IS NOW GOING TO
THE REBELS. V-O-A CORRESPONDENT ART CHIMES REPORTS FROM KOSOVO.

TEXT: KOSOVO IS THE POOREST PART OF THE FORMER YUGOSLAVIA. THERE IS
LITTLE ECONOMIC ACTIVITY, AND UNEMPLOYMENT IS HIGH. BECAUSE OF THE
POLITICAL SITUATION HERE, AS WELL AS THE BATTERED ECONOMY, MANY ETHNIC
ALBANIANS HAVE LEFT. PERHAPS 500-THOUSAND KOSOVO ALBANIANS LIVE IN THE
WEST -- IN AMERICA, SCANDINAVIA, GERMANY, SWITZERLAND, AND ELSEWHERE --
AND THEY SEND MONEY HOME TO SUPPORT THEIR FAMILIES AND ALBANIAN
INSTITUTIONS IN KOSOVO.

THE ETHNIC ALBANIANS OF KOSOVO HAVE AN ELECTED, BUT UNRECOGNIZED
GOVERNMENT OF WHAT THEY CALL THE "REPUBLIC OF KOSOVO," PLUS A UNIVERSITY,
SCHOOLS, AND OTHER INSTITUTIONS. THE BULK OF THE MONEY HAS COME FROM
KOSOVO ALBANIANS ABROAD.

A YEAR OR SO AGO, 60 PERCENT OF THE BUDGET CAME FROM THOSE ABROAD. BUT
AN ECONOMICS ADVISOR TO SHADOW PRESIDENT IBRAHIM RUGOVA, FATMIR REXEPI,
SAYS TAXES COLLECTED BY THE SHADOW GOVERNMENT ON LOCAL RESIDENTS ARE
DECREASING BECAUSE OF KOSOVO'S
ECONOMIC DIFFICULTIES. SO HE SAYS ETHNIC ALBANIAN INSTITUTIONS HERE ARE
INCREASINGLY RELYING ON THOSE CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE DIASPORA.

BUT AT THE SAME TIME, THAT FUNDING IS DRYING UP AS THE DIASPORA SHIFTS
ITS SUPPORT TO THE REBELS OF THE KOSOVO LIBERATION ARMY BYSENDING MONEY
TO VARIOUS FUNDS THAT FUNNEL THE MONEY TO THE REBELS.

REPORTER ARDAIN ARIFAJ OF THE ALBANIAN LANGUAGE "KOHA DITORE" (DAILY)
NEWSPAPER HAS BEEN FOLLOWING THE STORY.

/// ARIFAJ ACTUALITY ///

IT'S, I DON'T KNOW, I WOULD SAY PERHAPS 100 PERCENT THINGS HAVE CHANGED.
THEY ARE NOT PAYING THE GOVERNMENT OF KOSOVO AT ALL. ALL THE MONEY
THAT THEY PAY GOES TO THIS FUND, "FATHERLAND IS CALLING," OR ANY
OTHER FUND. OR EVEN THEY DO COLLECT CASH MONEY AT DIFFERENT MEETINGS. SO
ALL THE MONEY GOES TO U-C-K.

/// END ACTUALITY ///

THE U-C-K IS THE KOSOVO LIBERATION ARMY.

BECAUSE OF AN UNDEVELOPED BANKING SYSTEM AND NOW INTERNATIONAL SANCTIONS,
GETTING MONEY INTO KOSOVO TO HELP THE REBELS IS A BIT OF A PROBLEM.
SOMETIMES CASH IS CARRIED IN, SOMETIMES IT IS USED TO BUY WEAPONS ABROAD,
WHICH ARE THEN SMUGGLED IN.

/// OPT /// SOME TRAVEL AGENCIES ARE ACTING AS BANKERS, WITH MONEY
GIVEN TO A TRAVEL AGENT ABROAD PAID OUT HERE. IN THE PAST,THE PROCESS
HAS BEEN USED FOR WORKERS ABROAD TO REMIT MONEY TO THEIR FAMILIES. IT
COULD ALSO BE USED TO TRANSFER MONEY FOR OTHER PURPOSES. LOCAL TRAVEL
AGENTS CONFIRMED THE PROCESS, BUT ASKED NOT TO BE IDENTIFIED, OR
RECORDED. UNDERSTANDABLY, NONE WOULD ADMIT ANY INVOLVEMENT IN
TRANSFERRING MONEY TO AN ILLEGAL
GUERRILLA ORGANIZATION. /// END OPT ///

THE POPULARITY OF THE KOSOVO LIBERATION ARMY IS SURE TO HAVE AN IMPACT ON
CIVILIAN INSTITUTIONS THAT HAVE IN THE PAST BEEN RECEIVING MONEY FROM
ABROAD. NINETY PERCENT OF THE BUDGET OF THE ETHNIC ALBANIAN SHADOW
GOVERNMENT SUPPORTS A UNIVERSITY AND SCHOOL SYSTEM. IT IS SUMMER NOW
HERE IN KOSOVO, AND THE SCHOOLS ARE CLOSED. BUT EDUCATORS ARE ALREADY
WORRIED ABOUT WHAT HAPPENS WHEN STUDENTS RETURN IN THE FALL. (SIGNED)

Source: Voice of America

vfil...@haverford.edu

unread,

Jul 11, 1998, 3:00:00 AM7/11/98

From: Filipovic Vanja <vfil...@haverford.edu>
Subject: BosNet KOSOVA UPDATE: Kosova in the Media

----------------------------------------------------------------------
B o s N e t - July 11, 1998
______________________________________________________________________

KOSOVA NEWS nr. 24, 9 July 1998
-----------------------------------------------------------

CONTACT GROUP COMES UP WITH NEW STATEMENT IN BONN
PRISHTINA, July 9 (ARTA) - The Contact Group, meeting in Bonn on July 8 to
review the situation in Kosova, "agreed to recommend to the negotiating
teams basic elements for a resolution of the question of Kosovo's status," a
statement issued following the meeting said.
It will "define possible further elements for the future status of Kosovo,
which would be made available to the authorities in Belgrade and the
leadership of the Kosovo Albanian community for a dialogue with
international involvement," the 13-point statement of the Contact Group,
meeting at political directors' level, said. The six-nation Group noted that
"the prospects of a peaceful settlement have deteriorated since the Contact
Group's meeting in London on June 12."
The Contact Group assessed Belgrade's response to the requirements set out
in the 12 June London statement: to cease all action by the security forces
affecting the civilian population and order the withdrawal of security units
used for civilian repression; to enable an effective and continuous
international observer Group in Kosovo and allow unimpeded access for
observers; to facilitate, in agreement with UNHCR and ICRC, the full return
to their homes of refugees and displaced persons and to allow free and
unimpeded access for humanitarian organizations and supplies to Kosovo; and
to make rapid progress in the dialogue with the Kosovo Albanian leadership.
The Contact Group noted that "withdrawal of [Serb] security forces used for
civilian repression has not yet been carried out", nor "rapid progress in
the dialogue with the Kosova Albanian leadership" achieved. In point five,
the Contact Group called for an immediate cessation of hostilities in Kosova
"to pave the way for continuous talks between Belgrade and the Kosovo
Albanian leadership... and the future status of Kosovo." Contact Group
members will pursue this goal through immediate talks with both Belgrade and
the Kosova Albanians, the statement said, adding that the Kosova Albanian

team for all these talks "must be fully representative of their community in
order to speak authoritatively."

In an implicit acknowledgment of a set-back, aware that the basic demands of
the Contact Group have not been complied with by Belgrade, the Contact Group
now pins much hope on Belgrade implementing "fully the undertakings made by
President Milosevic in Moscow on 16 June".
In point nine, the statement notes that, in order to help the parties, "the
Contact Group set in hand work to define possible further elements for the
future status of Kosovo, which would be made available to the authorities in
Belgrade and the leadership of the Kosovo Albanian community for a dialogue
with international involvement."

IHF CALLS FOR LARGE-SCALE MONITORING MISSION IN KOSOVA
PRISHTINA, July 8 (KIC) - The International Helsinki Federation for Human
Rights (IHF) issued a statement today in Prishtina noting that IHF, in
cooperation with the Kosova Helsinki Committee, the Dutch Helsinki
Committee, and the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Prishtina,
dispatched a fact-finding mission to Kosova to investigate the conflict
situations and violations of international human rights and humanitarian law
"resulting from the escalation of security operations by the Yugoslav
government".
It is evident that the Kosovar civilian population has been intentionally
and disproportionatelly targeted by security forces contrary to common
Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions and Protocol II (1977) concerning
non-international conflict, the IHF statement said. "The mission obtained
information... concerning the believed abduction, i.e. arrest and detention
of 400 Kosova Albanians by government security forces in violation of
international law, as well as reports that the KLA has detained an estimated
30 Serbian detainees", the IHF said.
The IHF made a number of recommendations, including the deployment by the
international community of a "robust and large-scale international
monitoring mission", withdrawal of 'FRY' security and military units from
Kosova, as well as "the deployment of a preventive force to monitor the
implementation and enforcement of a cease-fire and to replace Serbian
security forces".

SERB MILITARY POUNDS BORDER VILLAGES IN GJAKOVA AND DECAN DISTRICTS
PRISHTINA, July 9 (KIC) - Yesterday and last night, Serbian forces shelled
with heavy artillery the Reka e Keqe region in the border area with Albania.
The sound of heavy detonations was heard in the town of Gjakova itself. The
extent of damage and possible casualty-toll in this latest Serb onslaught is
still unknown.
What is known is that local Albanians resistance forces, led by the UcK,
have been battling with Serb military and paramilitary forces. All the Reka
e Keqe region's villages have been engulfed in the fighting, local sources
said, refuting allegations that the village of Morine had fallen in Serb
hands.
Meanwhile, reports said last night and today the villages of Decan have been
shelled by Serb military from its positions on Suka e Biteshit and Kodra e
Zhdrelles. The villages of Gllogjan, Gramacel, Baballoc, Shaptej have been
reportedly targeted.

SERB SMASHES TEN ALBANIAN BUSINESSES
PRISHTINA, July 9 (KIC) - At 1:30 a.m. Wednesday, Ivan Katiq, a local Serb
from the northwestern town of Istog, smashed up doors and windows to ten
Albanian-owned businesses in the center of the town. Serb police told
Albanians the perpetrator had been arrested. He had been seen at large in
Istog, though, the newspaper said.

ARMED SERBS OCCUPY ALBANIAN APARTMENTS
PRISHTINA, July 9 (ARTA) - In the past few days, armed Serbs have forcefully
usurped several apartments belonging to Albanians in the municipality of
Fushe Kosova ('Kosovo Polje'), sources said.
Five of them have been usurped at the village of Bresje, and several others
in the small town of Fushe Kosova, sources said. The illegally seized
apartments had been evacuated by their Albanian occupants amidst an
increasingly tense situation in the recent days.
Furniture has been thrown out in corridors by the new, Serb occupants.

BODY OF UNIDENTIFIED MAN TAKEN TO PRIZREN MORGUE
PRISHTINA, July 9 (KIC) - The body of a still unidentified man was taken
Tuesday afternoon to the town hospital morgue in Prizren by the Serb police.
The chapter of the Council for the Defense of Human Rights and Freedoms
(CDHRF) in Prizren said the police had allegedly found the dead man near the
town of Rahovec, at a place called "Te rrasat". The body has bullet wounds,
the Council said.

THERE IS NO ORGANISED ARMS TRAFFICKING - COMMANDER
KUKES, July 9 (ATA) - The commander of the Second Infantry Division in
Kukes, Brigade-General Kudusi Lamaj, has ruled out the possibility of
organised arms trafficking across the Albanian-Yugoslav border.
"So far there has been no evidence of an organised arms traffic," Lamaj told
ATA. However, he did not exclude the possibility for certain persons, mainly
inhabitants of border villages, to have sold weapons to inhabitants beyond
the border.
Serbian official circles have recently accused Albania of allowing arms
smuggling to Kosova.
"Despite the tense situation in some 120 km of Albania's border with YU, the
local government structures of the border communes, in cooperation with the
border police, have worked to prevent any arms trafficking, the spokesman of
the Kukes prefecture, Fadil Zhuda, told ATA.
The charges brought by the Serbian side, added Zhuta, aim at justifying the
continued violence against the Albanian people of Kosova.

U.S. DEPT. OF STATE: THE VIEWS OF KLA OUGHT TO BE COVERED
US Dept. of State: July 9- During the Daily Press Briefing at the Dept. of
State (held Wednesday, July 8), the briefer, Mr. James Rubin, asked about
the US principles with the Contact Group that met in Bonn the same day, said
that Ambassador Hill was working closely on those principles... which are
"obviously short of independence, which was the goal of some, and far better
than the stripped autonomy and lack of rights the Kosovar Albanians have. So
between that and consistent with the previous Contact Group statement of
enhanced autonomy within the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia..."
Once again, Mr Rubin underlined that "... We do not regard the KLA -- this
loosely-knit group -- as a terrorist organization; we do not. We regard it
as an insurgency that is using force to respond to the stripped autonomy -
to the lack of an autonomy that President Milosevic took away from them.
That is our view on this organization. ...We do not say that the KLA ought
to be at the table. We say that indirectly or directly their views ought to
be covered....We want to see the table include the widest possible
cross-section of Kosovar Albanian views. As a practical matter, the views of
the KLA need to be reflected either directly or indirectly. Those are
careful terms of art and we all know what they mean.
So there's no new position, and that has always been our position".
Asked to comment the statement of the Greece愀 Defemence Minister about the
alleged mercenaries involved in the war in Kosova, Mr. Rubin said that the
US know that they have sought to participate and sought to give assistance
to the Kosovar Albanians in terms of actual mercenaries, "but we still, to
my knowledge, don't have evidence that the Kosovar Albanians have welcomed
these mercenaries into their ranks".

==========================================================================

New York Times
July 11, 1998

The Balance of Firepower Shifts in Kosovo
By CHRIS HEDGES

PRISTINA, Serbia -- Separatist rebels have acquired
arsenals of antitank and antiaircraft weapons that
are shifting the balance of power in the ethnic war in
Kosovo Province.

The new firepower has thwarted the recent Serbian drive
against rebel enclaves, left the army and the police
reeling from mounting casualties, allowed the ethnic
Albanian guerrillas to inch forward toward key towns and
probably ensured that the conflict will last for months
if not years.

"Events are moving so fast on the ground that we may not
be able to find a solution to halt the fighting," said a
Western diplomat. "The military balance has changed
dramatically." In a reference to NATO's threats of air
strikes to stop the fighting, the diplomat said, "Any
intervention would only assist a rebel force that, at
this point, needs no assistance."

While the rebels are guarded about letting outsiders
view stocks of weapons smuggled over the border from
Albania, there has been a noticeable proliferation of
rocket-propelled grenades and the highly accurate German
antitank weapon known as the Armbrust. A rebel in
Smonica, lifting the grayish-green tube, showed the
snap-out informational display on the German weapon with
a series of tanks of various sizes profiled on the
sight.

"You match the target with the profile and fire," said
the rebel, whose nom de guerre is Wolf. "You don't miss
much with this weapon. We have taken out four Serbian
tanks, three troop carriers and two Praga antiaircraft
vehicles. More than 80 Serbian soldiers have been
killed. We have yet to lose a fighter." The numbers of
deaths and vehicles destroyed could not be independently
verified.

The Serbian special police force and soldiers deployed
in the province have suddenly become very skittish about
going into areas held by the rebels. Convoys of armored
vehicles move through rebel-held areas, rarely leaving
the blacktop roads, raking both sides of the highway
with heavy machine-gun fire to ward off attacks.

The Serbs had intended their most recent assault on the
Kosovo rebels to be the blow that crushed the ethnic
Albanian rebel movement. Yugoslavia has about 50,000
troops in Kosovo, a combination of Yugoslav army
soldiers and special police officers. And the Serbs have
the superior resources of the Yugoslav army to draw on,
if they choose.

But the rebel movement is growing in numbers and in
strength, fed by recruits, money and arms from outside
Serbia. The rebels may not have the power to win a
secessionist war against Serbia, but with arms and money
they can keep up their resistance and draw out the
conflict.

The mounting strength, coupled with the rebels' decision
to dozen a day

There are increasing reports of Serbian desertions and
one rebel in Smonica was wearing a Yugoslav army uniform
he said was left in the woods by a soldier who had
changed into civilian clothes and fled.

The Kosovo Liberation Army, despite its shoddy
organization and lack of military acumen, is apparently
blessed with large sums of money sent by ethnic
Albanians overseas, an inexhaustible supply line over
the mountains from Albania and thousands of recruits.
Rebel soldiers, in full uniform with the red and black
patch of the Kosovo Liberation Army, pull thick wads of
German marks from their pockets.

There are also signs that the arrival of dozens of
former professional soldiers, as well as some
mercenaries, are rapidly turning the ragtag band into a
viable military force of several thousand fighters.

The commander in Smonica, for example, a man in his 40s
who goes by the nom de guerre Besnik, was a senior
career officer in the old Yugoslav army. He had in his
command a former army instructor for antitank weapons.
His force of several hundred fighters has steadily
increased the territory under its control, often by
moving forward a few hundred feet or yards each night,
moves that have persuaded the Serbs to retreat each
time.

The rebels and Western diplomats say that a number of
ethnic Albanians from Croatia who fought in the 1991
independence struggle against Belgrade are joining the
rebel army.

The supreme commander of NATO, Gen. Wesley Clarke,
during a meeting a few days ago in Zagreb, Croatia, with
the Croatian defense minister, expressed his displeasure
over the flow of professional soldiers from Croatia to
Kosovo to bolster the rebel movement, according to
Western diplomats in Zagreb.

"We are not sure that Zagreb is organizing this," said a
Western diplomat, "but at the same time it is doing
nothing to stop it."

There is an increasingly military feel to rebel-held
areas, with the unkempt civilian soldiers of a month ago
being replaced by men who report on walkie-talkies to
commanders and move in columns or groups of several
hundred.

The Western alliance has warned Belgrade that it might
carry out air strikes unless Belgrade removes its
special police forces and military, but the surprising
growth and reach of the rebel movement, which holds
about 40 percent of the province, has left Western
diplomats as concerned about the guerrillas as about the
Serbian police and military. The ethnic Albanians in
Kosovo make up 90 percent of the 2 million population.

At a rebel camp in Smonica, just over the hill from the
main road, the tread of Serbian armor could be heard
thundering past. The several hundred rebels, who had set
up a well-equipped field hospital, had stacks of
antitank and rocket-propelled grenades, a huge
recoilless cannon and 12.7-millimeter antiaircraft guns.

"The Serbs race past on the road blindly," said Besnik.
"They are scared."

In the last few days, rebel soldiers have drawn closer
to the strategically important towns of Pec and
Djakovica. They have taken the hilltop villages of Nec
and Ramoz north of Djakovica, giving them positions over
the city. They have also taken towns, including Lodja,
south of Pec. Rebel barricades have once again closed
the road to Kijevo, which was opened by the Serbs a week
ago. A three-day government attack to drive rebels from
an open-pit coal mine five miles from Pristina has seen
Serb forces enter the town, but the mine remains closed
because of constant rebel sniper fire on police
positions.

The decision by Belgrade to cordon off areas of combat
to the press, blocking the emotionally charged
television shots that create pressure on Western
governments to intervene, as well as to cut phone lines
to areas under attack, has left the fighting, now often
heavy, largely uncovered and unseen by the outside
world.

Belgrade, in a desperate attempt to stanch the rebel
advances, has been pounding border villages like Junik
with heavy artillery in the last three days.

The pro-government Serbian Media Center said Friday that
Yugoslav forces had confiscated weapons and ammunition
after fighting in the towns of Vrbnica and Kosare.

==========================================================================

Christian Science Monitor

FRIDAY, JULY 10, 1998

Rise of Armed Civilians Adds to
Kosovo Dangers

Visit to province this week by radical Serb official may have sparked a
new spate of ethnic killings by Serbs.

Justin Brown
Special to The Christian Science Monitor

GORAZDEVAC, YUGOSLAVIA

Less than 24 hours after Serbian radical leader Vojislav Seselj came to
this bucolic farming village in western Kosovo, the killing began.

On a tree-lined street lies an unidentified body. In the neighboring
village of Lodza, ethnic Albanians speak of guerrilla fighters killed in
combat.

Mr. Seselj, a recently appointed vice prime minister in the Serbian
government, toured parts of Kosovo, including the Serb-inhabited village
of Gorazdevac, on July 5. His visit, Serbs and Albanians say, provoked a
new round of civilian fighting.

In what Western diplomats say is a dangerous new trend in Kosovo, Seselj
and other Serbian officials have begun to encourage Serbian civilians to
take up arms. In some cases, authorities have distributed guns to the
Serbian population.

"Albanian terrorists only exist because our police [force] is letting
them," Mr. Seselj told reporters recently, referring to the
independence-seeking Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), which is estimated to
control 40 percent of the region.

The irregular fighting in Kosovo comes just as the international
community has begun to press for a cease-fire. Led by the six-country
Contact Group on the former Yugoslavia, diplomats this week launched a
monitoring mission that would help pinpoint areas of conflict and
presumably pave the way for a halt in the fighting.

But, say diplomats in the region, armed civilians could harm prospects
for peace because they are not easily controlled by the centralized
government in Belgrade. The same can be said of the KLA, which lacks a
clear chain of command.

Furthermore, the growth of independent fighters indicates that the Serbs
are losing control of Kosovo, which they consider to be the cradle of
their culture and is also a source of mineral wealth.

"This is alarming," says a Western observer in Kosovo. "We don't know
what to expect from these [armed civilians] and we don't know if they can
be controlled."

Already Serbian civilians have set up armed roadblocks in several regions.

According to a KLA fighter in Lodza, the fighting near Gorazdevac began
when members of the KLA approached the house of a Serb and asked him to
surrender his arms.

"[The Serb] let them into the house and then opened fire," says the KLA
fighter, who identified himself as Mehdi. "Two of our men were killed as
they tried to run."

The arming of the populace is reminiscent of the wars in Croatia and
Bosnia, when volunteers committed some of the worst atrocities of the war.

One leader of the irregular forces during that time was Seselj, who once
bragged that his men mutilated Croatians during the 1991-1995 war. Since
then, Seselj, leader of the Serbian Radical Party, has become a partner
in Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic's government.

But unlike in the wars in Bosnia and Croatia, the civilians are fighting
inside the borders of Yugoslavia and fall under the responsibility of
Belgrade.

"If these people commit atrocities, then there would be no doubt that
Milosevic is responsible," says Dejan Anastasijevic, a reporter for the
independent Belgrade-based magazine Vreme.

Already more than 300 people, mostly ethnic Albanian civilians, have died
in Kosovo since the Serbian forces launched a Feb. 28 crackdown.

While the ranks of the KLA have swelled in recent months, Serbian
conscripts have become less willing to fight for Kosovo, where some 2
million ethnic Albanians outnumber Serbs 9 to 1. The arming of locals is
an apparent attempt by the Serbs to bolster their forces.

Also fighting on the Serbian side are irregular police forces.

"Every day we see paramilitaries driving through the streets, trying to
intimidate us," says Tahir Demaj, vice president of the ethnic Albanian
Human Rights Council in Pec.

______________________________________________________________________

vfil...@haverford.edu

unread,

Jul 13, 1998, 3:00:00 AM7/13/98

From: Filipovic Vanja <vfil...@haverford.edu>
Subject: BosNet KOSOVA UPDATE: Kosova in the Media

----------------------------------------------------------------------
B o s N e t - July 13, 1998
______________________________________________________________________

PRESS RELEASE, 10 July 1998

ICG Examines the Albanian Dimension of the Kosovo Crisis

The International Crisis Group (ICG) publishes today a report
examining the Albanian dimension of the escalating conflict in
Kosovo.

The 15-page report, entitled The View from Tirana: The Albanian
Dimension of the Kosovo Crisis, is the latest in a series of ICG
studies of the southern Balkans.

As fighting escalates in Kosovo and Kosovo Albanian refugees
stream out of the ethnically-divided, southern Serbian province
into neighbouring Albania, that country -- Europes most
impoverished -- is being inexorably dragged into the conflict.

Relations between Albanians from Albania proper and their ethnic
kin over the border in Kosovo are complex. The political
division of the past half century and Albanias isolation have
caused the two communities to evolve in a very different fashion.

Given the nature of the fighting in Kosovo and the ethnic and, in
some cases, family ties between Kosovo Albanians and Albanians
from Albania proper, it appears almost impossible for Tirana to
stand passively by.

Since a violent outbreak of anarchy in spring 1997 in the wake of
the collapse of a series of pyramid investment schemes, parts of
northern Albania on Kosovos border have been largely beyond
Tirana's control. These regions therefore potentially offer
fertile soil for insurgents, whether from Kosovo or from Albania.

The ICG report describes the background to Kosovo-Albanian
relations, both during the communist era and more recently during
the 1992-1997 administration of ex-president Sali Berisha. It
also examines the position of the current Albanian government,
its restrained response to the crisis and its relationship with
Kosovo Albanian politicians.

The report examines how the Albanian media and opposition have
reacted to the violence in Kosovo, and considers Serbian
allegations that Kosovo Albanians are using northern Albania both
to acquire weapons and to recruit soldiers. It concludes with a
series of recommendations aimed at lessening tension and
contributing to stability in the region.

For further information and copies of the report, contact ICG in
Sarajevo on (+387 71) 447 845, 447 846 or 200 447, in Washington
on (+1 202) 986 9750, or in Brussels on (+32 2) 502 9038. The
report can also be accessed on ICGs web site -
http://www.intl-crisis-group.org
________________
forwarded by PBD
Originally from Nalini Lasiewicz

==========================================================================

KOSOVA NEWS nr.26, 12 July 1998

TWO ALBANIANS KILLED. THREE OTHERS FEARED KILLED IN WESTERN KOSOVA
PRISHTINA, July 12 (KIC) - The village of Isniq, municipality of Decan, was
shelled yesterday during the Serb attack on the Strellc i Eperm village,
sources in Decan said.
There have been no reported casualties there.
Heavy fighting was reported in the village of Prejlep last night.
Gunfire could be heard today (Sunday) along the Gjakova - Peja roadway,
local sources said.
In Peja, Shaban Mucaj (65), resident of Lluka e Eperme, a mentally- sick
person, died yesterday of Serb torture.
It is suspected that in the Dardania neighborhood of Peja, neighboring on
the village of Loxhe - scene of fierce fighting between Serbian troops and
local Albanian resistance forces yesterday - Serbs killed and then dumped
into the water ditch Ali Panxhaj (54), owner of the "Delta-Impex" firm, and
two elderly women, whose names have not yet been made known.
Meanwhile, Rexhe Morina, native of Loxhe, died last night of wounds he had
received during the Serbian attack earlier yesterday.

LOXHA AND RAUSHIQ ATTACKED AGAIN
Pejë, 11 July (ARTA) - Serb military\police and paramilitary forces attacked
the village of Loxhë and Raushiq, ever since 0800CET, this morning, CDHRF
sources inform. The offensive was particularly fierce in the village Loxhë,
where the shelling with surface to surface missiles began ever since
0930CET. The shelling was conducted from the military base in Zagërllë, from
a place called Qerhane, from the hill of Zahaq and from Gorazhdec, village
inhabited by Serbs, who were of great help to the Serb forces, in their
attack.
Great panic took over the people of Pejë as a great number of them started
fleeing their homes, following the miss-information transmitted in the
Albanian satellite TV station, on 10 July, about the shelling of Pejë. The
neighborhood of Pejë "Berzhenik" is almost completely emptied.

TWO KILLED AT THE BORDER WITH ALABANIA
Prizren, 11 July (ARTA) - Ylber Zenel Fanaj and Albrim Zaim Fanaj, from
Vërmica e Zhurit, were killed by the Serb forces on 10 July near the border
with Albania, local CDHRF sources in Prizren inform.
It was later confirmed that the police later mistreated the victims’
families, and on that occasion.

SEVEN ALBANIANS WOUNDED IN STRELLC
PRISHTINA, July 12 (KIC) - Seven Albanians were reported wounded Saturday
evening in Strellc i Eperm village of Decan, western Kosova, during a Serb
forces attack against Albanian positions. Sources in Decan said there were
heavy clashes between the Serb military forces and local Albanian resistance
units in Strellc. Strellc i Eperm came under a heavy mortar attack after
sunset yesterday. Seven local Albanians were wounded and material damage was
caused.
The wounded Albanians are: Avni Hasanmetaj (33), Xhevat Hasanmetaj (29),
Syle Hasanmetaj (28), Hajredin Hasanmetaj (23), Isa Avdimetaj (32), Rexhep
Avdimetaj (24) and Selman Avdimetaj (15).
Avni Hasanmetaj has received life-threatening wounds, sources said.
Unconfirmed reports said that there was loss of life on the Serb side.

SEVERAL VILLAGES OF SHALA E BAJGORES SHELLED
PRISHTINA, July 12 (KIC) - Serbian forces shelled the villages of Kutllovc,
Bare, Mazhiq, Vidishiq and Stanterg in the region of Shala e Bajgores,
municipality of Mitrovica, in northern Kosova, on Saturday afternoon.
Serbs started shelling at 12:30 hrs from the hilltop village of Koshtove,
where 'Yugoslav' military has a bases.
Saturday's shelling as well as earlier Serb attacks on the villages of
Pantine, Okrashtice and Caber, indicate that Serb forces are intent on
extending their offensive operations in other parts of Kosova.

SERB SNIPERS SHOOT AT AND WOUND TWO HUMANITARIAN ACTIVISTS

PRISHTINA, July 12 (KIC) - Two activists with the Prishtina-based "Mother
Teresa" charity association - Xhevdet Stullqaku (37) and Selatin Hasani
(40), both of them from Obiliq near Prishtina - were wounded by Serb snipers
Saturday afternoon.
The two humanitarian workers were wounded at around 16:00 yesterday at
Janovode village. They were driving back home to Obiliq after having
delivered a lorryload of relief supplies at Sibovc village, when attacked by
Serbs at Janovoda village.
Witnesses said Serb snipers opened fire without warning on the lorry of
"Mother Teresa" association. Xhevdet Stullqaku received life-threatening
wounds in his head, whereas Selatin Hasani sustained slighter injuries.
Mr. Stullqaku underwent a head surgery in the Prishtina hospital last
evening. His condition is still critical, hospital sources said.

SERB PARAMILITARIES OPEN FIRE ON PANTINE AND OKRASHTICE
PRISHTINA, July 12 (KIC) - Serb paramilitaries, joined by local Serbs of the
Frasher ('Svinjare') village opened fire for two hours, from 24:00 through
02:00, last night in the direction of the villages of Pantine and
Okrashtice, local sources said.

UCK SAYS IT IS EXPANDING THE ZONE OF OPERATIONS IN KOSOVA
PRISHTINA, July 12 (KIC) - The Ushtria Clirimtare e Kosoves (UCK, the Kosova
Liberation Army) said in its most recent statement (numbered 49) it has been
extending operations in a wider area in Kosova. The war in Kosova between
the Liberation Army and the occupying troops has assumed dimensions of a
large-scale operation, the UCK said in the statement forwarded to the media
in Prishtina. The UCK units have scored considerable results in maintaining
and attaining control over many strategic points and other vital objects in
Kosova, the organization said.
The UCK statement referred to the zones of Pashtrik, Drenica, Llapi,
Karadaku and Dukagjini, as ares where actions have been taken by the UCK "in
order to strengthen and extend positions". The UCK said fighting was going
on in Drenica, whereas "units for emergency action" have undertaken
important actions in Prishtina, Podujeva, in Shale and in Bardh i Madh
('Belacevac'). Three Albanian fighters have been killed, whereas UCK has
carried actions in the Karadaku zone, too, the statement said.
"The largest operations are being carried by UCK units in the zone of
Dukagjini, in order to expand the free territory", the statement said,
adding that the Serbian occupier has sustained huge losses, and the Albanian
resistance forces lost four men.
The General Staff of the UCK calls on the Albanian people to unite behind
and close ranks with the armed forces of the UCK, the statement said.
The UCK called on all fellow-countrymen to donate money to the "Homeland
Calling" (Vendlindja therret) fund. "We call upon the Bukoshi Government to
release the money collected for the liberation of Kosova, and pay it to the
appropriate fund", the statement said.
At the end of the statement, the UCK hailed the international community's
efforts, "especially the engagement of the United States of America", on
Kosova.
This engagement should be accelerated and concrete, because it would
contribute to peace and stability in Kosova and wider in the region, the UCK
concluded in the statement numbered 49.

UCK HANDS OVER YUGOSLAV ARMY DESERTERS TO INTERNATIONAL AGENCIES
PRISHTINA, July 12 (KIC) - Members of the Liberation Army of Kosova (UCK)
handed over three Yugoslav army deserters to international humanitarian
agencies on Sunday, sources said.
The three army deserters were from Montenegro, sources said, adding that
they had surrendered themselves to the UCK. Sources did not specify which
international agencies took over the deserters. Still unconfirmed reports
said that more Yugoslav army (VJ) soldiers who have deserted from the army
ranks amidst the unfolding Serb aggression in Kosova have been given
sanctuary in the homes of local resistance units. Three is an ever
increasing number of soldiers, mainly from Montenegro and Vojvodina but
Serbia proper too, deserting from the Yugoslav army bases in Kosova.

CLASHES IN THE MUNICIPALITY OF DECAN CONTINUE
Deçan, 11 July (ARTA) - Fierce clashes took place in more than one front
line, yesterday in the territory of the municipality of Deçan. Following the
sporadic shootings, that started at 1600CET, from Podi i Gështenjave, the
Serb police and army started using heavy artillery weapons.
There are claims that there are many killed and wounded, however, only one
wounded policeman is confirmed for the time being.
Sources from the ground claim to have seen ambulance cars going in the
direction of Pejë, carrying wounded policemen, many times. They also claim
to have seen military helicopters flying above the main road, landing and
transporting the killed from the front line.
After a few days’ pause, the burning of the houses in these villages
recommenced yesterday afternoon. The smoke was coming out from a large
number of houses, which the Serb police and paramilitary forces looted
previously.

ALBAIAN VILLAGES SHOT AT WITH ALL KINDS OF WEAPONS
Klinë, 11 July (ARTA) - Serb combined military\police forces continue to
shoot with heavy artillery in the direction of the villages of Klinë
municipality, particularly in Jashanicë e Epër, Ozrim, Jellovc, Dush,
Gjurgjevik i Madh, Gremnik, Gllarevë, Çupellë, Volljakë, Këpuz and Çeskovë.
Large Serb police\military forces are stationed in the agricultural airport
of Budisalc, in Drenoc, Dugajevë, Dollovë, Novosellë and near the Motel
"Nora", from where they are keeping under target over 10 villages. From
these positions, the Serb police and army, helped by the Serb civilians from
these villages, are shooting with all kinds of weapons in all the directions
inhabited by Albanians.
The corpse of Mon Rexhepi (90), killed by his Serb villagers on 1 July,
still remains unburied on the street of Drenoc, a village with few Albanians
remaining. An unconfirmed information is that a 80 years old woman, Gjyle
Isufi, was also killed in the same village.
Over 80 percent of the people of these villages, have received no food for
three months now. The Emergency Council has no means to respond to the
people's needs, whilst "Mother Teresa Association" and other humanitarian
organizations, never managed to get the aid through.
On the other hand, the only doctor in this area, Zaim Gashi, informs about a
large number of patients and about the great risk of expansion of infectious
diseases.

POLICE BURNED SEVERAL HOUSES
Bardhi i Madh, 11 July (ARTA) - While the police spent the day shooting in
all directions, they spent the night in the bunkers they built in the open
field, several hundred meters far from the village Bardhi i Madh. The KLA
forces, on the other hand, spent the night shooting against the police, who,
tucked in their trenches and APCs, replied occasionally.
This was the course of the past days in Bardhi i Madh, up to today, when the
police entered on foot in the closest houses and set fire on them.
KLA units have this region under control for three weeks now, but one single
Serb paramilitary and "Yugoslav" military offensive forced the people out
almost entirely and made the KLA units change their strategy. The mentioned
villages are not under the complete control of the Serb paramilitary forces,
as the Serb media informed, but they aren't under the complete KLA control
either, particularly Bardhi i Madh. Thus, if a qualification of the rule
over this region would have to be done, then it must be said that neither of
the sides has a complete power over it.
The most disturbing fact, presently, is the food and medicine provision. A
large number of people now sleep in the forest meanwhile the neighboring
villages are overcrowded with people.

ABOUT 300.000 DEM WORTH GOODS REMAIN BLOCKED
Prishtina, 11 July (ARTA) - "Around 10 to15 thousand of tons of flour and
1.500 tons of oil, worth between 200.000 and 300.000 DEM, were paid, but
never reached Kosova because of the Serb blockade", it was said in today’s
press conference of the Businessmen Association of Kosova.
"We suggest the blockade is lifted so people could move freely with their
goods. If this does not happen, then we will have to think of creating a
business corridor, where our people with their own money would buy the goods
outside the border", it was said.
The journalists also focused their questions on the provision of food and
hygiene items to the war afflicted regions. "There, the blockade is even
more severe. Only humanitarian aid can enter these parts and no merchandise.
In addition, another problem is that of the inflation of prices, especially
of the food items that came as a direct consequence of the blockade", it was
concluded at the press conference.

=========================================================================

Newsday
July 13, 1998

EDITORIAL / NATO Must Contain Conflict in Kosovo, But How?

What to do about Kosovo? That corner of the former Yugoslavia, stuck
to the underbelly of Serbia like an inflamed political appendix, is
about to go toxic and burst. Nobody wants that, not least because a
spreading war between Kosovo's ethnic Albanian separatists and hardline
Serbs could infect a much broader swath of the Balkans.
But NATO's leaders are stumped about what to do, because Kosovo
poses much thornier jurisdictional issues than Bosnia, that other
prickly patch of real estate to the north. So, at a loss for a solution,
NATO is pining for the good old days. That's the gist of a resolution
being drafted by France and Britain for the UN Security Council after a
meeting of the six-nation Contact Group on Kosovo. But it's just
collective wheel-spinning.
What NATO wants - a return to Serbian recognition of autonomous
status for Kosovo - is something that would no longer satisfy even the
Kosovars. What they want is independence. But none of the Contact Group
members wishes to support independence for Kosovo. Quite the contrary:
They believe that an independent Kosovo would spark a broader war for
Albanian irredentism in bordering Macedonia, which has a sizable
minority of ethnic Albanians. And that could eventually draw into the
conflict two NATO members that can barely control their hostility toward
each other, Greece and Turkey.
So there you have it: The making of a nice little quagmire just
waiting to suck in troops and money and spit out dead bodies and endless
political rancor. It's been a long time in coming, and no one wanted to
deal with it. Now they have no choice, but have no idea what to do. Good
luck.

EDITORIAL / NATO Must Contain Conflict in Kosovo, But How?., pp A22.

=========================================================================

VOA Report

DATE=7/13/98
TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT
DATELINE=BRUSSELS

INTRO: THE 15 FOREIGN MINISTERS OF THE EUROPEAN UNION NATIONS ISSUED A
FRESH APPEAL MONDAY TO BOTH SIDES IN THE KOSOVO CONFLICT TO REACH A
PEACEFUL SOLUTION TO THEIR DISPUTE. THE MINISTERS
ALSO CALLED ON THE UNITED NATIONS SECURITY COUNCIL TO CLEAR THE WAY FOR
MILITARY ACTION, IF THERE IS NO PROGRESS. JOHN FRASER REPORTS FROM
BRUSSELS.

TEXT: THE EUROPEAN UNION FOREIGN MINISTERS ISSUED A STATEMENT WHICH
DESIGNED TO PUT FURTHER PRESSURE ON SERBIAN PRESIDENT SLOBODAN
MILOSEVIC. THE AIM IS TO FORCE HIM TO TO COMPLY WITH
INTERNATIONAL DEMANDS TO END OPPRESSION IN KOSOVO, AND TO ENTER INTO
NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE MAINLY ETHNIC ALBANIAN COMMUNITY THERE.

THE STATEMENT EXPRESSES GRAVE CONCERN AT THE CONTINUING VIOLENCE AND LOSS
OF LIFE, AND WARNS OF THE DANGER THAT THE CONFLICT COULD SPREAD. IT
SUPPORTS THE ADOPTION OF A UNITED NATIONS SECURITY
COUNCIL RESOLUTION TO PUT THE U-N'S AUTHORITY BEHIND THE REQUIREMENTS
EXPECTED OF THE PARTIES BY THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY.

SHOULD THESE REQUIREMENTS NOT BE MET, THE E-U MINISTERS SAID FURTHER
ACTION SHOULD BE TAKEN UNDER THE U-N CHARTER TO BRING ABOUT COMPLIANCE BY
THOSE WHO ARE BLOCKING THE PROCESS.

SUCH ACTION WOULD BE LED BY NATO, WHICH HAS ALREADY DRAWN UP FULL
CONTINGENCY PLANS FOR AIR ATTACKS AGAINST SERB TARGETS IN KOSOVO, AS WELL
AS MORE DIRECT INTERVENTION BY TROOPS.

HOWEVER, THE E-U MINISTERS ALSO RECOGNIZE THAT THERE ARE TWO SIDES IN THE
CONFLICT, AND THEY HAVE CALLED ON THE ARMED ALBANIAN MILITIAS IN KOSOVO
TO ALSO END THEIR VIOLENCE.

THE EUROPEAN UNION FOREIGN MINISTERS HAVE WELCOMED THE NEWS THAT THE
INTERNATIONAL WAR CRIMES TRIBUNAL IS TO EXTEND ITS TERRITORIAL SCOPE TO
INCLUDE KOSOVO. BRITISH FOREIGN SECRETARY
ROBIN COOK SAYS THIS HAS THE EFFECT OF PUTTING ON NOTICE ALL THOSE
INVOLVED IN THE FIGHTING THEY THEY COULD FACE PROSECUTION FOR WAR CRIMES,
AND IN PARTICULAR, FOR ATTACKS AGAINST CIVILIANS.

//OPT// HE SAYS THAT INTERNATIONAL HAS ALREADY HAD SOME EFFECT IN
PREVENTING A RECURRENCE OF THE SERB OFFENSIVE IN EARLY JUNE WHICH LEFT
50-THOUSAND PEOPLE HOMELESS IN A SINGLE WEEK. //END
OPT// BUT MR. COOK DOES STRESS THE DIFFICULTY OF BRINGING PRESSURE TO
BEAR ON BELGRADE.

ŇTHE LAST THING I'M GOING TO BE IN THESE CIRCUMSTANCES IS COMPLACENT
ABOUT THE PROSPECTS OF A RESPONSE, PARTICULARLY FROM BELGRADE, WHICH HAS
SHOWN ITSELF SO STUBBORN AND SO UNYIELDING IN RESPONSE, SO FAR. WE HAVE
NOW TAKEN A BATTERY OF MEASURES AGAINST BELGRADE.

WE HAVE A VISA BAN ON SENIOR MINISTERS. WE HAVE
AN ARMS EMBARGO. WE HAVE A BAN ON SUPPLY OF EQUIPMENT CAPABLE OF USE FOR
OPPRESSION. WE HAVE A BAN ON GOVERNMENT-FINANCED EXPORT CREDIT. WE HAVE
FROZEN THE FUNDS OF THE GOVERNMENT HELD ABROAD. AND WE ARE CURRENTLY
WORKING ON A BAN ON FLIGHTS BY THE AIRLINES OF YUGOSLAVIA. ALL OF THOSE
ARE NOW IN PLACE AND WILL, OVER A PERIOD OF TIME, INCREASINGLY BITE ON
BELGRADE. Ň

THE E-U FOREIGN MINISTERS HAVE ALSO EXPRESSED ANGER AT ACTION TAKEN
AGAINST INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATS IN BELARUS, WITH ATTEMPTS BY THE
AUTHORITIES THERE TO EVICT THEM FROM THEIR RESIDENCES. THE E-U MINISTERS
HAVE ORDERED A BAN ON THE ISSUING OF VISAS TO A SERIES OF GOVERNMENT
FIGURES, FROM THE PRESIDENT DOWN, IN RETALIATION FOR THE ACTION OF THE
AUTHORITIES.

THE FOREIGN MINISTERS ALSO DISCUSSED A RECENT MISSION TO EAST TIMOR BY
THREE E-U AMBASSADORS, AND THEY PRAISED THE DIPLOMATS FOR THE COURAGE
THEY SHOWED DURING THIS DIFFICULT FACT-FINDING
EXERCISE.

//REST OPT// THERE WAS ALSO A DEBATE ON THE PRIORITIES FOR THE AUSTRIAN
GOVERNMENT, WHICH HOLDS THE E-U PRESIDENCY FOR THE SECOND HALF OF THIS
YEAR. A MAJOR OBJECTIVE IS TO MAKE PROGRESS ON MEMBERSHIP NEGOTIATIONS
WITH CYPRUS AND WITH FIVE CENTRAL AND
EASTERN EUROPEAN STATES.

TO ACHIEVE THIS, BOTH THE APPLICANTS AND THE CURRENT MEMBERS OF THE CLUB
NEED TO MAKE DIFFICULT DECISIONS ON REFORM. THIS WILL REQUIRE ECONOMIC
PROGRESS IN EASTERN EUROPE, AND A REFORM TO THE E-U'S OWN AGRICULTURAL
AND REGIONAL AID PROGRAMS.

AT THE SAME TIME, ALL E-U MINISTERS AGREED THAT THEIR TOP PRIORITY MUST
REMAIN THE FIGHT AGAINST UNEMPLOYMENT. (SIGNED)

13-Jul-98 3:06 PM EDT (1906 UTC)

Source: Voice of America

vfil...@haverford.edu

unread,

Jul 14, 1998, 3:00:00 AM7/14/98

From: Filipovic Vanja <vfil...@haverford.edu>
Subject: BosNet KOSOVA UPDATE: Kosova in the Media

----------------------------------------------------------------------
B o s N e t - July 14, 1998
______________________________________________________________________

KOSOVA NEWS nr. 27, 13, July 1998

TWO ALBANIANS KILLED, TWELVE WOUNDED IN SUHAREKA
PRISHTINA, July 13 (KIC) - At least two Albanians have been killed and 12
others wounded today (Monday) morning during a Serbian attack on the village
of Pecan, municipality of Suhareka, some 50 km south of capital Prishtina.
The killed were named as Muhamet Krasniqi (22) and Xhemajli Bytyci (20).
Serbian military troops positioned in Birac and Serb police forces in
Shiroke shelled the village of Pecan and its elementary school building at
7:15 in the morning today.
An extremely grave situation is reported in the town of Suhareka.
Serb police and civilians have been engaged in a shooting spree aimed at
instilling panic amongst the Albanians.

ASSISTANCE TO ASYLUM-SEEKERS FROM KOSOVA CUT DOWN
Bonn, 12 July (ARTA) - The German "Bundesrat" (government), adopted a new
bill on asylum-seekers in Germany, last Friday. According to the bill, the
whole category of asylum-seekers that were denied asylum in Germany, will
receive less aid. People who sought asylum for economic reasons, usually
using false IDs or hiding their documents, will also be affected.
According to the new law adopted by the upper chamber of the German
Parliament, refugees granted asylum will also have to count on the reduction
of economic help.
There are claims that this German institution requested from the government
to fashion the standards of accepting and the program of distributing aids
for refugees according to the standards of other EU countries. The new law
will affect the refugees and asylum-seekers from Kosova the most, with the
current number seeking refuge in Germany reaching 140 thousand, who have
been denied asylum.

SWISS ASSISTANCE TO IDDs
Zurich, 12 July (ARTA) - Swiss authorities, in fear of an eventual wave of
refugees from Kosova, undertook a blitz-action of collecting money for the
IDPs in Kosova. They have gathered 3,5 million francs so far.
This sum of money is expected to be used for urgent programs within the
frames of humanitarian aid of federal bodies. The Swiss government funded
Swiss Disaster Relief is actually building a shelter and repairing several
houses for refugees in northern Albania. The funding came from the gathered
contributions.

GREMNIKU AND GJURGJEVIKU UNDER KLA CONTROL
Kline, 12 July (ARTA) - Three Serb policemen were killed and two KLA members
wounded in the last round of fighting between Serb forces and KLA units,
that took place in the village of Gremnik.
On the other hand, many houses belonging to Albanians have been reported
destroyed by the shelling in the village of Sverk i Gashit.
There was an intense exchange of fire between Serb police\military forces,
mainly stationed in the villages of Grapc and Binxhe (with a Serb majority)
and KLA forces, which are stationed in the villages of Ozrim, Jashanice e
Eperme and Jellovc. The fighting has been taking place for the last couple
of days, with the most intense battles taking place along Ozrim, Jashanice e
Eperme, Jellovc, Dush, Gjurgjevik i Madh, Dollc, Gremnik and Çupeve.
Fighting is also taking place in other villages of the municipality of
Kline, making the villagers shut themselves in their houses despite the fact
that it is harvesting time.

FIREFIGHTING NEAR STANTERG MINING TOWN
PRISHTINA, July 13 (KIC) - An hour before midday today, a convoy of Serbian
military and police forces headed in the direction of Stanterg ('Stari
Trg'), in the municipality of Mitrovica.
At a location called 'Ura e Fazlise', Serbian forces run into a barricade
set up by the UcK. Fierce fighting broke out there. Reports said the Serb
convoy consisted of three tanks, three Katjusha rocket launchers, three
military lorries and three other lorries trailing anti-aircraft cannons, as
well as three police armored vehicles, a lorry and a car.

SERB FORCES ATTACK VILLAGES OF DECAN AND OBILIQ
PRISHTINA, July 13 (KIC) - Heavy fighting was reported between Serbian
troops and local Albanian resistance forces in the village of Prejlep last
night and today morning.
The fighting in the village was halted at 11 -00 hrs today. Serbian forces
shelled for three hours today the village of Baballoq and Gramacel. There
have been no reported casualties. Also, Serb forces launched today
afternoon a heavy attack against the villages of Shipitulle (municipality of
Fushe Kosova) and Sibovc (municipality of Obiliq), about 10 miles
north-west of Prishtina. The Serb attack on these two villages began at
around 13:00 hrs.
Albanian farmsteads were being pounded with machine guns and mortars, he
said at around half past one.
A large number of displaced families from the villages around the coal mine,
Bardhi, Hade and Lismir, have found refuge in Grabovc, Sibovc and the
neighboring Drenica region villages in the wake of a huge Serb army and
police offensive in the area on 29 June.
Sources told the KIC today morning that residents of Shipitulle and Grabovc
were fleeing homes as Serb forces were building up in the area.

SERB ARTILLERY SHELLS DRENOC VILLAGE
PRISHTINA, July 13 (KIC) - At 8 o'clock in the morning today, Serbian army
shelled with heavy artillery the village of Drenoc, municipality of Rahovec,
the local chapter of the human rights council (CDHRF) said.
There were no reported casualties.
Three days ago 200 policemen arrived from Serbia in the town of Rahovec.
Serb snipers have been stationed on top of buildings in the town, as well as
on top and the terrace od the "Hotel-Park" in Rahovec.

FOUR ALBANIANS WOUNDED IN GJAKOVA AREA
PRISHTINA, July 13 (KIC) - Fighting between Serbian military and police
troops and local Albanian resistance forces has been reported in the border
area village of the Reka e Keqe region, in the municipality of Gjakova.
The villages of Nec and Smolice have been the scene of fiercest clashes.
Meanwhile, reports said four Albanians were wounded during the fighting last
night.
In the morning hours today the villages of Raskove and Malesi e Vogel were
shelled by Serb forces.

THE POLICE SET 100 DEM FEE FOR THOSE WHO FLEE PEJA
Peje, 12 July (ARTA) - Albanian daily "Koha Ditore" sources say that every
person that tried to flee Peje yesterday and today, had to give 100 DEM to
the police.
The Serb police, stationed at the Peje-Kulla-Rozhaje route, ask for 400 DEM
from every vehicle with Albanian passengers, the sources add.
Explanations concerning the reasons of travelling and the direction were
useless. The answer was the same - you must pay to escape.
Otherwise, hundreds of inhabitants of Peje and the surrounding villages have
abandoned their homes following the attack against the village of Loxhe.
Most of the people that fled are now in Montenegro.

FIVE UNIDENTIFIED VICTIMS BURIED IN PEJA
PRISHTINA, July 13 (KIC) - Last week, on July 8, the state-run "Higjiena"
enterprise in Peja ('Pec') buried five unidentified persons, sources in Peja
said. The bodies had been collected in the Peja district. The identity of
the buried people was unknown.

UCK DOES NOT RECOGNIZE RUGOVA AS LEADER
CNN - July, 13- Kosova Liberation Army (UCK) spokesman Jakup Krasniqi told
the Prishtina daily "Koha Ditore" of 11 July that his organization does not
"recognize shadow-state President Ibrahim Rugova as the UCK's commander
because [Rugova] did not create it."
Krasniqi called on all political parties "to unite in a broad national front
and recognize the UCK as Kosova's legitimate army. He added that the UCK
fights for "the liberation of all occupied Albanian territories and for
their unification with Albania" and that "we have not taken up arms just to
gain autonomy." Krasniqi noted that the UCK is ready for talks with
Belgrade, but he stressed that the Serbian authorities must first "free all
political prisoners and hostages and withdraw their forces from Kosova."
The spokesman added that foreign powers, "preferably the U.S.," must
establish "control" over the province. And he pledged that the UCK will be
in Prishtina "soon."

==========================================================================

DATE=7/14/98
TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT
TITLE=U-N / KOSOVO (L ONLY)
BYLINE=LISA SCHLEIN
DATELINE=GENEVA

INTRO: THE U-N REFUGEE AGENCY (U-N-H-C-R) REPORTS A SHARP INCREASE IN
THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE FLEEING THE CONTINUING VIOLENCE IN SERBIA'S KOSOVO
PROVINCE. LISA SCHLEIN IN GENEVA REPORTS THAT LAST WEEK, ALMOST
THREE-THOUSAND REFUGEES FROM KOSOVO FLED INTO ANOTHER YUGOSLAV REPUBLIC,
MONTENEGRO.

TEXT: MONTENEGRO HAD BEEN RECORDING AN AVERAGE OF BETWEEN 200 AND 250
REFUGEES FROM KOSOVO EACH DAY. THE U-N REFUGEE AGENCY SAYS THE GROWING
VIOLENCE IN KOSOVO LED TO A BIG JUMP IN THE NUMBER LAST WEEK.

U-N-H-C-R SPOKESMAN KRIS JANOWSKI SAYS AID WORKERS REGISTERED 29-HUNDRED
PEOPLE FROM KOSOVO AT TWO ENTRY POINTS INTO MONTENEGRO.

/// JANOWSKI ACT ///

THIS BRINGS THE TOTAL OF PEOPLE DISPLACED INTO
MONTENEGRO FROM KOSOVO TO OVER 18-THOUSAND WHICH IS AGAIN A FAIRLY
CONSERVATIVE ESTIMATE. THE SHARP INCREASE OF ARRIVALS IN MONTENEGRO MAY
BE EXPLAINED BY THE INCREASED MILITARY ACTIVITY, SHELLING AND FIGHTING IN
THE PEC AREA.

/// END ACT ///

MR. JANOWSKI SAYS THE INCREASING NUMBER OF REFUGEES IS PUTTING
CONSIDERABLE STRAIN ON MONTENEGRO'S ABILITY TO CARE FOR THEM. HE SAYS
BORDER TOWNS ARE RUNNING OUT OF PLACES TO HOUSE THESE PEOPLE.

THE U-N REFUGEE AGENCY IS TRYING TO REFURBISH PUBLIC BUILDINGS TO
ACCOMMODATE THE REFUGEES. BUT, MR. JANOWSKI SAYS IN SOME PLACES, EVEN
PUBLIC BUILDINGS ARE NO LONGER AVAILABLE.

/// JANOWSKI ACT ///

THE MONTENEGRiN GOVERNMENT HAS BEEN ACTUALLY VERY, VERY GOOD IN TAKING
THOSE PEOPLE, LOOKING AFTER THEM AND NOT COMPLAINING ABOUT IT. BUT,
MONTENEGRO IS A TINY, LITTLE REPUBLIC, AND THEY CANNOT TAKE AN
UNLIMITED NUMBER OF PEOPLE. SO, WE WORRY THAT IF THE EXODUS CONTINUES AT
THE CURRENT PACE, THE MONTENEGRO AUTHORITIES MAY SOON BECOME OVERWHELMED.

/// END ACT ///

MR. JANOWSKI SAYS THE REFUGEE AGENCY ALSO IS CONCERNED ABOUT THE SAFETY
OF U-N STAFF AND ABOUT 13-THOUSAND KOSOVO REFUGEES IN NORTHERN ALBANIA.
HE CALLS NORTHERN ALBANIA A DANGEROUS PLACE --
HEAVILY ARMED AND TORN BY CLAN RIVALRY. MR. JANOWSKI SAYS THERE WERE
SEVERAL SHOOTING DEATHS IN NORTHERN ALBANIA LAST WEEK.
(SIGNED)

Source: Voice of America

==========================================================================

Cross-Purposes in Kosovo

Washington Post
Monday, July 13, 1998; Page A20

THE SIX-NATION "contact group" now warns warring Serbs and ethnic
Albanians in
Kosovo to cease fire. Otherwise, the United States and its partners will
seek a Security Council
resolution to enforce peace. But no U.N. resolution is needed. A
political decision is needed to
pile on the pressure, including the use of force. The first candidate for
enforcement must be
Slobodan Milosevic, Serb author of Kosovo's miseries. The second
candidate should be the
Kosovo Liberation Army, a separatist force opposed militarily by the
Milosevic army and
politically by the negotiation-minded Kosovans loyal to Ibrahim Rugova.

If Mr. Milosevic was the only troublemaker in Kosovo, he could be pressed
to accept
negotiations with the Kosovans to restore and strengthen autonomy within
Serbia. But there is
a second party: the Liberation Army. Its program calls not for autonomy
but for independence.
That puts it at cross-purposes with the contact group (United States,
Russia, Britain, France,
Germany and Italy), which calls for negotiated autonomy.

In other circunstances, the six might be upholding self-determination by
Kosovo's 90 percent
majority of ethnic Albanians. In the real world, however, Kosovan
self-determination,
meaning ethnic Albanian self-determination, would not simply dismember
Serbia. It likely
would light the fires of a Greater Albania and drag in heavily Albanian
Macedonia and fully
Albanian Albania, perhaps others. The United States is devoted to
self-determination, but not
in all places or in all circumstances. It also is devoted to regional
stability and to preventing the
death, loss and refugee flows that war brings.

This is how the contact group gets to the idea of enhanced autonomy for
Kosovo. It is a
compromise answer, and perhaps not an ultimate one, but it distributes
the rewards and the
pain somewhat fairly. Kosovans will be unhappy to have the consummation
of their full
self-determination deferred, but the right sort of autonomy would leave
them a safety and
dignity they now lack. Serbia resists enhanced autonomy, seeing it as a
harbinger of
dismemberment, but it had an opportunity to earn the trust of Kosovans,
and it failed.

The emphasis of the contact group is on arranging a cease-fire and
encouraging a peaceful
resolution of the crisis. To do this, it will have to exercise a credible
threat to use force to keep
the peace. On this issue the group is split on familiar lines, with
Russia and France holding
back. Unless the parties relent, the United States and its other European
allies will have to be
prepared to act on their own.

______________________________________________________________________

vfil...@haverford.edu

unread,

Jul 15, 1998, 3:00:00 AM7/15/98

From: Filipovic Vanja <vfil...@haverford.edu>
Subject: BosNet KOSOVA UPDATE: Kosova in the Media

----------------------------------------------------------------------
B o s N e t - July 15, 1998
______________________________________________________________________

KOSOVA NEWS nr. 28, 15 JULY 1998

EUROPEAN UNION SEEKS U.N. BACKING FOR ACTION ON KOSOVA

PRISHTINA, July 14 (ARTA) - The European Union (EU) foreign ministers,
meeting in Brussels on Monday, called for United Nations backing for
"further action" in Kosova.
"The Council supported the adoption of a UN Security Council resolution
putting the UN's authority behind the requirements expected of the Parties
by the international community. Should the required steps not be taken, the
Council endorsed the principle of further action under the UN Charter to
bring about compliance by those who block the process. It is the
understanding of the Council that such action would be under Chapter VII of
the UN Charter.", the key point in the EU statement said.
The U.N. Charter's Chapter 7 authorises foreign military intervention to
preserve peace.
The Council of EU foreign ministers expressed "its grave concern at the
continuing violence and loss of life in Kosovo, particularly among the
civilian population."
It called for an immediate cessation of all hostilities in Kosova and "the
restart of a political process with direct international involvement between
the Parties."
The Council welcomed the intention of the Contact Group to set in hand work
to define possible further elements for the future status of Kosova.
The Council of EU ministers for the "outstanding provisions of the 12 June
Contact Group Statement" to be implemented. In this light it recalled the
necessity of further action by the Belgrade authorities on the withdrawal of
security forces used for civilian repression in Kosova, unimpeded access for
observers, the full return of refugees and displaced persons to their homes
and free and unimpeded access for humanitarian organizations and supplies to
Kosova.
Further, the EU statement said the Council noted that the Prosecutor of ICTY
had expressed the view that the situation in Kosova represents "an armed
conflict within the terms of the Tribunal's mandate". So both Belgrade and
others on the ground in Kosova are called on to cooperate with the
Prosecutor's investigation, the Council said.
At the end of the statement, the Council of EU Ministers reiterated its full
support for Mr Felipe Gonzalez as Special Representative for the FRY.

FOUR ALBANIANS WOUNDED BY SERB SHELLING
PRISHTINA, July 14 (KIC) - Four members of the UcK (Kosova Liberation Army)
have been wounded during the fighting of the past few days between Serbian
military and police and local Albanian resistance forces in the region of
Shala e Bajgores, local sources said. Serbs reportedly suffered loses and
material damage.
Several houses have been damaged by Serb shelling in the village of Bare.
The villages of Stanterg, Vidishiq, Mazhiq, Rashan and Pasome have been
shelled, too.
Meanwhile, reports from Vushtrri said many Albanian residents of the
villages of the Shala e Bajgores fled their homes in the wake of yesterday's
shelling of the region.
Many of the evacuees have found refuge in the municipality of Vushtrri,
which has been the destination of many Albanians displaced from the Drenica
region, in the wake of the Serbian military-police aggression in early
March.

SERBIAN TROOPS SHELL BORDER VILLAGES
PRISHTINA, July 14 (KIC) - Since early morning today, Serbian military,
paramilitary, and police forces have been shelling the Reka e Keqe villages
in the border area with Albania, an area stretching from Nec to the Junik
region, sources in Gjalova said.
The sound of heavy blast can be heard in the town of Gjakova itself.
Local Albanian resistance forces, including the UcK, have been putting up a
fierce resistance, sources said, adding that they could not obtain further
details regarding the extent of damages or casualty toll on either side.
Serb army and police troops have been leaving the town of Gjakova for the
Reka e Keqe region today.
Meanwhile, an Albanian, Ali Rrustemi, resident of the Babaj i Bokes
village, died today in the town hospital in Gjakova of serious wounds he had
received during a Serb army attack a few days ago.
Another wounded Albanian has been in hospital, sources added.
Ms Fatime Boshnjaku, a local official with the Mother Teresa charity,
arrested a couple of days ago, is still in custody. The other local
activist, Astrit Beqa, arrested the same day, has been taken to the Serb-run
Peja investigating court.

DECAN : NOTHING IS YET KNOWN ABOUT 200 ABDUCTED ALBANIANS
DECAN, 13 July (ARTA) : The drama about 200 abducted Albanians is still
going on, thus an appeal is being made to the international humanitarian
associations and foreign observers in Kosova for their engagement in finding
the missing and make the burial of the dead possible.
Albanian sources claim that 15 buses full of policemen started from the
direction of Devė (Gjakovė) in the direction of Deēan, this morning.
But, despite the clashes and occasional shelling, weddings and births of new
babies haven’t stopped. Thus, only in one improvised "maternity ward" in the
municipality of Deēan, 86 babies were born in one month.

KLA SOLDIERS GIVE SOLEMN OATH
MALISHEVA, 13 July (ARTA) - The soldiers of the KLA unit "Lumi", from
Malishevė, gave their solemn oath at 1100CET today, in the village of Bllacė
(10 km. North of Suharekė). Around 2,000 people attended the ceremony,
including relatives of the KLA members.
The oath was read by the unit's commander and was repeated by the chorus of
hundreds of soldiers.
The commander of "Lumi" then held a speech, saying that "the KLA introduced
its soldiers' oath in days of war", stressing that the soldiers have a very
high fighting morale.
The ceremony was held only 2 km away from the positions held by the Serb
army and the mass participation goes to show that the people endowed all of
their trust to these youngsters.

SERB FORCES SHELL TWO VILLAGES OF OBILIQ
PRISHTINA, July 14 (KIC) - Yesterday (Monday) several houses of two Albanian
family compounds were damaged by Serbian shelling of the village of
Shipitulle, municipality of Obiliq.
The village of Siboc was also targeted in the shelling.
At 4 o'clock in the morning today, gunfire was reported in the direction of
the village of Palaj ('Vodica') and the Kosova B power plant area near
Obiliq.
At a location called "Kershi i Grabocit" fresh Serb forces were reported
deployed today morning. Heavy Serb police forces backed up by tanks and
heavy armament were deployed there on Monday.
Two local villagers of Shipitulla, Rasim Mjekiqi and Daut Mjekiqi, have
been missing since yesterday. They were seen last while on their way to
their fields and halted by the police. Local population in several Obiliq
villages, including Shipitulla, Graboci i Ulet and Siboci have fled their
homes over the past days amidst rapid increase of Serb forces in the area.
Meanwhile, Serb snipers wounded on Monday an old Albanian from Lajthishta
(Leshkoshic) village. Ibush Terbushani (62) was wounded while walking to his
home near a coal roller conveyer in the vicinity of the Kosova B power
plant.

U.S. DEPT. OF STATE - THE FUTURE STATUS OF KOSOVA IS A COMPLEX ISSUE
July 13- Asked to comment the European Union´s "alarm at growing support for
armed Kosovo Albanians", the State Dept. briefer, Mr. James Rubin, answered
that the U.S. view hasn't shifted and that the sporadic fighting continues
throughout the region... "Problems with food deliveries have arisen in these
areas of fighting. On Friday, Ambassador Hill met with authorities in
Belgrade; on Saturday, he held a series of meetings in Pristina with a
number of members from the Kosovar Albanian leadership, including Dr.
Rugova. Ambassador Hill had additional meetings with the Kosovar Albanian
leadership today", added Mr. Rubin.
Her also stressed that the U.S. have said for some time that "the primary
responsibility for this conflict and for the fighting and for the repression
and for the dying is Slobodan Milosevic...", adding that this doesn't mean
that "extremist elements on the Kosovar Albanian side are free of responsibi
lity".
Mr. Rubin also pointed out that none of that view changes the fact that
President Milosevic is primarily responsible for "stripping these people of
their rights, taking away their rights and radicalizing the population of
Kosovo such that they have extremist groups now pursuing totally and wholly
unrealistic objectives using military force".
Asked about the current work of Ambassador Hill, Mr. Rubin said: "He
continues to think it's useful to have these discussions. This is a complex
issue that will require many, many discussions in order to reach agreement,
if that is possible. So he is continuing to do his work and giving regular
updates to the Secretary".
To the question on how can the U.S. bridge the "insurmountable gap between
Belgrade and Pristina" since the sanction did not bring any good, Mr. Rubin
said that in practice actions don't always immediately cause results and
that "we've put very stiff sanctions in place, and it has helped to bring
home to President Milosevic the error of his ways; but we will see whether
over time it continues to do that. With respect to the Kosovar Albanians,
there is an embargo on arms going into Kosovo which has an effect on them.
So there is, in that sense, a sanction already in place".

=========================================================================

Department of State
98/07/15 Daily Press Briefing
Office of the Spokesman

DEPARTMENT OF STATE
DAILY PRESS BRIEFING INDEX
Wednesday, July 15, l998

Briefer: James P. Rubin

[.....]

QUESTION: About Kosovo - there was a panel of Defense Department
experts this morning briefing on the subject. They said that since -
and I would ask you to - how does this sound to you - since Milosevic
went to Moscow and talked to Mr. Yeltsin, there hasn't been the kind of
Serb offensive that was so indeed so offensive and so damaging. In
other words, the Serbs have been laying off somewhat. The NATO people,
when asked - not NATO, excuse me - the military people, when asked what
the solution to this problem would possibly be, they said they have not
a solution. Does the State Department have a better idea; because they
were looking for better ideas today?

MR. RUBIN: I received a report of that briefing and it was ever so
slightly different than the one that you just provided me.

QUESTION: It was?

MR. RUBIN: Just ever so slightly. I think I indicated to you about a
week ago that it is correct that there has been some modification in
Serb activity, and that the kind of massive crackdown that we saw has
not recurred, but there continues to be fighting that we're concerned
about; that the issue is complicated - that on the one hand, as I've
indicated to you, it is clear that President Milosevic is still
President Milosevic and he is still pursuing policies that are
reprehensible and ill advised, the way he did in Bosnia; but that the
situation between Bosnia and Kosovo is not the same -- that Bosnia was a
country that was recognized by the international community, that it had
leaders who were capable of exerting influence over its citizens, and
one could therefore pursue a policy with that difference.

The Kosovar Albanian situation is different. The people there have
every right to be very, very angry at the Serb authorities who have
stripped them of their legitimate rights. We support their legitimate
rights and we want to see fundamental changes in the way the Yugoslavia
is made up so that the fundamental rights and the legitimate rights of
the people of Kosovo can be improved.

But that does not mean that military planning for a military action is
easy. As I understand it, DOD officials were simply pointing out the
complexity of military planning. But that planning continues; it's on
an accelerated basis; and no options have been ruled out.

QJust to make sure we hit all the buttons on the Middle East peace
talks, is there any new information on --

MR. RUBIN: I have nothing new for you today.

QAnd is Dennis Ross still --

MR. RUBIN: He's still here, yes.

[...]

Editor's note: AP quoted today a senior Defense official who stated that
"from a policy perspective, we're not anywhere near making a decision for
any kind of armed intervention in Kosovo right now." In other words, any
military action in Kosovo seems very distant and unlikely

=========================================================================

DATE=7/15/98
TITLE=DATELINE: KOSOVO'S SUPPORTERS
BYLINE=PAMELA TAYLOR
EDITOR=RON PEMSTEIN

CONTENT = (VOICE & ACKS IN AUDIO SERVICES)

// NOTE: SOME MATERIAL CONTAINED IN THIS PROGRAM WAS
PREVIOUSLY ISSUED ON HOUSE WIRES//

INTRO: THE KOSOVO LIBERATION ARMY WHICH IS FIGHTING TO SEPARATE KOSOVO
PROVINCE FROM THE REST OF YUGOSLAVIA HAS ACQUIRED A VAST ARSENAL OF
WEAPONS THANKS TO ETHNIC ALBANIANS LIVING OVERSEAS. DIPLOMATS FEAR THIS
DEVELOPMENT MAY
HAVE ALTERED THE BALANCE OF POWER IN KOSOVO'S ETHNIC CONFLICT WHICH UNTIL
RECENTLY HAS FAVORED SERB FORCES. THAT'S THE SUBJECT EXAMINED BY VOA NEWS
NOW'S ANALYSIS PROGRAM 'DATELINE'. HERE'S PROGRAM HOST, PAMELA TAYLOR:

TEXT: THE KOSOVO LIBERATION ARMY -- OR K-L-A -- HAS BEEN DESCRIBED AS
A RAG-TAG BAND OF STUDENTS AND FARMERS LED BY A FEW WELL-TRAINED
PROFESSIONALS WHO HAVE RETURNED FROM ABROAD. ALTHOUGH APPARENTLY LACKING
A WELL-ORGANIZED COMMAND STRUCTURE, THE K-L-A HAS NEVERTHELESS BEEN ABLE
TO PURCHASE ANTI-TANK AND ANTI-AIRCRAFT WEAPONS WITH LARGE SUMS OF MONEY
SENT BY ETHNIC ALBANIANS WORKING IN GERMANY, SWITZERLAND AND THE UNITED
STATES. MOST OF THE WEAPONS CAME INTO THE COUNTRY OVER KOSOVO'S
MOUNTAINOUS BORDER WITH ALBANIA. THE FLOOD OF ARMS AND MONEY HAS ALLOWED
THE K-L-A TO INCH FORWARD TOWARD KEY TOWNS AND TAKE A HEAVY TOLL ON SERB
SECURITY FORCES. THE CONFLICT HAS CLAIMED A TOTAL OF 350 LIVES -- MOSTLY
CIVILIAN.

YUGOSLAVIA HAS THOUSANDS OF TROOPS IN KOSOVO TO QUELL THE SUCCESSIONIST
MOVEMENT BY WHAT IT CALLS A TERRORIST MOVEMENT. THOSE TROOPS INCLUDE
ARMY, SPECIAL POLICE AND PARATROOPS. THESE FORCES MAY CALL ON THE
SUPERIOR RESOURCES OF THE YUGOSLAV ARMY IF ORDERED TO DO SO BY PRESIDENT
SLOBODAN MILOSEVIC. MR. MILOSEVIC SAYS HE IS TRYING TO PROTECT KOSOVO'S
SERBIAN MINORITY AND PREVENT
FURTHER SPLINTERING OF YUGOSLAVIA. KOSOVO IS THE SITE OF SERBIA'S MOST
REVERED MONASTERIES AND THE LEGENDARY BATTLEFIELD WHICH DEFINES SERBIAN
NATIONHOOD.

KOSOVO HAS ALWAYS BEEN THE POOREST PART OF YUGOSLAVIA AND WITH LITTLE
ECONOMIC ACTIVITY AND UNEMPLOYMENT HIGH, MANY ALBANIANS SOUGHT WORK
OVERSEAS. THEIR EARNINGS ARE NOW FINANCING THE GUERRILLA INSURGENCY
WHICH IS DEDICATED TO OUSTING KOSOVO'S SERBIAN RULERS. // OPT //

WE HAVE MORE FROM VOA CORRESPONDENT ART CHIMES:

TAPE: CUT ONE CHIMES # 5-04088 RUNS 2:42

PERHAPS 500-THOUSAND KOSOVO ALBANIANS LIVE IN THE WEST -- IN AMERICA,
SCANDINAVIA, GERMANY, SWITZERLAND, AND ELSEWHERE -- AND THEY SEND MONEY
HOME TO SUPPORT THEIR FAMILIES AND ALBANIAN INSTITUTIONS IN KOSOVO. THE
ETHNIC ALBANIANS OF KOSOVO HAVE AN ELECTED, BUT UNRECOGNIZED
GOVERNMENT OF WHAT THEY CALL THE "REPUBLIC OF KOSOVO," PLUS A UNIVERSITY,
SCHOOLS, AND OTHER INSTITUTIONS. THE BULK OF THE MONEY HAS COME FROM
KOSOVO ALBANIANS ABROAD. A YEAR OR SO AGO, 60 PERCENT OF THE BUDGET CAME
FROM THOSE ABROAD. BUT AN ECONOMICS ADVISOR TO SHADOW PRESIDENT IBRAHIM
RUGOVA, FATMIR REXEPI, SAYS TAXES COLLECTED BY THE SHADOW GOVERNMENT ON
LOCAL RESIDENTS
ARE DECREASING BECAUSE OF KOSOVO'S ECONOMIC
DIFFICULTIES. SO HE SAYS ETHNIC ALBANIAN INSTITUTIONS HERE ARE
INCREASINGLY RELYING ON THOSE CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE DIASPORA.

BUT AT THE SAME TIME, THAT FUNDING IS DRYING UP AS THE DIASPORA SHIFTS

ITS SUPPORT TO THE REBELS OF THE KOSOVO LIBERATION ARMY BY SENDING MONEY

TO VARIOUS FUNDS THAT FUNNEL THE MONEY TO THE REBELS. REPORTER ARDAIN
ARIFAJ OF THE ALBANIAN LANGUAGE "KOHA DITORE" (DAILY) NEWSPAPER HAS
BEEN FOLLOWING THE STORY.

/// ARIFAJ ACTUALITY ///

IT'S, I DON'T KNOW, I WOULD SAY PERHAPS 100 PERCENT
THINGS HAVE CHANGED. THEY ARE NOT PAYING THE
GOVERNMENT OF KOSOVO AT ALL. ALL THE MONEY THAT THEY PAY GOES TO THIS
FUND, "FATHERLAND IS CALLING," OR ANY OTHER FUND. OR EVEN THEY DO COLLECT
CASH MONEY AT DIFFERENT MEETINGS. SO ALL THE MONEY GOES TO U-C-K.

/// END ACTUALITY ///

THE U-C-K IS THE KOSOVO LIBERATION ARMY. BECAUSE OF AN UNDEVELOPED
BANKING SYSTEM AND NOW INTERNATIONAL SANCTIONS, GETTING MONEY INTO KOSOVO
TO HELP THE REBELS IS A BIT OF A PROBLEM. SOMETIMES CASH IS CARRIED IN,
SOMETIMES IT IS USED TO BUY WEAPONS ABROAD, WHICH ARE THEN SMUGGLED IN.

THE POPULARITY OF THE KOSOVO LIBERATION ARMY IS SURE TO HAVE AN IMPACT ON
CIVILIAN INSTITUTIONS THAT HAVE IN THE PAST BEEN RECEIVING MONEY FROM
ABROAD. NINETY PERCENT OF THE BUDGET OF THE ETHNIC ALBANIAN SHADOW
GOVERNMENT SUPPORTS A UNIVERSITY AND
SCHOOL SYSTEM. IT IS SUMMER NOW HERE IN KOSOVO, AND THE SCHOOLS ARE
CLOSED. BUT EDUCATORS ARE ALREADY WORRIED ABOUT WHAT HAPPENS WHEN
STUDENTS RETURN IN THE FALL.

TEXT: VOA'S ART CHIMES REPORTING FROM KOSOVO'S PROVINCIAL CAPITAL --
PRISTINA. // END OPT //

THE NEW-YORK BASED ALBANIAN-AMERICAN CIVIC LEAGUE SAYS THERE ARE ABOUT
400 THOUSAND ALBANIAN AMERICANS IN THE UNITED STATES. THE PRESIDENT OF
THE LEAGUE -- FORMER CONGRESSMAN JOSEPH DIO GUARDI -- SAYS EVER SINCE THE
SERB BOMBING OF DRENICA IN FEBRUARY FINANCIAL SUPPORT HAS SHIFTED TO THE
K-L-A -- WHICH THE SERBS CALL A TERRORIST ORGANIZATION:

TAPE: CUT TWO DIO GUARDI (LATHAM # 7-301110) RUNS :13

THE ALBANIAN-AMERICANS CONSIDER MEMBERS TODAY OF THE KOSOVO LIBERATION
ARMY TODAY AS HEROES. NO ONE SHOULD EVEN THINK OF CHARACTERIZING THIS
GROUP AS A GROUP OF TERRORISTS. THEY ARE NOT.

TEXT: THE SERBS DISAGREE WITH MR. DIO GUARDI SAYING THE K-L-A IS A
TERRORIST ORGANIZATION BECAUSE IT ATTACKS SERB POLICE STATIONS.

SAMI REPISHTI, AN ETHNIC-ALBANIAN WHO IS PRESIDENT OF THE NATIONAL
ALBANIAN-AMERICAN COUNCIL, SAYS SO MUCH MONEY IS GOING TO THE K-L-A
BECAUSE THE WEST PAID NO ATTENTION TO SERBIAN REPRESSION OF ALBANIANS IN
KOSOVO UNTIL THE GUERRILLA MOVEMENT BEGAN TO FIGHT BACK.

TAPE: CUT THREE REPISHTI (LATHAM # 7-301110) RUNS :32

IT IS TRUE THAT THEY HAVE CAUSED A KIND OF EUPHORIA
AMONG MANY PEOPLE WHO HAVE BEEN TOTALLY FRUSTRATED BY THE INACTION OF THE
INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY, ESPECIALLY THESE PAST 10 YEARS. SINCE THEY ARE
TAKING UPON THEMSELVES THE ROLE OF LIBERATORS, THEY DEFINITELY HAVE A
GREAT EMOTIONAL APPEAL AMONG THE POPULATION. IN THE UNITED STATES THERE
ARE DEFINITELY PEOPLE WHO ARE FIRED UP. THEY FEEL THAT, FINALLY, THE
ALBANIANS IN KOSOVA ARE FINDING ENOUGH COURAGE TO STAND UP AND TO SAY,
'THAT'S ENOUGH OF MILOSEVIC.'

TEXT: MR. REPISHTI SAYS TODAY ALBANIANS IN AMERICA TEND TO SHOW THEIR
SUPPORT FOR THE PEOPLE OF KOSOVO BY GIVING MONEY TO THE UCHEKA -- AS THE
K-L-A IS CALLED IN THE ALBANIAN LANGUAGE:

TAPE: TAPE FOUR REPISHTI (LATHAM # 7-301110) RUNS :23

THERE ARE SOME PEOPLE WHO HAVE LEFT THE UNITED STATES, TOO, AND THEY WENT
THERE TO JOIN THE U-C-K. MOST OF THE POPULATION HERE HAVE HELPED THE
U-C-K FINANCIALLY -- THERE IS NO DOUBT. BUT THEY HAVE CONTINUED ALSO TO
HELP THE SONS OF KOSOVA. I DON'T HAVE THE EXACT FIGURES IN MONEY THAT
HAS GONE TO ONE OR THE OTHER. BUT DEFINITELY A LOT OF MONEY HAS BEEN
GOING TO BOTH SIDES.

TEXT: // OPT // MR. REPISHTI DEFENDS THIS FINANCIAL SUPPORT AS
NECESSARY IN THE FACE OF INDECISION AND VACILATION BY THE INTERNATIONAL
COMMUNITY:

TAPE: TAPE FIVE REPISHTI (LATHAM # 7-301110) RUNS :29

WE HAVE HERE AN ARMY OF PEASANTS AND SHEPHERDS WHO ARE FIGHTING AGAINST
THE ARMY OF MILOSEVIC, WHOSE CONDUCT AND AIMS WE HAVE SEEN IN BOSNIA.
ALBANIAN-AMERICANS ARE VERY UPSET ABOUT THE WHOLE THING BECAUSE, WHEN THE
EMBARGO WAS PLACED ON BOSNIA, THE BOSNIAN PEOPLE WERE LEFT UNARMED AND
DEFENSELESS. IF WE CUT THE FINANCIAL MEANS OF BUYING WEAPONS FOR
ALBANIANS, WE ARE GOING TO
FIND A LARGE NUMBER OF ALBANIANS FACING THE SERBIAN ARMY TOTALLY
UNARMED. AND, OF COURSE, WE ARE GREATLY CONCERNED. // END OPT //

TEXT: BOTH SAMI REPISHTI AND JOSEPH DIO GUARDI SAY SUPPORT FOR THE
GUERRILLA MOVEMENT WILL CONTINUE DESPITE WESTERN CALLS TO STOP FINANCING
THE WEAPONS PIPELINE TO THE K-L-A. LAST WEEK WESTERN DIPLOMATS MEETING
IN BONN CALLED FOR A HALT IN THE FLOW OF FINANCIAL AND OTHER SUPPORT TO
KOSOVO ON THE GROUNDS IT IS SUSTAINING FIGHTING IN THE AREA. JIM HOOPER
OF THE WASHINGTON-BASED BALKAN INSTITUTE SAYS THE DECISION BEARS AN
UNCOMFORTABLE RESEMBLANCE TO A SIMILAR DIPLOMATIC PROPOSAL TO END THE
FIGHTING IN BOSNIA:

TAPE: TAPE SIX HOOPER RUNS :52

THIS LOOKS LIKE A KOSOVO VERSION OF THE ARMS EMBARGO AGAINST THE
BOSNIANS. IT PREVENTED THEM FROM OBTAINING THE WEAPONS NECESSARY FOR
THEIR SURVIVAL AND IT FACILITATED THE ATTACKS BY THE SERBS AND THE
GENOCIDE THERE WHICH TOOK OVER 200 THOUSAND LIVES. AND I THINK WHAT
WE'RE SEEING HERE IS THE SAME MORAL EQUIVALENCY APPROACH IN THIS CONTACT
GROUP STATEMENT. IT MAKES IT SEEM THAT THE KOSOVO LIBERATION ARMY AND THE
KOSOVAR ALBANIANS WHO ARE DEFENDING THEMSELVES ARE ON THE SAME
LEVEL AS THE SERBS WHO ARE ATTACKING THEM WITH PLANES, HELICOPTER
GUNSHIPS, TANKS, ARTILLERY, AND ARMORED PERSONNEL CARRIERS.

TEXT: MR. HOOPER AGREES THE K-L-A GUERRILLAS DO NOT HAVE THE POWER TO
WIN AN ALL-OUT WAR WITH SERBIA. BUT WITH ENOUGH ARMS AND MONEY HE SAYS
THAY CAN DRAW THE CONFLICT OUT FOR YEARS -- A PROSPECT HE BELIEVES NO ONE
WANTS -- INCLUDING YUGOSLAV PRESIDENT SLOBODAN MILOSEVIC.
(SIGNED)

NEB/PAM/

15-Jul-98 4:47 PM EDT (2047 UTC)

Source: Voice of America

Radenko

unread,

Jul 16, 1998, 3:00:00 AM7/16/98

The author of this article still uses the term of "kosova", something
non-existant.
I advice him/her to use the official, original and internationally accepted
name Kosovo and Metohija, alternatively Kosmet or even only Kosovo.

Although I realize political motives are behind the using of the name
"kosova", I will keep on posting these corrections every time an article of
this sort appears...

Rødskola

unread,

Jul 16, 1998, 3:00:00 AM7/16/98

to Radenko

Pa dobro, bolan, Radenko!
Zar nakon svega sto je receno o tvom srbovanju iz Svedske i Stokholma jos
uvijek imas obraza da se javljas?

vfil...@haverford.edu

unread,

Jul 16, 1998, 3:00:00 AM7/16/98

From: Filipovic Vanja <vfil...@haverford.edu>
Subject: BosNet KOSOVA UPDATE: Kosova in the Media

----------------------------------------------------------------------
B o s N e t - July 16, 1998
______________________________________________________________________

The New York Times
July 16, 1998, Thursday, Late Edition - Final
Section A; Page 12; Column 1; Foreign Desk

NATO Threat to Intervene in Kosovo Fades as Rebels Succeed
By STEVEN LEE MYERS
WASHINGTON, July 15

The already remote prospect of NATO military intervention in Kosovo has
quickly faded as the Serbian crackdown there has let up and the rebels
expand their campaign, Pentagon officials said today.

A month after NATO warplanes staged a noisy show of force over
neighboring Albania and Macedonia, the officials said that NATO had not
ruled out the use of force to halt the growing civil war in the Yugoslav
province. But they said for now the success of ethnic Albanian insurgents
in the Kosovo Liberation Army had significantly undercut that possibility.

While NATO's strategists have drafted preliminary plans, including
possible air strikes against Serbian forces in Kosovo, the officials said
neither the United States nor NATO had any intention of helping the rebels
in their campaign for independence from the Yugoslav Government by bombing
the Serbs.

"They need to know -- and NATO has made this clear and the U.S.
Government has made this clear -- that the cavalry is not coming," a
Defense Department official told reporters at the Pentagon today, speaking
only on the condition of anonymity.

The officials said they remained worried that the fighting could spread
to neighboring countries, an event that would almost certainly draw in
NATO, but those fears have diminished since the Serbs have eased their
crackdown.

Other officials in Washington and at NATO's headquarters in Brussels
said today that NATO's military planning had virtually ground to a halt
and that the United States and its allies had focused their attention on
diplomatic efforts to end the fighting. The officials emphasized, though,
that NATO could still launch a strike against the Serbs on very short
notice.

"The emphasis is very much on the political side," a Western diplomat
said today.

Another meeting of the "contact group" of countries monitoring the
fighting -- the United States, Russia, Germany, Italy, Britain and France
-- is to take place in London next Tuesday. President Clinton's senior
national security aides met at the White House this evening to discuss the
situation.

In recent weeks the United States and its allies have become frustrated
by the rebels' apparent unwillingness to consider a peaceful resolution.
Compounding the frustration is the confusion over who, if anyone, can
speak for the loosely organized rebels.

"We actually are having a hard time in our community understanding
exactly who is in charge -- who is in charge of the military, who is in
charge of the politics," an intelligence official at the Pentagon said
today, referring to the intelligence community.

The Serbian crackdown has eased significantly since NATO's air exercise
on June 15, in which more than 80 aircraft coursed across the skies over
Albania and Macedonia. Though largely symbolic, the exercise showed NATO
could quickly assemble air power in the Balkans. A day later, Mr.
Milosevic met with President Boris N. Yeltsin of Russia and pledged to
halt the bloodshed.

"Over the past two to three weeks, we've seen a definite leveling off
and perhaps even drop in offensive-type of operations on the part of the
Serbs," one of the officials said today.

That raised hopes that a political solution was still possible, but
those hopes have dimmed because of the rebels, who are vowing to establish
an independent state of Kosovo, whose 2 million people are overwhelmingly
ethnic Albanians.

The Kosovo Liberation Army, once a couple of hundred irregulars, has
grown in size and strength since Mr. Milosevic ordered his crackdown.
Still, the officials said, it is unable to wage a sustained military
campaign against the better-trained and equipped Serbs. The rebels control
their land, these officials said, because the Serbian forces have not
pursued them.

"In the face of determined Serb resistance or counterattacks, the
K.L.A. have not shown yet that they are capable of holding ground," one
said. "They can harass and temporarily occupy and hold ground, but they
hold the ground because the Serbs are allowing them."

The officials, who spoke to reporters on events of the last few weeks,
offered details that contradicted a number of recent reports about the
size and strength of both sides.

While reports have suggested that 50,000 Serbs have taken part in the
fighting, intelligence reports indicate that only 10,000 soldiers from the
Yugoslav National Army are involved, along with a smaller number of
special police units, the officials said. The rebels, by contrast, have
only 2,000 soldiers, although they can rely on the support of "tens of
thousands" of armed supporters in Kosovo.

The officials also displayed a map suggesting the rebels control far
less than the 30 to 40 percent of territory often cited.

The rebels are receiving money and weapons from ethnic Albanians
outside Kosovo, including expatriates in Germany and North America, the
officials said.

GRAPHIC: Map showing the location of Kosovo, Yugoslavia: Ethnic Albanians
outside Kosovo are sending in money and arms.

======================================================================

Serbian army showing restraint, official says Milosevic feared to be
biding time
Steven Komarow

WASHINGTON -- Serbia's forces have shown new restraint in their battle
against Albanian nationalists in the Kosovo province. But Yugoslav
President Slobodan Milosevic may just be waiting for a more favorable time
to launch a major move against the rebels, U.S. officials said Wednesday.

"He's a master at being able to manipulate," an official said at the
Pentagon during a briefing given on the condition that names are not used.

Heavy-handed tactics by Milosevic's troops, who shelled and burned
villages, nearly brought Western intervention last month.

But after warnings from the West, including an air power demonstration
just off the Kosovo border, and pressure from Russian President Boris
Yeltsin, Milosevic turned down the heat.

"Over the past 2-3 weeks, we've seen a definite falling off" of
activity by the Serb army, officials said.

As a result, the rebel Kosovo Liberation Army has expanded its turf,
especially in the western part of the mountainous land. The KLA has
quadrupled since March to about 2,000 troops and has strong support from
tens of thousands of the ethnic Albanians who make up 90% of Kosovo's 2
million people, officials said.

Kosovo is a province of Serbia, which with Montenegro form present-day
Yugoslavia.

More than 300 ethnic Albanians have died and 65,000 have fled to
northern Albania since the crisis began in March.

But though it is growing, the KLA remains loosely organized and lacks
the weapons and transport of a regular army.

"They hold the ground because the Serbs allow them to hold the ground,"
a defense official said.

The rapid changes in Kosovo make it difficult for the West to force a
peaceful solution to the conflict, which officials fear could ignite
unrest in neighboring countries.

The United States and NATO allies reject the claims of the Kosovo
Albanians that they should be an independent country.

Instead, the West supports giving the province autonomy within
Serbia -- something Milosevic took away but now says he would return as
part of a settlement.

But peace talks have not begun, despite a visit by Richard Holbrooke,
President Clinton's nominee for ambassador to the United Nations.

"Milosevic has handled the international community with great skill," a
NATO official said. But his kindly posture is likely to end, he said.

One scenario feared by NATO is that Milosevic will resist the rebels
through the summer and then, with the onset of bad weather in October,
"take them out," the official said.

Cloud cover would hamper severely NATO airstrikes, should the alliance
want to contain a Serbian offensive. Without air cover, the West won't
send ground troops.

Meanwhile, the rebels don't have the skills, supplies or weapons to
fight successfully in the winter, according to NATO's analysis.

And any military action to stop the fighting must be carefully weighed
to make sure that neither side gains an advantage. If Milosevic continues
to restrain his troops from committing atrocities, the Pentagon does not
expect to be sending troops.

======================================================================

Copyright 1998 News World Communications, Inc.
The Washington Times
July 16, 1998, Thursday, Final Edition
INSIDE THE RING; Pg. A11

Ernest Blazar; THE WASHINGTON TIMES

[..]

SLOW BURN

Folks worried that U.S. troops might soon see duty in Kosovo can rest
easy.

For now, anyway.

"We're not anywhere near making a decision for any kind of armed
intervention in Kosovo right now," a defense official who asked not to be
named told reporters at the Pentagon yesterday.

The sporadic fighting between Yugoslav troops and ragtag, ethnic
Albanian insurgents in Kosovo, a Yugoslav province, has proved to be a
"tough nut to crack" for NATO, defense and intelligence officials
explained.

Chief among NATO's concerns is how to give neither side an advantage
if NATO troops intervene. Strict neutrality is required because NATO
disapproves of both the Yugoslav army violence in Kosovo and the ethnic
Albanians' drive for independence there. NATO has even considered bombing
both sides if the fighting escalates.

The Serbs are now applying only enough military force to keep the
Kosovo insurgents at bay, mainly to avoid the kind of major offensive that
could trigger a NATO military response, intelligence officials told
reporters.

For their part, the loosely organized Kosovo insurgents are incapable
of launching anything more than harassing raids, ambushes and sniping.
This has resulted in something of a Mexican standoff in that tense region.

But that may soon change. Intelligence officials describe as
"explosive" the continuing rise in the number of ethnic Albanian
insurgents. Said one intelligence official: "It has been remarkable."

=========================================================================

Kosovo clashes pushing Yugoslavia into hyperinflation - Croatian daily
Source: 'Jutarnji List', Zagreb, in Serbo-Croat, 4 Jul 98

Excerpt from article by Marijan Heski: "The war in Kosovo costs Serbia
3m dollars a day" , published by the Croatian daily 'Jutarnji List' on 4th
July

The war in Kosovo is again pushing Serbia and Montenegro into
uncontrolled hyperinflation. The black market was the first to react to
the increased cost of maintaining the "occupation forces" - which is now
covered by the additional printing of money - and the introduction of
international sanctions. The street exchange rate of the German mark is
now seven official Yugoslav dinars instead of six.

Although a devaluation took place in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
recently, in late March, in an attempt to calm the domestic foreign
currency market, the official exchange rate barely held for two months.
The increase in the number of police in late April and their doubling
during May increased the daily cost of the use of the police in the
southern province to 1.7m dollars. Accordingly, the police cost the
Republic of Serbia 52m dollars a month, which is approximately 45 per cent
of the funds spent on retirement pensions or 22 per cent of the take-home
salaries of those employed in Serbia. Adding the cost of ammunition and
the loss of material and equipment, the total cost of the use of the
police in Kosovo is significantly higher.

The price of just one bullet is DM0.5, and 100,000 to 300,000 bullets
are fired daily in cleaning [as published] operations. An alleviating
factor is that the equipment used in Kosovo by the Serbian MUP [Ministry
of Interior] is mainly from the JNA [Yugoslav People's Army] armoury or
cheap Russian vehicles. However, every vehicle that is lost, although it
might have been acquired cheaply from the countries of the former eastern
bloc, is an irretrievable loss for the impoverished country. Serbia's
earlier expenditures on the maintenance of occupation troops in Kosovo
were not small either. Up to April of this year, the monthly cost of the
troops of the Kosovo MUP was 864,000 dollars.

Before the escalation of violence in Kosovo, Serbian police officers
were happy to go to the province, because of the relatively high wages.
The wages for Kosovo have not changed in years, however, and one can get
killed there now. The extra 78 dinars per day is no longer enough to
motivate Serbian police officers to guard the " sacred Serbian land" . One
cost that has increased dramatically, but is not shown anywhere, is
payment for the additional activities of the secret police.

A special additional cost is the engagement of the Yugoslav Army. As it
is estimated that the Pristina corps has been reinforced with
approximately 20,000 troops, Serbian experts believe that the basic daily
cost of army maintenance amounts to 500,000 dollars. Moreover, every time
the army takes a step outside the barracks, the cost of the Yugoslav
Army's engagement multiplies. A single day of "drill" activities by a tank
brigade gobbles up as much oil as the Belgrade public transport company in
a month.

The daily expenditure of large-calibre ammunition in the support that
the Army has given the police amounts to 500 shells. Depending on the
calibre, the price of a shell ranges from 100 to 1,500 dollars. The daily
use of helicopters and planes is a significant burden on the military
budget. One hour of flight time by a helicopter, depending on its size - a
Gazelle [Serbo-Croat: gazela] or an Mi-8 - costs from 600 to 1,200
dollars. Adding the cost of using combat vehicles, the additional
regrouping of units, entrenching and planting mine fields as additional
noncombat costs, the maintenance of the status quo in Kosovo costs the
state of Serbia and Yugoslavia almost 3m dollars a day on average...

======================================================================

Rebel army officer says "real war" under way
Source: 'Sueddeutsche Zeitung', Munich, in German 14 Jul 98

Text of interview with Lum Haxhiu, "officer for morals, politics, and
information of the regional Kosovo Liberation Army commando in the '
liberated territory'at the western fringe of Kosovo" , in Junik, Kosovo:
"There is war in Kosovo" , published by the German newspaper '
Sueddeutsche Zeitung' on 14th July

['Sueddeutsche Zeitung'] What did your meeting with [US envoy Richard]
Holbrooke yield?

[Haxhiu] Nothing. He spoke of peace. We need freedom. Peace under
Serbia is occupation.

[Q] And the latest meeting of the international contact group in Bonn,
which urged both sides to cease hostilities?

[A] It just blunted the edge of the sanctions against Belgrade. The
Serbs see themselves being encouraged to continue their actions against
us, the so-called terrorists. A real war is under way on our territory.
Our villages are bombed. If someone wants peace in the Balkans, then he
must ensure that there is an independent Kosovo.

[Q] Do you not also want a greater Albania of all Albanians? The West
is primarily worried about the existence of Macedonia, whose western
fringe is densely populated with Albanians.

[A] Our primary goal is an independent Kosovo. We are 90 per cent of
the population here. The Albanians in Macedonia only want to enforce
national rights within Macedonia so far. They have their own leader. We do
not want to cause even more problems in the Balkans.

[Q] The contact group wants the political parties of the Kosovo
Albanians to agree on one line and one delegation for negotiations and to
include the UCK [ Kosovo Liberation Army, OVK in Serbo-Croat]. Competitors
of "President" Ibrahim Rugova, such as, above all, Adem Demaci with his
Parliamentary Party, are meanwhile offering themselves to the UCK as its
"political wing" .

[A] We are all subordinate to the Supreme Staff. Relations with the
parties are its business. For the UCK there is no party policy, only
national policy.

[Q] And what do you yourself think of Rugova?

[A] Rugova expected too much from the West and got nothing. We have the
same goal - independence for Kosovo. However, our paths are different.
Rugova still believes in a peaceful path. The UCK does not. And that is
why we are fighting.

[Q] Holbrooke thinks that the UCK is not a unified group.

[A] We have been a military organization for some weeks. We recognize
the international conventions, and we have not committed one single war
crime. Our Supreme Staff and its seat are still secret at the moment. But
we have spokesmen - Jakup Krasniqi in the country and Bardhyl Mahmuti
abroad.

[Q] Should NATO intervene?

[A] We would welcome a NATO intervention. But it would already be late.

===========================================================================

U.S. Department of State
98/07/16 Daily Press Briefing
Office of the Spokesman

DEPARTMENT OF STATE
DAILY PRESS BRIEFING INDEX

Thursday, July 16, l998

Briefer: James P. Rubin

[....]

QUESTION: Kosovo - actually a couple of developments. The Serb riot
police stormed the headquarters of the Albanian political party - the
Kosovar political party. The Albanian Prime Minister today said that
the flow of refugees, which he puts at several thousand higher than I
think you said in the past, is destabilizing Albania - seeming to
endorse a position you've taken before. Has the refugee flow increased,
do you know?

MR. RUBIN: It is not our understanding that the refugee flow has
increased. Often there are different databases that apply in this case.
Our understanding of the situation there is that there is scattered
fighting throughout the Decani and Pec region. Our embassy personnel
continue to travel throughout Kosovo through the monitoring mission, and
we are enhancing our ability to gather real-time information.

With respect to the parliament, the parallel of Kosovo-Albanian
parliament convened a meeting this morning in Pristina. They elected an
assembly speaker and three vice presidents. This is the first time that
the parallel parliament has met.

With respect to what the Serbs have done, it is our understanding that
Serbian police were present in force. There was no violence, and we saw
no reports of arrests made as they entered LDK party headquarters where
the assembly session was held and searched through party files.

We do not recognize Kosovo's parliament as an official political
institution. But we do recognize the right of free assembly and that
this was engaging in the right of free assembly, and that right is
vitally important. The kind of heavy-handed intimidation by the Serb
police is emblematic of the repressive nature of Slobodan Milosevic's
regime in Kosovo, which sparked the current crisis in Kosovo. If
Belgrade is ever going to be able to benefit the Serbs in Kosovo or its
country in general, they have to learn to change their tactics.
Stripping away the legitimate rights of the Kosovar Albanian people
using heavy-handed tactics like this in a legitimate expression of
freedom of association and freedom of assembly, like the decision to use
military force to crack down, are the kind of mistakes that have
radicalized the Kosovar Albanian population and make it harder to get
the kind of agreement that will serve the interest of both Yugoslavia
and the people in Kosovo.

QUESTION: Was Ambassador Hill present when the incident occurred?

MR. RUBIN: I believe there was someone present; I don't believe it was
Ambassador Hill. He was here yesterday, and I can't imagine he made it
all the way back to Pristina by this morning or the middle of the night.

QUESTION: Have you seen the remarks of the Albanian Prime Minister
about destabilizing the refugees -

MR. RUBIN: I haven't seen those remarks, but I had two points to make.
One is that we do believe there is a grave risk of destabilization as a
result of refugees pouring out of Kosovo. That is the reason why we
have made clear that this poses a security threat to Europe and a
security threat to the world. It is the reason why the Contact Group
and the international community, through the Security Council, has
stated that it effects international peace and security.

With respect to the numbers, again, I'm not aware of a ramping up of the
numbers, but we may start from different numbers.

QUESTION: He put it 16,000 - 20,000.

MR. RUBIN: We still have our numbers.

QUESTION: Jamie, there were some reports, stories today in papers and
there was a briefing over at the Pentagon yesterday in which some people
interpreted what was being said was that the fighting had subsided to
such a degree that NATO was no longer really considering any sort of
military intervention.

MR. RUBIN: Well, interpretations are always a risky business. I've
checked with the Secretary on this, and nothing has changed. NATO
continues to pursue an accelerated military planning, continues to
narrow and flesh out options for the possible use of force; and no
option has been ruled out. That is the situation today; it was the
situation before any briefing that was interpreted in a certain way; and
it's still the situation.

QUESTION: Just a follow-up, the NATO Secretary General said this
morning that among the contingencies they were considering was a
deploying a force in Kosovo after a theoretical peace treaty to enforce
that peace. Is the United States prepared to participate in such a
mission?

MR. RUBIN: I am certainly not prepared to make a decision for the
Commander-in-Chief here at the State Department on Thursday, as you
could imagine. I can tell you that if the Secretary General is saying
that they are doing such planning, then they are doing such planning.

QUESTION: I just wanted to follow up on the subject of Kosovo.
Yesterday the panel of DOD experts said they had no evidence that there
were foreign mercenaries coming into Kosovo --

MR. RUBIN: That sounded familiar.

QUESTION: -- with arms. Does the State Department have any evidence
one way or the other about foreign mercenaries?

MR. RUBIN: I think I've said for many weeks now pretty much the same
thing; and obviously, my colleagues at the Department of Defense have
said pretty much the same thing. That same thing is that we are aware
of efforts on the part of the rogue's gallery of mercenaries in these
kind of conflicts to seek access to participate in fighting of this
kind. We have made clear to the Kosovar Albanians what a dumb idea it
would be to accept such assistance. And we're not aware of evidence
that such assistance has been accepted and delivered and operating now.

QUESTION: Would it be a fair interpolation of what's just said to say -
because several of us are hearing other accounts that Iranians and
Albanians and people from Tajikistan are coming in and assisting the
liberation army and trying to overthrow Belgrade in Kosovo. Would it be
fair to say - is it a fair interpolation of what you just said that
Kosovo Albanians - and by that I assume you mean - or maybe I shouldn't
make any assumption - the guy you're backing and the people whose views
ought to be heard but you're not backing have stopped --

MR. RUBIN: Well said, Barry.

QUESTION: Well, you've got to speak in shorthand here. Have stopped,
have rejected efforts by mercenaries to come help them liberate, in
their terms, Kosovo?

MR. RUBIN: You choose the verb. What I am under the impression is that
entreaties have been made, supplies and assistance have been proffered,
but it has not yielded any result.

QUESTION: Jamie, you said - I'm quoting this accurately, I think - "We
have enhanced our ability to gain real-time information." What does
that mean?

MR. RUBIN: Well, we are working through the Kosovar monitoring group to
try to improve our ability to know what is going on there. We are
trying to enhance the capability of that group so that it is in a
position to accurately report what's going on.

QUESTION: And physically, how are you enhancing its abilities?

MR. RUBIN: Well, I can get you the fact sheet on the Kosovar observer
monitoring group that I've provided some general information on in the
past. What I'm saying to you is that these monitors are operating and
they are trying to improve their ability to know what's going on in
Kosovo. That is a very important issue, because it's very important to
have independent confirmation of what is going on there; and that is
going on through the Kosovar monitoring group that I've described to you
in the past.

QUESTION: Are you using satellites?

MR. RUBIN: I don't believe that is a word that we normally use from the
podium here. Is today the day to try to trick the spokesman?

QUESTION: No, it's just a straight-out question.

QUESTION: Jamie, do you see an increase in displaced people within
Kosovo, as opposed to refugees flowing out to Albania? Do you see them
going into other neighboring countries, entities, whatever you want to
call them?

MR. RUBIN: Sorry?

QUESTION: The number of people within Kosovo that are displaced - do
you see an increase in displaced people, as opposed to refugees going
into Albania?

MR. RUBIN: I'm not aware that there has been a fundamental change in
the refugee or internal displaced person situation. Most of that
happened several weeks ago. At low levels it continues.

There were a lot of displaced persons within Kosovo. There were
refugees that flooded into Albania; there were refugees that flooded
into Macedonia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. The fact
that I indicated we don't see a ramping up of the refugees into Albania,
as I understand it, reflects the fact there isn't a lot of movement of
people in the thousands, the way there were several weeks and months
ago. That would apply, as well, to internally displaced people.

[.....]

______________________________________________________________________
Opinions expressed/published on BosNet/BosNet-B DO NOT necessarily

Radenko

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Jul 17, 1998, 3:00:00 AM7/17/98

vfil...@haverford.edu

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Jul 19, 1998, 3:00:00 AM7/19/98

From: Filipovic Vanja <vfil...@haverford.edu>
Subject: BosNet KOSOVA UPDATE: Kosova in the Media

----------------------------------------------------------------------
B o s N e t - July 19, 1998
______________________________________________________________________

BBC Summary of World Broadcasts

July 18, 1998, Saturday

Spokesman explains structure of rebel "army"
Source: 'Koha Ditore', Pristina, in Albanian 12 Jul 98

A spokesman for the Kosovo Liberation Army has said that the group is
organized with a military hierarchy rather than consisting merely of armed
groups, and it is gaining new members every day. He said he expected rebel
soldiers to be in Kosovo's capital, Pristina, "within a short time" , and
called on Kosovo's politicians to stop trying to establish control over
the rebels. The following is the text of a 10th July interview with Kosovo
Liberation Army spokesman Jakup Krasniqi in Malisevo, published by the
Kosovo Albanian-language newspaper 'Koha Ditore' on 12th July; subheadings
inserted editorially:

['Koha Ditore'] On the basis of its discussions, the international
community has reached the conclusion that the Kosovo Liberation Army [UCK
in Albanian, OVK in Serbo-Croat] is commanded on five levels, or, put more
simply, it has no serious overall command, but a horizontal hierarchy.

Rebel army organized from the start

[Krasniqi] The UCK is a new army in the process of formation. However,
the UCK has had its own staff and its military hierarchy from the start,
and still has today. Of course, at the present time when there are so many
parties, people have perhaps joined the UCK not out of inclination, but
obligation. These are special cases. One can come across people who say
this. For example, the president [Ibrahim Rugova, elected in an unofficial
ballot on 22nd March] still does not accept that the UCK is an organized
army, but thinks that there are armed groups. However, I take the view
that the times are such that there is room for troublemakers, paid or
instigated by whoever, to say all kinds of things. The UCK is an organized
army.

[Q] Do you for example exert any influence on the UCK at Junik?

[A] No area of Kosovo has been able to arm itself without the
supervision and organization of the responsible people in the UCK. No
doubt there are cases in which certain irresponsible people say things,
but these people have no right to talk on behalf of the UCK. The meeting
between [US envoy] Mr [Richard] Holbrooke and the members of the UCK was
not necessarily a meeting with the hierarchy. This has been
misinterpreted. Junik does not represent a particular centre of our
military organization. It is at a certain level in the hierarchy in which
we have apportioned operational zones. These are military secrets, but
there is also a hierarchy of the operational zones.

[Q] Are there misunderstandings among the commanders of the UCK? For
instance, was there a disagreement at Drenoc [Drenovac in Serbo-Croat] and
a problem at Llaushe [Lausa]?

[A] Look, Drenoc and Llaushe were insignificant problems. They have
been settled.

[Q] There is another problem, which is the question of the creation of
two ministries. You refused Ahmet Krasniqi, the officer appointed by [
Kosovo Prime Minister in exile Bujar] Bukoshi, as the coordinator of
military affairs, and had problems with the Armed Forces of the Republic
of Kosovo [Forcat e Armatosura e Republikes se Kosoves, FARK]. Where in
fact does the problem lie?

[A] As we said, we solved the problem with the FARK. Indeed, the prime
minister himself said that he recognizes no armed forces in Kosovo apart
from the UCK. As for Ahmet Krasniqi, we had never heard of him, because
the UCK has carved out its own liberated territories where it operates and
fights, and the people who have achieved this are those who have the first
claim to decide military matters. The UCK will not accept any kind of
ministry-on-paper that may be created outside Albanian territory. We have
made it clear that any military personnel are welcome at any time,
although we already have plenty of them, who have made great reputations
in Bosnia and Croatia. Servicemen who want to liberate Kosovo do not pay
any attention to what rank they will receive, although of course there
cannot be an army without ranks.

[Q] All right, what about the arrival of the 43 officers, who told
Bujar Bukoshi that they would no longer remain with Ahmet Krasniqi's
group, but would go to fight alongside the UCK?

Soldiers joining every day

[A] That is not the only group. I do not want to mention figures.
Soldiers are coming to us every day. They are arriving as sons of this
nation. It is not a matter of a few score. We are dealing with large
numbers. Servicemen abroad who are dreaming only about ranks and not the
liberation of Kosovo have no sense of principle. The highest rank of all
is the liberation of the Albanian people of Kosovo.

[Q] Let us talk about the UCK's clenched fist salute. Some have
interpreted the UCK as an ideological army of former political prisoners,
and others as a military police force dressed in black.

[A] There are two kinds of salute. The official UCK salute is a
military salute like that used in the Republic of Albania, with swift
movement of the hand to the forehead. However, there is also another
salute that we use in the street with civilians and children, which is a
clenched fist. We do not consider this has anything to do with ideology.
For us, a fist is a symbol of unity and strength. I do not think we have
any ideology, and in fact we do not have time for such things even if we
were interested in them, because we have our main job to do, which is the
task of liberation. We will leave ideology and parties for another time.

As for the police dressed in black, this had more to do with the
shortage of cloth. It is not that they are associated with anything in
particular. I think that in the future, when we are better off, our
policemen will also be better dressed. Look at these things together.
People interpret the clenched fist as ideological and the clothes as
fascist. These two hardly go together. So, we had some black cloth, and we
cut this in a distinctive way. It has nothing to do with fascist or
communist ideology.

[Q] Two days ago, at UN headquarters in Geneva, some Albanians said
that they represent the UCK's political wing abroad. They said that they
had also met Mr Gelbard. Do you know what this is about?

[A] There was a mistake in the interview I gave to 'Der Spiegel'. They
are legitimate representatives of the UCK who have the authority to talk
in the name of the UCK with various representatives and diplomats abroad.
This means that they were and are legitimate representatives of the UCK,
able to talk with diplomats and politicians about UCK issues and questions
regarding Kosovars. They are part of our network, our hierarchy, and are
entirely under our control, authorized to express our views in the
discussions that took place.

[Q] The UCK is in fact a product of the Popular Movement of Kosovo
[Levizja Popullore e Kosoves, LPK], which operates in Switzerland and
Germany. How much influence does the LPK in fact have over the UCK?

[A] It is true that the LPK has invested most in the creation of the
UCK. A military wing developed especially after 1992-1993. It was
announced in 1994 that the UCK had been formed. Then 'Zeri i Kosoves' ,
the organ of the LPK, always advertised the fund The Homeland Calls, which
brought the UCK to where it is today. Nevertheless, the LPK has never
sought to bring the UCK under its political umbrella, and this is to its
great credit as a political force. The demand of the LPK and now of the
UCK is that all those Albanians who believe that all avenues for Kosovo to
win independence by political means have been exhausted should join the
UCK to realize their aspirations. We were never bent on war. War is a
reality that has been imposed on us, and is in fact necessary for us to
achieve our final goal, which we are determined to pursue to the end. In
fact, in this context, the UCK and the LPK as organizations of national
liberation have grasped both the concept of pursuing liberation through
war and also the concept of talks on certain conditions.

We must also add that the National Movement for the Liberation of
Kosovo [Levizja Kombetare per Clirimin e Kosoves, LKCK] is also
incorporated in the ranks of the UCK, besides representatives of other
parties that have suspended their activities and joined our ranks, such as
Uke Bytyci, Rame Buja and Gani Krasniqi.

Ties with Albania

[Q] Where do you stand in relation to Albania?

[A] Albania is our kindred state, which we always think of. She made
her own contribution, and I think is continuing to contribute politically
and diplomatically, and through aid, especially to the people who have
been forced to leave their own territories. We hope that the government of
Albania and all its institutions will increasingly assist our just
struggle, because we are fighting in Kosovo to retain our national
identity and our existence as a nation. It is entirely natural that all
Albanians, wherever they are, should use ever opportunity to help their
brothers. Unfortunately there was a lot of work done in Kosovo last year
to encourage enmity towards Albania. This was a mistaken policy, and I
think it turned out to be unproductive. We hope that no state institution
or politician in Albania will form their attitudes on the basis of
statements by irresponsible individuals and journalists, but only by
relying on the fact that the Albanians of Kosovo have always seen Albania
as their kindred state, as indeed she is, with opportunities, abilities,
and duties to help us.

[Q] To what extent can you refute the statements by the international
community and Serbia that the UCK is leading the war from Tropoje and the
north of Albania?

[A] Albanians may now have gone to Tropoje, sent their families there,
and returned to defend Kosovo. It is entirely natural for Albanians to
look to Albania as their main source of help. However, the war in Kosovo
is being directed and waged in Kosovo, not outside.

[Q] How true is it that the UCK would have 100,000 soldiers inside
Kosovo, if it had weapons?

[A] The UCK indeed had problems obtaining weapons at the start. It is
experiencing these difficulties less and less. The UCK is growing stronger
every day, and we can say that we have won in all of our clashes with the
occupying police and army. I think that this is an example that shows our
level of professionalism, because these battles were against a
professionally-trained army and police force, well armed and with the most
modern equipment. However, the UCK's resistance was up to the challenge
and forced the enemy to retreat. We say that the UCK is in the process of
formation, but it is also in training, in the physical sense rather than
in its morale, because we have no lack of morale. We are sure that a fine
standard will be achieved soon.

[Q] What happened in the case of Bardh i Madh [Belacevac]? Was that a
mistake or a matter of tactics.

[A] Bardh i Madh was a tactical step.

[Q] Are you in a position to tell the people of Kosovo that you will
defend them from all forms of Serbian genocide and are you in a position
to inform the international community and the people that the UCK will
liberate and protect them from the occupying army?

Pledges to liberate Kosovo

[A] Before we address the people, we would ask the political parties to
suspend their destructive, divisive, and defeatist activities within our
Albanian nation, to remove all obstacles, and to give up all attempts to
put the UCK under their umbrella. Apart from this, the UCK is growing
stronger every day in every sense, both from the human and the material
point of view. It is advancing determinedly forward, and we promise the
people that the UCK will protect them wherever it is, and wherever the UCK
is supported and helped. The UCK belongs to the people. It has the
strength, courage, and determination to defend them, and nobody will enter
Albanian villages and towns without passing over the dead bodies of the
soldiers of the UCK.

[Q] Can you guarantee that you will also come to Pristina?

[A] We have told you and others that we are making such good progress
that within a short time we may also be physically present in Pristina.

[Q] Are you frightened of winter, and will you have liberated Kosovo by
then?

[A] We are not scared of winter. As for liberation, that is a different
question. We will liberate Kosovo!

[Q] The international community has criticized the violation of human
rights in the kidnapping of Serbian and Montenegrin civilians. What can
you say about this?

[A] It does indeed seem to us ridiculous to equate the operations of
the UCK with those of the Serbian occupier, which are notorious throughout
the world. On this point, it seems to me that the international community
is not respecting its conventions, starting with the UN Charter, etcetera,
because the UCK has never dealt with civilians, or only if they have been
in the service of the army and the police and have done serious hard to
the people and the Albanian national cause. There have been cases in which
they have been kidnapped, but in this event they have been handed over to
international organizations, of course when they have been innocent.

First of all, all Serbian forces, whether the police, the military, or
armed civilians, are our enemy. From the start, we had our own internal
rules for our operations. These clearly lay down that the UCK recognizes
the Geneva Convention and the conventions governing the conduct of war,
even though it has not been offered the chance of signing them, as it
would have done. We do not go in for kidnapping. Even if some people have
suffered, these have been more Albanian collaborators than Serbian
civilians. We do not deal with civilians, and we return those whom we take
as prisoners of war. A few days ago we handed over two Serbs originating
from Croatia to the International Red Cross. Those we have kidnapped are
either announced in a list or reported to be executed, but we do not
behave in a base fashion like Serbia.

[Q] What message would you have for the Serbian people?

[A] We would appeal to the Serbian people in Kosovo not to become
involved in terrorist operations organized by the Serbian army and police,
and to mind their own business. The UCK has no intention of getting
involved with the civilian population, and has not done so hitherto. We
appeal to civilians who have taken up arms to surrender them and not to
oppose the UCK, or, worse, to set themselves against their neighbours. If
they do not do these things, they will come to no harm.

[Q] Are there Croats and mujaheddin in the ranks of the UCK?

[A] No, there are not. We will not allow our struggle to acquire any
colouring, especially one that is religious.

========================================================================

July 17, 1998, Friday, Final Edition; Pg. A15

American official calls for talks on Kosovo, rebels' independence
Jason Keyser and Gaedig Bonabesse; THE WASHINGTON TIMES

A State Department official said yesterday that ethnic Albanian rebels
fighting Serbian forces in Kosovo must be brought into negotiations and
that their demands for independence should be considered.

"A broader political strategy is needed," said the official, Daniel
Serwer, who is on loan to the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP), a
Washington policy group.

Negotiations between Yugoslav President Sloboan Milosevic and the
ethnic Albanian leader in Kosovo, Ibrahim Rugova, have not succeeded in
ending the fighting in the Serbian province.

The Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), which demands independence from
federal Yugoslavia, has not taken part in the talks. Mr. Rugova is a
moderate leader who is not affiliated with the KLA.

"Independence has to be on the table," Mr. Serwer said. "You can't
have negotiations if one party's position is off the table."

The United States and its NATO allies seek reinstatement of autonomy
for Kosovo, not independence. Mr. Milosevic withdrew autonomy for the
beleaguered province of 2 million, 90 percent of whom are ethnic
Albanians, in 1989.

Renewed fighting erupted in Kosovo Feb. 28 with a Serbian police
crackdown on the KLA. More than 300 people have died.

Mr. Serwer and other USIP officials briefed reporters about a recent
workshop set up to train ethnic Albanians in conflict resolution and
negotiation.

Jaco Cilliers, part of the USIP training team, said the ethnic
Albanians he worked with in the five-day workshop want alternatives to
military force.

"They are not yet very pessimistic," he said. "They are eager to
learn."

Veton Serroi, a member of Mr. Rugova's negotiating team, requested
the USIP training for Kosovo's ethnic Albanian leaders.

John Menzies, a former ambassador to Bosnia -Herzegovina and a USIP
senior fellow, criticized President Clinton's special envoy, Richard
Holbrooke, for "continuing to look to Milosevic for solutions."

"Ambassador Holbrooke characterized Milosevic as both the arsonist and
the fireman," he said. "But who gave him the fireman's badge? Why are we
not pursuing him with a policeman's badge and holding him accountable" for
the crackdown in Kosovo?

Mr. Menzies expressed concern about Western pressure on ethnic
Albanians last month to meet with Mr. Milosevic. They rejected the
calls.

"We felt sending Rugova to meet with Milosevic was like sending Bambi
to meet Godzilla," he said.

Also yesterday, NATO Secretary-General Javier Solana reiterated that
NATO is ready to use military force if diplomacy fails in Kosovo.

He told reporters the threat of force from the international community
has been effective.

"I'm sure the restraint we are seeing now in Milosevic's camp has a
lot to do with the clear statement made by NATO that we are prepared to
act if necessary," he said.

Mr. Solana, in Washington for a day of talks with administration
officials, told reporters NATO would keep a firm position on Kosovo
because the problem has gone beyond national borders and threatens
regional stability.

He said a diplomatic solution would be preferable, but "we will be
prepared to act in order to help a diplomatic solution."

-------------------------------------------------------------

July 17, 1998, Friday, Final Edition
COMMENTARY; Pg. A16

Mismatch of words and deeds
Gary Dempsey

In its latest foreign policy scramble, the Clinton administration is
trying to reverse the perception that it favors independence for Serbia's
embattled Kosovo Province, where more than 300 guerrillas, policemen and
civilians have been killed since February.

Making its first public criticism of the rebel Kosovo Liberation Army,
the Contact Group (representatives of the United States and five European
nations) issued a statement recently admonishing the KLA and stressing
that violence is inadmissible and will not solve the problem of Kosovo.
The Contact Group also announced that it will seek a United Nations
Security Council resolution calling on the insurgents and the Serbian
government to agree to a cease-fire.

But talk is cheap. Washington's actions tell a different story.
Despite its claim to the contrary, the Clinton administration doesn't
consider violence inadmissible. In fact, U.S. special envoy Richard
Holbrooke recently rewarded and legitimized the KLA's violence by offering
KLA representatives a spot on the Kosovar Albanian negotiating team. At
the same time, Mr. Holbrooke is unwilling to expand the Serbian side's
negotiating team to include nonviolent opposition leaders like Democratic
Party President Zoran Djindjic and Serbian Orthodox Bishop Artemije. Mr.
Djindjic wants a Kosovo solution that establishes equality under the law
and regional stability. Bishop Artemije leads a 2-year-old peace movement
that espouses a federalism plan that would simultaneously ease tensions in
Kosovo and reduce the power of Serbian strongman Slobodan Milosevic.

Moreover, inviting the KLA to join the Kosovar Albanian negotiating
team is downright hypocritical. In February, U.S. special envoy Robert
Gelbard asserted that the KLA is, without any questions, a terrorist
group. But now Washington wants the Yugoslav government to bargain with
the KLA. That is a policy Washington would never consider for itself -
negotiating with a group it had identified as a terrorist organization.

The Contact Group's promise to seek a U.N. Security Council
resolution calling for a cease-fire from both sides is equally empty. It
sounds evenhanded, but in reality, only one side - the Yugoslav government
- has the threat of sanctions, military strikes and other punishments
hanging over its head. The KLA has no comparable incentives for
restraint.

Even if Washington wanted to coerce the KLA, it would be extremely
difficult to do so. There are no pressure points to push: no KLA
government to sanction, no KLA installations to threaten with NATO air
strikes.

That problem was underscored recently when Washington warned the KLA
against launching a new offensive. But the warning was nothing more than
a statement of the obvious: that new attacks, in State Department
spokesmen James Rubin's words, are a sure-fire way to give President
Milosevic another pretext to kill innocent [ethnic] Albanians. Of course,
that's just what the KLA could use: more fodder for CNN that brings NATO
one step closer to intervention.

It's time for the administration to admit that the dynamics of the
Kosovo dispute make it quite impossible to be evenhanded. It's also time
for the administration to admit that if it continues its current policy,
the KLA will not be deterred from waging war for an independent Kosovo.
In fact, the opposite will happen. The rebels will be encouraged further
by the fact that there is a shield of U.S. threats protecting them
against the full force of the Milosevic regime.

Warring factions will not stop fighting until a cease-fire presents a
better option than violence. But as long as American threats can only
apply to one side, a cease-fire will not seem a better option to the KLA;
they will have everything to gain by exploiting the strategic opportunity
the Clinton administration has effectively created for them. The result:
Washington could find itself an unwitting accomplice to another Balkan
war.

Gary Dempsey is a foreign policy analyst at the Cato Institute.

______________________________________________________________________
Opinions expressed/published on BosNet/BosNet-B DO NOT necessarily

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Jul 20, 1998, 3:00:00 AM7/20/98

From: Filipovic Vanja <vfil...@haverford.edu>
Subject: BosNet KOSOVA UPDATE: Kosova in the media

----------------------------------------------------------------------
B o s N e t - July 20, 1998
______________________________________________________________________

NATO DIVIDED AS KOSOVO SPINS OUT OF CONTROL / DELAY IN MILITARY
INTERVENTION
By Roy Gutman. WASHINGTON BUREAU
Brussels

Brussels - Increased warfare between Serbs and ethnic Albanians has
divided NATO, making it more difficult for the alliance to agree on
military intervention in Kosovo, NATO sources said yesterday.

NATO "lost an opportunity to nip it in the bud," and is now in need of
a new political strategy, a source told Newsday. Serb forces and guerrilla
Albanians in the province of Kosovo "are more interested in fighting than
negotiating . . . It is not clear what our options are," said the civilian
source, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Serb military forces fired cannons and mortars into five Kosovo
villages yesterday as they recaptured a coal mine in Belacevac that had
been seized last week by the Kosovo Liberation Army. Thousands of
civilians have fled.

Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said the violence was
"unacceptable" and demanded that Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic
withdraw Serb special police forces and the Yugoslav army. She told
reporters in Shanghai that NATO had stepped up planning for possible
military action.

But events appear to have outpaced her.

As she spoke, German foreign minister Klaus Kinkel said the West no
longer demanded a withdrawal of Serbian troops and police from the
province before negotiations. A ceasefire will suffice for talks, he said.

The United States has been pressing for the early use of military force
in Kosovo, but the main brake, indirectly, is the U.S. military, which
wants to minimize the risk to its troops, sources said.

Alliance military experts have promised to complete planning military
options by next week, but two plans that might have helped halt the
fighting seem bound for rejection because of U.S. concerns, a NATO
official said.

One plan, declaring a no-fly zone in order to prevent Yugoslav air
bombardments of Albanian villages, would require destruction of the
Yugoslav air defense system - some 500 targets - and a possible ground
deployment to prevent them from being restored.

"There is too much risk in the minimal option," the official said.
Member states find the broader strike highly controversial and no one
wants to send in ground forces, the official said.

A second plan was to station NATO troops in northern Albania in order
to stop the influx of weapons into Kosovo, but U.S. fears of the risk to
American troops has driven up the requirement for forces to 25,000,
necessitating enormous expenditure.

A yet bigger problem concerns the political goals of any proposed
military intervention. NATO countries unanimously oppose independence for
Kosovo, where ethnic Albanian outnumber Serbs by a ratio of 9-to-1.
Instead, NATO members favor the "broadest possible autonomy" for the
Kosovar Albanians.

A senior western diplomat called the idea that Kosovars would want to
stay in a country where they have undergone 10 years of Serb repression a
"naive assumption."

A major worry for many NATO members is that the early use of force
would alienate Russia, which two weeks ago launched a diplomatic
initiative to restart negotiations. Most member countries, led by France,
insist that any use of force be first approved by the UN Security Council,
where Russia has a veto. The United States insists Security Council
approval is not required.

In some countries, the split within the government is in the open.
German Defense Minister Volker Ruehe takes the U.S. position that NATO can
act if the security of member countries (in this case, Greece and Turkey)
is endangered. But Foreign Minister Kinkel, apparently worried about
Russia, has insisted on the Security Council mandate.

AP Photo-Villagers flee fighting between Serb forces and Kosovo Liberation
Army insurgents near Pristina; the Serbs fired on five villages yesterday
as they recaptured a coal mine in Belacevac.

=========================================================================

MONTENEGRO CRISIS LOOMS IN BALKANS
By Roy Gutman. WASHINGTON BUREAU
Podgorica, Yugoslavia

Podgorica, Yugoslavia - Slobodan Milosevic baffled the world in the
early 1990s by provoking three wars that broke multi-ethnic Yugoslavia
apart, but nothing the Serbian strongman has done to date seems so
self-destructive as his dispute with Montenegro.

The conflict now unfolding may be even more fateful than the violent
military assault he launched this spring against ethnic Albanians in
Serbia's Kosovo province, which the State Department last week
characterized as "wildly" and "stupidly" overreacting.

Montenegro is the smaller of the two republics that make up the
federation of Yugoslavia. Populated mainly by ethnic Serbs, Montenegro has
only 630,000 inhabitants, one-fifteenth that of Serbia, but
constitutionally the two are on equal footing. Montenegro's ace in the
hole is that it is Serbia's only outlet to the sea. Its departure from the
federation would mean no more Yugoslavia, and probably no more Milosevic.

Unlike Kosovo, Montenegro was an independent state from 1878 to 1918
and a full republic in communist Yugoslavia, as Milosevic, who was born
there, is well aware. The republic's new governing coalition says it does
not want separation; it wants the ouster of Milosevic and his ally in
Montenegro, Momir Bulatovic, whose Socialists the coalition routed in
Montenegro's parliamentary elections last month.

"One state shouldn't be ruined just because we have a bad regime on the
top. Such a regime should be destroyed," Filip Vujanovic, Montenegro's
new prime minister, told Newsday Wednesday. "I personally think that the
danger for Yugoslavia now exists in Belgrade - that Milosevic and
Bulatovic want to separate Serbia from Yugoslavia."

Ten days ago, the newly elected parliament demanded withdrawal of all
Montenegrin troops from Kosovo until Milosevic complies with the demands
of the United States, Russia and major European powers to end his
crackdown there. The 42 members of the governing party approved the
nonbinding resolution, while Bulatovic's 29 Socialists boycotted the
session.

Montenegro is pursuing "its long-established tradition of an
independent and free state," said Kiro Gligorov, president of Macedonia,
the only republic to leave the Yugoslav Federation peacefully. "It cannot
come to terms with being a second-rate republic in a federation," he told
Newsday last week.

Since Milo Djukanovic, a Socialist turned western reformer, defeated
Bulatovic in Montenegro's presidential elections last October, the clash
has developed political, economic and ideological dimensions, and now it
has become a constitutional confrontation.

On the eve of the May 31 parliamentary elections, and in defiance of
the outgoing Montenegrin parliament, Milosevic engineered the election of
Bulatovic as the federal prime minister with the help of cronies in the
federal parliament. It was a declaration of political war.

Bulatovic halted all payments to Montenegrin pensioners. So now
Montenegro's representatives in the federal parliament are blocking all
action in its upper house. This will paralyze Milosevic's government, said
Vujanovic, Montenegro's prime minister, because "the federal president
can't act without the federal parliament."

Meanwhile, Milosevic has halted all trade between Serbia and Montenegro
and seen to it that Montenegro's borders with neighbors Croatia and
Albania remain closed. The airport in Podgorica, Montenegro's capital, is
dependent on the federally owned JAT airline and now has only a few
foreign flights. Its superb Adriatic resorts have only a handful of
foreign tourists this year. Belgrade's latest move is to slap a $50 fee
on tourist visas, which will dampen demand still further.

Timely intervention by U.S. special envoy Robert Gelbard helped
Djukanovic's political survival when Bulatovic threatened violence to
block his inauguration last January, and the new Montenegrin president has
cultivated friendly ties with the United States. For example, Montenegro
television is filled with American films, and its news programs use Voice
of America reporters as its correspondents. Serbian television is not
available here.

"We agreed to have Belgrade's evening news, provided the Serbs showed
ours. We have equal status," said Danica Jankovic, a government
spokeswoman, by way of explanation.

The current mood should not conceal that Montenegro has undergone a
transformation since 1991, when the public overwhelmingly backed
Milosevic's attempt to carve up Croatia and Bosnia and create a single
state of Serbs on the ruins of Yugoslavia.

"We in Montenegro realized that we have to oppose Milosevic, which
meant total isolation, a drop in the living standards, even going
backwards. When we saw it was impossible for Milosevic to change, we
decided to change ourselves," Vujanovic said.

Unlike Serbia, where Milosevic rose to power using intolerance against
Albanians as his platform, Djukanovic's government has ethnic Albanians in
key positions. In many ways, Montenegro today has the feel of the old
multi-ethnic Yugoslavia of the late President Josip Broz Tito, with
tolerance sustained not by police repression but by political consent.

One independent scholar, Milan Popovic of Podgorica law faculty,
believes the government cannot press for independence, because Bulatovic's
party won 36 percent of the vote, and if even half that number oppose
independence, there will be civil war. "Montenegro has no choice but to
give Milosevic the lead in destruction of the federation and follow every
step against it with a full explanation to the public," he told Newsday.
When Bulatovic's support falls below 10 percent, "it will not be so
dangerous."

A Djukanovic aide predicts that will be within a year.

==========================================================================

Kosovo. A war spreads

BELGRADE

THE war between ethnic-Albanian separatists and government forces in
Serbia's province of Kosovo is heating up. The Kosovo Liberation Army
(KLA) thinks it is gaining the upper hand. Soon, it says, it will come
down from the hills and enter the province's capital, Pristina. Having
been driven out of the town of Decane, on the Albanian border, in early
June, KLA fighters are once more taking a toll on Serbian police and
troops of the Yugoslav army.

Gloomy young conscripts from Montenegro and Serbia (the two republics
left in Yugoslavia under its president, Slobodan Milosevic) are deserting
in greater numbers, obliging the government to rely increasingly--as it
did in previous fighting in Bosnia and Croatia --on "volunteers" from
former para-military units. The road between Pristina and Prizren, not far
from the Albanian border, is no longer secure.

The KLA's recent successes should not, however, be exaggerated. The
Serbian police and army may still have the firepower to contain or even
defeat the KLA. But if they used it, they would further enrage the
Albanians and, almost certainly, appal the rest of the world by causing
heavy casualties among civilians. Another flood of refugees would probably
head for Macedonia. NATO's threats of military force and American-led
efforts to broker a ceasefire have restrained Mr Milosevic. But if the KLA
becomes too dominant, his patience may run out and he could yet unleash
his forces--whatever the diplomatic cost.

Such worries have galvanised the Contact Group, the representatives of
America, Russia and Western Europe's four biggest countries. Russia still
opposes a UN Security Council resolution to give NATO authority to go into
Kosovo (or bomb parts of it) if need be, but at a meeting last week in
Bonn the six countries drew up the outline of a peace plan proposing wide
autonomy for Kosovo, while ruling out independence.

The province's ethnic Albanians would, under the plan, control the
local police, as they largely did before Mr Milosevic took away their
autonomy in 1989. Neither side would be able to change Kosovo's status
without consent. Foreign observers would try to ensure that the rights of
all people in Kosovo --Serbs as well as Albanians--were respected.
America's ambassador to Macedonia, Chris Hill, now has the backing of all
Contact Group countries to pursue shuttle diplomacy (with Richard
Holbrooke, Bill Clinton's ambassador-designate to the UN and a seasoned
Balkan trouble-shooter, appearing when things get hot).

But just as divisions within the Contact Group seem to be healing--the
Americans are bringing the Russians back into the fold--the Kosovo
Albanians' leadership is falling apart. Ibrahim Rugova, twice chosen to be
president of the self-declared Republic of Kosovo in unofficial elections,
is still treated by the Contact Group as the negotiating partner of choice
because of his genuine long-held belief in non-violence. But the KLA now
disavows Mr Rugova and questions his legitimacy.

His own negotiating team says it no longer has the authority to speak
for Kosovo's Albanians. His once all-powerful Democratic League of Kosovo
is cracking up, as local leaders defect to the KLA, which Mr Rugova
refused to recognise for so long. Two other rival groups--the
Parliamentary Party of Kosovo, led by Adem Demaqi (who served 28 years as
a political prisoner of the communists), and the new Albanian Democratic
Movement--are both vying to be the KLA's political wing but have been
rebuffed by the men with guns.

Such disarray explains why various Americans have tried to talk
directly to the KLA in the hope of fixing a ceasefire. Robert Gelbard,
America's table-thumping envoy to the Balkans, went to Geneva to meet the
KLA's "foreign spokesman", Bardul Mahmuti, who last week announced that a
new group, the Kosovo National Movement, had become the KLA's political
wing--and would go on fighting for independence. A ceasefire, he said, was
possible only if Mr Milosevic first withdrew all his forces from the
province.

American and European diplomats admit they are unsure whom they are
talking to and whether the KLA has a coherent leadership at all. Jakup
Krasniqi, the KLA's apparent spokesman based in rebel-held central Kosovo,
blessed Mr Gelbard's meeting in Geneva, but denounced Mr Rugova. However,
Mr Krasniqi's own credentials and authority are also uncertain.

Mr Gelbard is particularly keen that the KLA should keep Macedonia out
of the fray. The Contact Group is meanwhile drawing up plans to clip the
wings of the KLA by stopping arms and men flowing into Kosovo from
Albania.

In a big concession, Mr Milosevic has allowed a diplomatic mission to
monitor events in Kosovo. The Contact Group hopes that the 100 or so
military observers from the United States, EU countries, Russia and
elsewhere will help calm things down. But if the war turns much nastier,
they may just become hapless bystanders.

=========================================================================

New York Times
July 20, 1998

Rebels Claim First Capture of Kosovo City

Related Articles
The New York Times: Conflict in Kosovo

Forum
Join a Discussion on the Conflict in Kosovo

By MIKE O'CONNOR

RAHOVAC, Yugoslavia Ñ In what could be the beginning of a
significant new phase of the fighting in the
Serbian province of Kosovo, ethnic Albanian separatists said Sunday
that they had taken Orahovac, their first
city, and that they would use their newly acquired weapons to keep
it.

Serbian forces were counterattacking Sunday afternoon, but the separatist
forces seemed confident and kept up heavy
firing against what they said were the remaining four government
positions in the city.

No matter what the outcome of this battle, the separatists of the Kosovo
Liberation Army are once again showing that
international efforts to support ethnic Albanian political leaders who
want to end the conflict with negotiations may fail.
The politicians have little influence over the insurgents, who are armed
with artillery and surface-to-air missiles that
they say are smuggled in, and they increasingly believe that they can win
militarily.

"This is the first step taken to intensify the quality of the war from
warfare against rural areas to the stage of moving
against urban areas," said the ethnic Albanian commander of the attack,
who would give only his nom de guerre,
Snake. He said the insurgents' strategy was now to take over other cities
and eventually to capture the provincial
capital, Pristina.

Tall columns of smoke twisted into the sky Sunday from Orahovac, whose
population is estimated at 20,000. Cannon
fire came in spurts. Serbian artillery rounds sent ethnic Albanian
soldiers toppling over one another for cover in houses
and bunkers, but Albanian officers said their forces were returning fire
with their own artillery.

On hills at the edge of the city, where the houses overlook patches of
dark green and lime-colored crops, sniper bullets
whizzed and whined through short stalks of corn. Ethnic Albanian
civilians, who said their homes were being hit by
Serbian shells, were fleeing the city. They inched sideways, their backs
hard against building walls, then dodged
across open spaces as they tried to get out of the way of the fighting.

Western military observers said that if the rebels have the weapons they
claim to have, they might well be able to keep
control of this city.

The population of Kosovo is about 90 percent ethnic Albanians, many of
whom want an independent country. Serbia
and Montenegro are the only two republics remaining in Yugoslavia. Kosovo
was once semi-autonomous, but Serbia
revoked that status in 1989.

Recently, under pressure from Western governments, the Yugoslav forces
have reduced larger-scale attacks on rebel
areas. Some foreign officials have said the government forces behaved so
brutally against civilians that their actions
encouraged people to join or openly support the rebels.

Now, however, some foreign diplomats say Serbian reluctance to order
soldiers to retake territory is leading the rebels
to assume they have little to fear from government forces.

"Instead of calming things down and letting us figure out how to get
everyone to the negotiation table, what we've
done is give the Albanian fighters a feeling of euphoria," said a Western
diplomat, who spoke on condition of
anonymity. "This makes them bolder, and it also makes other Albanians
want to join them."

Support for the insurgents began to grow early this year as many ethnic
Albanians in Kosovo said they had lost faith in
the ability of their political leaders to find a way to make the Serbian
government give them autonomy.

The insurgents have made surprising military advances. After six months
of fighting, they now contend that they
control about 40 percent of the territory of Kosovo, although the figure
is open to dispute.

In an effort to shift the focus back to peaceful negotiations, Western
diplomats, led by the United States, have tried to
foster cooperation among the traditional Albanian political leaders.

But this has failed, say diplomats involved in the efforts, as ethnic
Albanian politicians quarreled over who would lead
the coalition the West is trying to create. The result, at least for now,
they say, is that the rebels have become even
more attractive to the ethnic Albanians.

A member of the team of ethnic Albanian political leaders who are
supposed to be discussing strategy for negotiations
with the Serbian government said team members bickered so much that they
could seldom agree on anything.

"Time is running out, and there is no consensus." said the politician,
who spoke on condition of anonymity. He said
that without negotiations, the rebels were "the only way to gain
independence," adding, "The politicians have lost
contact with the people and don't see how desperate they are for
freedom."

The member of the negotiating team, along with many other ethnic
Albanians, said most of their political leaders look
to Western governments for support instead of listening to average people
in Kosovo.

"These so-called leaders think they can govern Kosovo by having their
picture taken with Bill Clinton," the politician
said. "Maybe that used to work, but it doesn't now. Now you have to go
the people. You have to see how they yearn
for their own country."

In Malisevo, the first town up the twisting road from Orahovac, many of
the people were in rebel uniform Sunday. An
American 105-millimeter recoilless rifle, bolted to the bed of a pickup
truck, was on its way to the fighting.

Behind the high walls that surround the clusters of homes where extended
families live in the traditional ethnic
Albanian way, people were receiving refugees.

Two brothers sat on the red-and-black carpets with intricate diamond and
square patterns that spread across the floor of
their compound's communal room. They asked to remain anonymous because
another brother is a soldier in the
Kosovo Liberation Army.

His picture was on the wall. There were also fuzzy black-and-white
photographs and fading drawings of Albanian
national heroes.

"We don't have President Rugova's picture," said the elder brother,
referring to Ibrahim Rugova, the political leader of
Kosovo Albanians and the man American diplomats say they hope can lead
negotiations to end the conflict.

The younger brother added: "Rugova should have been here at least once to
see us. We have waited for him, and for
the democratic countries, but no one came. Now we are tired of waiting."

======================================================================

Thousands Flee As Lawlessness Spreads in Kosovo
Conflict Between Serbs, Ethnic Albanians Leaves Pec a Ghost Town After Dark

By R. Jeffrey Smith
Washington Post Foreign Service

Monday, July 20, 1998; Page A12

PEC, Yugoslavia, July 19ÑBajram, an ethnic Albanian who has lived here
for 40 years, was
standing in a bread line in pitch darkness at 4:30 a.m. a few days ago
when a half-dozen
Serbian policemen approached in an armored vehicle. After taunting the
group, the policemen
became enraged at Bajram because his papers stated that he was born near
a village where
several Serbian policemen had just been shot.

For the next 30 minutes in the back of the armored vehicle, Bajram, 45,
said, "they beat me, on
one side and then the other," while cruising up and down the streets of
Pec, the second-largest
city in Kosovo. They used numchucks -- two metal nightsticks joined by a
short chain -- as
well as the butts of their rifles and the tips of their boots, before
dumping him onto a deserted
street and ordering him at gunpoint to lie down in a ditch.

During the beating, Bajram, said, the policemen repeatedly threatened to
kill him, saying, "you
will never eat Serbia's bread again." It was their effort to hammer home
the Serbs' claim to
undisputed dominion over everything in Kosovo, a province of Serbia --
Yugoslavia's
dominant republic -- where ethnic Albanians comprise 90 percent of the
population.

Bajram's bruises and scars are just part of the evidence that Kosovo is
rapidly becoming a
lawless territory, in which kidnappings, beatings and other acts of
violence are turning the lives
of citizens upside down. The open warfare between Serbs and ethnic
Albanians that has
touched dozens of villages and towns has not yet spread to Pec, but the
city is suffused with an
atmosphere of fear and, sometimes, terror.

As many as a third of the city's 40,000 inhabitants have fled in the past
two weeks, most
traveling by foot over mountain passes as high as 5,000 feet to avoid
Serbian checkpoints and
reach relative safety in the neighboring Yugoslav republic of Montenegro.
According to the
United Nations, more than 14,300 refugees from Kosovo have been
registered in Montenegro
since March, including at least 7,200 ethnic Albanians and 2,000 Serbs
from the province's
western region.

They are fleeing a city where few people go out to socialize, where
almost no one has a steady
job, where cultural performances have been halted for months and where
even private
celebrations to mark holidays or high school graduations are discouraged
for fear of attracting
the unwanted attention of Serbian police. At least 17 Serbs and six
ethnic Albanians have
disappeared from Pec and surrounding villages since mid-May, according to
the Pristina-based
Humanitarian Law Center; they are presumed to be victims of kidnappings
by ethnic Albanian
guerrillas or government security personnel.

Loxha, a 55-year old ethnic Albanian interviewed at a refugee center near
the Montenegrin city
of Rozaje, said he left a suburb of Pec with five relatives "because a
lot of shootings were
going on. Everyone [nearby] abandoned their houses. We hate wars. If I
were to go back, I
would not feel safe."

Many who fled evidently were alarmed by brief fighting last week between
the Serbian militia
and members of the ethnic Albanian rebel group known as the Kosovo
Liberation Army, over
control of Lodja, a village two miles southeast of Pec. Most of the
houses along the road
leading there are abandoned, with Serbian snipers peering out of windows
piled with sandbags
and a large police detail blocking all traffic from reaching the village.
Smoke could be seen
rising from houses in the village on Friday, but it remained under Kosovo
Liberation Army
control.

Fighting in outlying areas has caused an influx of more than 36,000
refugees into the city,
most of whom are staying with friends or relatives whose resources
already are stretched thin.

Almost none of the residents of Pec venture outside after dark, turning
what was once a vibrant
city of musicians, traders and tourists into a ghost town at night. Under
normal conditions, the
streets of most Balkan towns are thronged on Saturday night with flirting
teenagers and
strolling families. In Pec last evening, a reporter encountered only a
few stray dogs and one
couple during a 90-minute walk in the city center.

The woman, Mirjana Ilic, said most of her friends are unemployed and that
she now lives off
the street-gambling winnings of her husband, Sefkija Zejnelagic.
"Milosevic and Rugova,
these are the people who are making trouble," Mirjana said, speaking of
Yugoslav President
Slobodan Milosevic and ethnic Albanian leader Ibrahim Rugova. "The two
sides are making
mistakes, but I as a Serb say Serbs are making more mistakes."

Ilic, who spoke as Serbian police sang nationalist songs at a nearby
cafe, said she felt safe
walking late at night. But she warned an ethnic Albanian that "when the
guys with painted
faces [Serbian special police] come, you'll have no protection."

During the day, city residents are forced to spend much of their time
foraging in shops for
scarce food, such as cooking oil, bread, flour, sugar, butter and
macaroni. For much of the
past four months, Serbian officials have clamped an unofficial embargo on
shipments of these
and other goods to Kosovo; three weeks ago, they declared in a letter to
businessmen in the
province that shipments of roughly 40 commodities would be restricted.

The results of what some aid workers have called a "slow strangulation"
of the province have
been catastrophic for many businesses here. A trade association in
Pristina, the provincial
capital, reported last week that nearly one-third of all the province's
egg-laying chickens have
died because farmers cannot obtain chicken feed, causing a doubling of
egg prices in the last
month.

It is "an effort to squeeze the population into submission," said the
local director of a
humanitarian organization in a letter last week to special envoy Richard
C. Holbrooke, who has
been nominated as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. In response,
State Department
spokesman James P. Rubin issued a statement in Washington last week
saying that "we have
seen this kind of intimidation tactic before and condemn such action as a
violation of human
rights."

Despite the protests, what little food comes in has been funneled to
state-run stores, which are
managed by Serbs; private stores run by ethnic Albanians can sell only
the produce they obtain
in the province. Moreover, many of the state stores maintain lists of
"permitted" customers,
most of whom happen to be Serbs.

Kujtim, 27, an ethnic Albanian who has lived in Pec all his life, said he
tried Saturday to buy
several of the 350 loafs of bread available at a state-run store called
Agropromet. But the owner
told him: "This bread is not for Albanians; it is only for Serbs." Asked
his reaction to hearing
that, Kujtim shrugged and said, "we are used to being treated this way,
like a person who has
no rights."

Bajram, the man who was beaten, said he has never been involved in
politics or other
provocative activities. But he lost his identification card that evening
and fears that if he is
stopped on the street by Serbian police, he could become one of the
"disappeared." But, in a
Catch 22 situation, he cannot get new identification without crossing
Serbian checkpoints to
reach officials in his former hometown, which is convulsed in ethnic
fighting.

"I am," Bajram said, "a prisoner in my own home."

______________________________________________________________________
Opinions expressed/published on BosNet/BosNet-B DO NOT necessarily

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From: Filipovic Vanja <vfil...@haverford.edu>
Subject: BosNet KOSOVA UPDATE: Kosova in the Press

----------------------------------------------------------------------
B o s N e t - July 21, 1998
______________________________________________________________________

Copyright 1998 The New York Times Company
The New York Times
July 21, 1998, Tuesday, Late Edition - Final
Section A; Page 8; Column 3; Foreign Desk

Serb Forces Claim a Tenuous Recapture of a Kosovo City
By MIKE O'CONNOR
ORAHOVAC, Serbia, July 20

Heavily armed ethnic Albanian rebels looked down from the hills on the
north side of this city on Sunday and proclaimed the ferocious fighting
below to be the death rattle of Serbian control and the beginning of their
new strategy of taking and holding large towns.

Today, Serbian officers on the hills to the south said they had retaken
the city.

For now, the absence of gunfire and the casual attitude of most of the
Serbian troops now in trenches that a day earlier had protected guerrillas
gave reason to suspect that the rebel strategy had been blunted.

But the way one Serbian commander described conditions in the city may
apply to much of the province of Kosovo, where 90 percent of the people
are Albanian and most of them seem to want independence: "I can assure you
that the government is in 100 percent control of the whole city,
everywhere," said the officer, Capt. Milan Sipka. "But it would not be
safe to go in there unless you have an armored personnel carrier."

Commanders of the ethnic Albanian fighters say they have artillery and
shoulder-fired antiaircraft missiles that could give the rebels far
greater ability to attack Government forces or to defend themselves.

Serbian officers say they think that the rebels, who have formed what
they call the Kosovo Liberation Army, probably have at least some
artillery pieces. "I can't confirm that absolutely," Captain Sipka said,
"but from the sounds of the weapons used against us and the type of
explosions, we think it was artillery."

Troops from the Serbian interior ministry who counterattacked the
ethnic Albanian forces here displayed shoulder-fired rocket launders,
heavy machine guns and an antiaircraft gun they said they had found in the
rebel positions they captured. Officers said some of the weapons and
ammunition were from China, and indeed they bore markings that appeared to
be Chinese.

Orahovac, with a population of 20,000, was attacked by the Kosovo
Liberation Army over the weekend. Its population is almost entirely
Albanian, with Serbian policemen and officials in the government offices
and the hospital. Those were the places the rebels attacked, and late
tonight there were reports from Albanian journalists in the area of a
large flow of refugees toward the north. The refugee reports could not be
confirmed.

There are perhaps 2,000 ethnic Serbian residents of Orahovac. Today
police officials said about 35 Serbian civilians had not been accounted
for. Officials said they suspected that some had been taken by the rebels
as prisoners, though they said they had no concrete evidence. Serbian
officers said that one policeman had been killed in the counterattack but
that they knew of no deaths among Serbian civilians.

This afternoon, 70 ethnic Albanian women and children huddled in one
corner of a gas station in a single quivering mass. Government troops who
had detained them during the counterattack stood nearby.

"We're housewives with children," said Sevdia Hoxa, a white scarf over
her gray hair. "We don't know what is happening. We spent the last three
days in the basements of our homes with our children and grandchildren and
nothing to eat."

Her words came slowly, her knowledge of Serbian limited; many ethnic
Albanians cannot speak Serbian.

"The shooting stopped just about an hour ago, and the soldiers brought
us here," said a woman who would not give her name as two of her small
children held her. "What will they do to us now?"

Despite their fears, the women said they had been given fruit juice and
milk for their children, and an hour later the authorities began to
release some of them.

In a small room of the gas station, some 40 ethnic Albanian men sat on
the floor, their knees to their chests, their heads down in despair. They
said they were civilians, but most seemed able-bodied. None had been
mistreated, but an intense terror radiated from their eyes.

As Serbian forces inched in to retake Orahovac, they also moved toward
an area north of the town that is a stronghold of the Kosovo Liberation
Army. But in the ethnic Albanian villages through which they advanced,
they were confronted by new trenches and bunkers, and houses where snipers
lay waiting, according to Serbian officers.

This is a problem the Serbs will face in other places, because though
the government may control the main buildings in the cities and towns,
including the police headquarters and city hall, the great majority of the
people in the villages sympathize with the rebels. There the insurgents
can prepare their attacks and can withdraw from Serbian attack.

This afternoon, standing in Bela Crkva, a village just south of
Orahovac, Captain Sipka pointed to a score or more of the roofless or
burned-out buildings that his men had fired on to rout the rebels.

"There were teams of snipers," he said. "There were barricades across
the road and machine-gun positions in many places."

But of what he estimated to be the 800 rebels waiting for his forces
before they got to Orahovac and the even greater number in the city, not
one prisoner was taken and no dead were found. "They just seemed to get
away," the captain said.

Photo: Ethnic Albanian men rested in a service station yesterday after
they were detained by Serbian forces during the fighting in Orahovac,
Kosovo. They reported no mistreatment, but many were fearful
nevertheless. (Reuters)

Map of Kosovo showing location of Orahovac: Orahovac has changed hands
twice in last few days of fighting.

=========================================================================

This story ran on page A02 of the Boston Globe on 07/21/98.
Copyright 1998 Globe Newspaper Company.

25,000 flee fighting in Kosovo
100 killed as largest town hit by strife is deserted
By Adam Brown , Associated Press, 07/21/98

ORAHOVAC, Yugoslav Federation - Tens of thousands of refugees streamed
deeper into guerrilla territory yesterday to escape the third straight day
of fierce fighting between Serb security forces and militant separatists
in Kosovo, ethnic Albanian sources said.

Some 25,000 people have been forced to flee after house-to-house battles
in Orahovac, the Albanian-language daily Koha Ditore reported yesterday.
Both sides have indicated weekend fighting in the town and near the border
with Albania has killed at least 100 people.

Each side also asserted Sunday that it controlled most of Orahovac. With a
peacetime population of 20,000, it is the largest town yet caught in the
ethnic conflict in Kosovo, Serbia's southernmost province.

The violence casts more doubt on the possibility of a negotiated
settlement between Serbia, the dominant of the two remaining republics in
the Yugoslav Federation, and independence-minded ethnic Albanians, who
make up 90 percent of Kosovo's population.

Reporters brought to Orahovac's outskirts by Serb police saw no signs of
life in the town, and no sound or sight of fighting. Smoke was rising from
one area, but it was not clear what was burning.

Serb police clearly controlled the southern edge of Orahovac but said
separatist Kosovo Liberation Army snipers continued to fire at the town
center from hills to the north.

Serb police Captain Milan Sipka said one officer was killed and nine were
wounded after 600 rebel fighters stormed the town of red brick and
concrete houses, in the middle of a traditional wine-making region. It was
not clear how many ethnic Albanians were killed.

The thousands of refugees were moving north to Malisevo, in territory
believed held by the Kosovo Liberation Army, according to Koha Ditore, the
Pristina-based newspaper.

The reports would make the battles among the deadliest in nearly five
months of fighting in Kosovo.

In other fighting, the Serb Media Center in Pristina said at least 20
ethnic Albanian rebels were killed Sunday when a few hundred tried to
cross the Albanian-Yugoslav border northwest of Djakovica.

The center asserted yesterday that 16 foreigners were among the Albanian
fighters, but it was not clear whether any had been killed or captured.

It said documents found at the scene indicated five were Albanians from
Macedonia, six were from Saudi Arabia and one was from Yemen. Another four
apparently were Arabs from Germany.

=========================================================================

IN KOSOVO, THOUSANDS IN FLIGHT;
U.S. WARNS SERBS OVER REPORTED SHELLING INTO ALBANIA
>From Tribune News Services.
ORAHOVAC, Yugoslavia

Thousands of refugees streamed deeper into Kosovo's guerrilla-held
territory Monday to escape the third straight day of fierce fighting
between Serb forces and militant separatists, according to ethnic Albanian
sources.

Meanwhile, the United States warned Serbia not to launch shells into
neighboring Albanian territory, while declaring its opposition to the
Greater Albania that some Kosovo secessionists seek.

About 25,000 people have been forced to flee after house-to-house
battles in the Kosovo town of Orahovac, the Albanian-language daily Koha
Ditore reported Monday. Both sides have indicated that weekend fighting in
the town and near the border with Albania has killed at least 100 people.

Each side also claimed control of most of Orahovac. With a peacetime
population of 20,000, it is the largest town yet caught in the ethnic
conflict.

The violence casts more doubt on the possibility of a negotiated
settlement between Serbia, which dominates what remains of Yugoslavia, and
independence-minded ethnic Albanians, who comprise 90 percent of Kosovo's
population.

Reporters brought to Orahovac's outskirts by Serb police saw no signs
of life in the town, and there was no sound or sight of fighting. Smoke
was rising from one area, but it was unclear what was burning.

Serb police clearly controlled the southern edge of Orahovac but said
separatist Kosovo Liberation Army snipers continued to fire at the town
center from hills to the north.

Serb police Capt. Milan Sipka said one officer was killed and nine were
wounded after 600 KLA fighters stormed the town. It was unclear how many
ethnic Albanians were killed.

"It's not safe in our houses . . . because of the snipers," Sipka said.

The thousands of refugees were moving north to Malisevo, in territory
believed held by the KLA, according to Koha Ditore, the Pristina-based
newspaper.

The reports would make the battles among the deadliest in nearly five
months of fighting in Serbia's Kosovo province.

Albania has said that three Serb shells landed Saturday about 500 yards
inside Albania, in the northern Padesh region, after heavy fighting
erupted just across the border.

The Serbian army denied shelling Albanian territory.

In Washington, State Department spokesman James Rubin said the U.S.
had reason to believe the alleged shelling was an attempt to stop ethnic
Albanian fighters from crossing back into Kosovo.

"If true, the shelling represents an unacceptable violation of Albanian
territory. Belgrade must understand that such shelling runs the risk of
escalating further the current conflict," Rubin said.

He said that Christopher Hill, the U.S. ambassador to Macedonia and the
main mediator, met Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic in Belgrade on
Monday and would go to Kosovo's capital, Pristina, on Tuesday to see
ethnic Albanian leaders.

"We are working intensively on some ideas that we've put down to try to
create enhanced autonomy for the people of Kosovo and give them what they
want without seeing this conflict spin out of control and spill over into
the countries of the region," Rubin said.

"As far as the question of a Greater Albania is concerned . . . let me
start by saying we're against it and that this would be a very dangerous
development that could affect the stability of the region," Rubin said.

=========================================================================

The Washington Post
July 21, 1998, Tuesday, Final Edition; Pg. A15

Serbs Drive Rebels From Kosovo Town
Douglas Hamilton, Reuters
PRISTINA, Yugoslavia, July 20

Serbian security forces said they had control of the southwest Kosovo
town of Orahovac today despite sporadic sniper fire from pockets of Kosovo
Liberation Army (KLA) guerrillas.

The Serbs drove the ethnic Albanian rebels out of the center of
Orahovac on Sunday after two days of fighting in which the guerrillas
tried to storm the police station and capture their first town in the
five-month conflict in the Serbian province.

A Serbian security source, who refused to be identified, said: "We
could not let Orahovac fall, not because of its strategic importance but
because of its political significance. We could not permit the KLA to take
a large urban area under their control and create an unofficial separatist
capital."

The town, where ethnic Albanians make up 80 percent of the peacetime
population of 20,000, is 30 miles southwest of Pristina. It is close to
the southern edge of western Kosovo between Pristina and the Albanian
border that is largely controlled by rebel fighters seeking independence
from Serbia, the dominant republic of Yugoslavia.

The heaviest casualties came in the fighting for Orahovac and in
clashes between the Yugoslav army and rebel guerrillas who were ambushed
while trying to cross into Kosovo near Djeravica from training grounds in
northern Albania.

There was no immediate word of the fate of 40 Serbs reportedly taken
hostage in Orahovac during the weekend, or official figures for the number
of dead in the town.

Official Serbian sources said the ethnic Albanian death toll in the
army's border ambushes on Saturday and Sunday was around 30, but Belgrade
media reported that at least 90 uniformed rebel fighters were killed.

======================================================================

Fighters trapped as rebels retreat
By Philip Smucker in Orahovac

ETHNIC Albanian guerrillas retreated from positions in central Kosovo
yesterday but there were reports of hundreds being trapped inside
Orahovac. Refugees said that young men between the ages of 20 and 30 had
been prevented from leaving Orahovac yesterday. The withdrawal is seen as
a huge setback to the Kosovo Liberation Army. Rebel leaders had vowed that
the city would be their first step towards the total "conquest and
liberation" of Kosovo. A Serbian security forces tour that led up to the
edge of the city uncovered scores of demolished homes raked by heavy
shelling. Serbian police officials said that 13 Serbian civilians were
missing and 20 Albanians and gipsies were also missing. Albanian civilians
said that scores of Serbian police and Albanians had been killed in the
fighting that has lasted for four days. Interviews with frightened
refugees standing two miles from the smoking city indicated that the death
toll was much higher than Serbian officials had revealed. They said that
in one town near to Belicrkva, 10 Albanian civilians had been killed.
Serbian security forces showed journalists a petrol station full of women
and children, many of them in tears and complaining that they were being
mistreated. In an adjacent room there were an estimated 40 men separated
from their families. On the road leading from the south of the city there
were signs of a fierce battle that had ended in victory for Serbian
forces. There were abandoned trenches and bloated farm animals in addition
to overturned barricades that the police said had been broken down by
heavy Serb armour. There were rumours of summary execution and reports of
many Albanians being tied up with rope outside of their homes. One
refugee, who gave his name as Sali, said that he had seen four men tied up
outside one home. He said that the KLA had beat a hasty retreat from most
positions in Orahovac. The Serbs claimed to have lost only one policeman
in the fighting.

=========================================================================

West plays waiting game over Kosovo
By Patrick Bishop

DIPLOMATIC efforts to end the war in Kosovo are being stalled while the
international community awaits developments on the battlefield. Moves by
Germany and France to call a peace conference like the one that resolved
the Bosnian conflict have received a cool reception from Britain and
America. They are against intervention while the Serbs and their ethnic
Albanian separatist adversaries believe they can still make gains by
fighting on. The attitude of the powers engaged in trying to broker a
settlement in Kosovo has changed since last month. Then the six-nation
Contact Group threatened Slobodan Milosevic, the Yugoslav president, with
air strikes unless he reined in his special forces fighting with the
guerrillas of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA). But KLA military successes
and confusion over who represents ethnic Albanian opinion have diminished
the pressure on the outside world to come up with a quick fix.
Nonetheless, Germany has approached America to test the idea of an
international conference similar to the one at Dayton, Ohio, in 1995.
Then, the parties in the Bosnian war were brought together and kept
isolated from the outside world until they emerged with a comprehensive
settlement. The idea, with French backing, was privately put to the United
States ambassador to France, Felix Rohatyn. But America, like Britain, is
unimpressed with the idea. The Dayton deal was done when the Serbs were
exhausted and the Muslim and Croat forces were on the offensive, buoyed up
by a Nato bombing campaign that amounted to an intervention on their
behalf. "We're not sure that the situation is ripe for a Dayton-style
conference," said a British diplomat yesterday. "The KLA are making gains.
They have to be persuaded that there is something to be gained from
negotiations." The German intervention seems to stem from domestic
political considerations rather than from a conviction that the
circumstances for peace exist. Diplomatic efforts are suffering from the
fact that the situation in Kosovo has become enormously confused and
complicated since the conflict turned violent in February. What had seemed
like a re-run of the Serbian ethnic cleansing campaigns of the Bosnian war
changed character when the KLA went on the offensive, seizing control over
large parts of the region, while Mr Milosevic's forces seemed to heed
outside calls for constraint. The international community's uneasiness
over the ethnic Albanian cause has intensified since it became clear that
most Kosovo people would no longer be satisfied with the autonomy that is
all the outside world is prepared to advocate. KLA spokesmen said at the
weekend that they aimed to create an independent Albania from "the
Albanian lands of Kosovo, Macedonia and Montenegro". An irredentist
Albanian state shattering existing borders is exactly what the outside
powers are struggling to prevent.

=========================================================================

Copyright 1998 The Financial Times Limited
Financial Times (London)
July 21, 1998, Tuesday LONDON EDITION 1
WORLD NEWS - EUROPE; Pg. 02

Kosovo attack carries heavy political risks
By David Buchan in Belgrade
Belgrade

The increase in fighting in Kosovo in recent days carries high military
and political risks for both Albanian separatists and Serb security
forces. But it does not yet appear enough to advance the cause of
international mediation in the growing war.

The attempt by the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) at the weekend to take
and hold the centre of Orahovac, a town with a peacetime population of
20,000, and to get sizeable reinforcements in from Albania, was certainly
audacious. But some diplomatic observers also yesterday characterised it
as a foolhardy underestimate of the Yugoslav army along the border.

The official Serb claim was that the KLA lost 30 men; however,
unofficial Serb sources said the real figure was nearer 90. Up to last
weekend, the combined death toll for both sides in the 4 1/2 -month war
was put at about 300.

The KLA wants to extend to the south the chunk of territory it holds
immediately west of the provincial capital of Pristina, so as to cut the
security forces' extended supply lines.

The army and police along the western border with Albania are sitting
at the end of long supply lines that mostly have to pass through Prizren
in the extreme south-west of Kosovo. But such a strategy may need wiser
heads with inside knowledge of how the Yugoslav army operates. One
observer said that such men - Kosovar Albanian veterans of the old
Yugoslav army - exist, but are only just beginning to come in from western
Europe.

The weekend actions will not jeopardise support from the Albanian
diaspora, which may now redouble supplies of money, munitions and men. But
they could affect western public opinion, which has been overwhelmingly on
the side of the ethnic Albanians, not only because of the long
discrimination they have suffered at Serb hands, but because, so far, they
have been the military underdog.

Any shift in public opinion will make western governments, who support
autonomy, not independence for Kosovo, more ambivalent towards the KLA.

But the Serbs yesterday played on western fears that the KLA might draw
on Islamic fundamentalists and spark separatism in Kosovo's neighbours.
They claimed documents found on the bodies of 16 dead KLA members showed
the men were from Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Macedonia.

=========================================================================

Drums of war quell Kosovo deal hopes
Anthony Loyd

The ethnic Albanian province displays a paranoia that may yet propel
it into an all-out conflict, writes Anthony Loyd

AN insurgent army, failing diplomacy, nervous soldiers, the
clenched-fist salutes of roadside children, pounding propaganda,
contagious paranoia, secret police and a growing body count: Kosovo feels
at the brink of madness that usually precedes war. On paper it is a
conflict that the Serbs have lost, but one that will be fought anyway.

President Milosevic's Yugoslav National Army (JNA), though underpaid,
ill-equipped and demoralised, remains one of East Europe's most powerful
armies. However, its hands will be tied in a coming war by international
pressure to avoid too high a civilian death toll and stresses within
Yugoslavia. Montenegro, whose conscripts are fighting Kosovo Liberation
Army (KLA) guerrillas crossing the forested border from Albania, is
unlikely to stand by Belgrade should these troops be used in the densely
populated interior.

The demography of Kosovo alone suggests that Serbian military victory
would be impossible. More than 90 per cent of its two million people are
ethnic Albanians and, short of a scorched earth policy, it is hard to see
how the security forces could crush a popular movement.

Ranged against Belgrade's forces are the KLA fighters. Growing by the
day in numbers, strength, organisation and equipment, this force already
controls more than 40 per cent of Kosovo's territory. Far from being a
haphazard conglomeration of peasants, the KLA has a hardcore cadre that
evidently has been established for some years.

Many Kosovo villagers speak openly of having known who their local KLA
commander was by 1995, and admit to having been armed and structured since
that time. Indeed, the hierarchical Albanian family and clan units, with
their secretive nature and skill at having operated for years in a society
devolved from Serb control, have proved an ideal template on which to
superimpose a guerrilla command organisation. In a coming fight they will
prove a hard force to break.

In late February and early March this year Mr Milosevic used Interior
Ministry Special Police units to wipe out two villages regarded as KLA
hotbeds. But this move succeeded only in goading KLA cells elsewhere into
action.

While the West bases its entire negotiating position on a compromise
solution involving a broad-based autonomy for the province and dealing
with the Albanian moderate, Ibrahim Rugova, the drum roll towards war has
accelerated over the past three months, making both the option of autonomy
and the credibility of Mr Rugova obsolete. The KLA wants full
independence. The Kosovans want full independence.

With the pumping-out of vitriolic propaganda by both sides, it is not
uncommon to meet Albanians who talk of Serb policemen cutting the foetuses
out of pregnant women, or Serbs who say Albanian parents throw their
children in front of cars to fund the KLA with insurance money. No one has
witnessed either.

"The Slavs are barbarians," one Albanian doctor told me. "They do not
want to live with us any more, and we do not want to live with them." When
intellectuals start talking in such a way, you know instinctively that
inter-ethnic harmony is over bar the shooting.

On one hand, the loss of Kosovo should herald the end for Mr Milosevic
and his strategy of a Greater Serbia. Most Serbs in Serbia admit to caring
not at all for the fate of the people in the province. Nevertheless, they
would be happy to blame its loss on the unpopular Yugoslav President,
whose disastrous economic policies have little support.

But Mr Milosevic, a master of personal survival at the expense of his
people, could yet play a trump card. He knows that the West is disturbed
by the prospect of an independent Kosovo. A KLA force invigorated by
victory would prove a destabilising influence on the Albanian populations
in Macedonia as well as in northern Albania.

Moreover, if Kosovo gains its independence, becoming free to unify
with whomever it wishes on the strength of majority vote alone, then the
Bosnian Serbs of Republika Srpska could be used by Belgrade to make
similar demands in exchange for loss of Kosovo, fraying the delicate
Dayton peace accord in Bosnia which has prevented them from unification
with Serbia proper.

As the summer begins to fade into autumn in Kosovo, the international
community may well find itself side by side with Belgrade's strategy of
ragged containment in Kosovo, sacrificing justice for pragmatism, while Mr
Milosevic once again emerges with renewed prowess.

______________________________________________________________________
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From: Filipovic Vanja <vfil...@haverford.edu>
Subject: BosNet KOSOVA UPDATE: KOsova in the Press

----------------------------------------------------------------------
B o s N e t - July 22, 1998
______________________________________________________________________

12,000 Flee Serbian Attack in Kosovo

NYT - By MIKE O'CONNOR
07.22.98

MALISEVO, Yugoslavia -- Terrified ethnic Albanians fleeing three days of
fighting in nearby Orahovac are arriving here with accounts of scores of
civilian deaths after attacks on homes by government artillery and rampages of
violence by soldiers and Serbian civilians.

In the last few days about 12,000 refugees have made their way through about
10 miles of forests and mountains to this town, where the ethnic Albanian
rebels are in complete control, according to local officials. The streets are
filled with people wandering almost in shock, and their condition adds weight
to the impression that they have experienced something appalling. But their
accounts of events were often confused or lacking in detail and could not be
independently verified.

In at least a score of interviews, refugees gave accounts similar to that of
Faik Vuciterna, 38, a father of six.

"It began on Saturday," he said. "They began to massacre us first by
artillery shelling. Many were killed." Many refugees said their neighborhoods
were shelled by government forces retaliating against ethnic Albanian
separatists. The separatists had attacked ethnic Serbian targets in Orahovac,
a city of about 20,000, which, like the province, is 90 percent ethnic
Albanian.

"When the shelling stopped," Vuciterna said, "the sniping began. I don't
know where it came from because it seemed to be everywhere. The soldiers began
to go through our neighborhood killing people. They were in civilian clothes,
some of them were in uniform, about 100 of them altogether. They were armed."

When he heard those words, an old man sitting on his haunches nearby began
to moan. "Ohhhh, they had every kind of weapon, everything to kill people," he
said.

Another man cut in. "They had the dum-dum," he said, using a vernacular term
for an anti-aircraft cannon with explosive shells which Serbian forces often
fire against buildings.

"One of my friends was hit by a sniper bullet," Vuciterna said. "Then they
hit him with the dum-dum and he exploded in front of me. He was my best
friend."

Describing scenes reminiscent of the war in Bosnia, refugees said they
believed Serbian forces wanted to drive ethnic Albanians from the area in
order to more easily control it.

Refugees talked of seeing their Serbian neighbors joining marauding
government forces to attack ethnic Albanians, then loot and burn their homes.

In Pristina, the provincial capital, a senior Serbian official categorically
denied there were any indiscriminate attacks on civilians in Orahovac. The
government announced it would allow the press to visit the city on Tuesday. It
was closed to the press on Monday, making it impossible for reporters to
confirm the refugees' accounts.

At the local health clinic here, the director and the chief nurse were
tallying the number of people they have treated in the last three days for
what they say are war wounds.

The nurse counted out the names of patients from a logbook. At 5 p.m.
Tuesday she said, "It looks as if it comes to 112."

The clinic director, Dr. Rame Morina, first insisted all of the patients
were civilians. Then he conceded that about 10 percent were soldiers.

Doctors said they had not been able to treat many of the seriously injured
because they have run out of some medications.

An unknown number of wounded have died or been left behind on the trails
that refugees are taking through the mountains, doctors said.

A more complete picture of what happened in Orahovac was not available
because, while the Serbian government had sealed off Orahovac, the ethnic
Albanian fighters were barring journalists from entering Malisevo for most of
the day.

An ethnic Albanian man who asked to remain anonymous said he and a group of
about 20 were caught by soldiers as they were trying to escape the city. "Over
the radio I heard the order given to the soldiers, 'Finish your job.' They
were going to shoot us," the man said.

He said the soldiers then saw a white BMW on the road carrying two men
racing to rescue their families. When the soldiers turned their guns on the
car, he said, his group took the chance to run.

"When we ran, three of our group were shot dead, I guess eight were wounded,
and the rest of us got here today," he said.

Two men, who said they and 72 other ethnic Albanians had hidden in a
basement for three days, said they emerged to find homes in their neighborhood
being torched by Serbian soldiers and civilians.

"I will wait here to see if any of my relatives arrive, then I'll go back
and kill the Serbs," one man said. His companion flashed 10 fingers three
times, then ran his hand across his throat to indicate how many Serbs he
intended to kill.

====================================================================

Kosovo Rebels Stumble As Gamble Backfires

By R. Jeffrey Smith
Washington Post Foreign Service

Wednesday, July 22, 1998; Page A01

BELA CRVKA, Yugoslavia, July 21輸n attempt by the insurgent Kosovo
Liberation Army to seize a city north of here has led to a significant
setback for the separatist guerrilla group and allegations of
execution-style slayings, mass detentions and other human rights abuses
by the Serbs.

In the largest strategic gamble of the widening conflict between Serbs
and ethnic Albanians in the Serbian province of Kosovo, members of the
guerrilla movement strolled into the picturesque hillside city of
Orahovac last Friday, fired their guns into the air and announced they
were taking control.

The attempt to gain a foothold in the city of 20,000 was the first step
in what some Kosovo Liberation Army sources described as a new strategy
by the guerrillas to take their fight for Kosovo's independence into the
province's urban centers -- a move that would mark a potentially
significant escalation of the five-month-old conflict in which more than
300 people have been killed.

But the guerrillas' action in Orahovac proved disastrous for the city
and its residents. Fleeing civilians said it led to a military setback
for the guerrillas and human rights atrocities by Serbian forces similar
to some reported during the war in Bosnia between 1992 and 1995.

After three days of intense fighting and shelling by Yugoslav militia
and regular army troops began producing heavy guerrilla and civilian
casualties, hundreds of guerrillas were forced to withdraw from the city
and flee with more than 15,000 refugees toward their nearby stronghold
in the city of Malisevo to the northeast.

The city's southern end is now virtually empty, except for Serbian
security personnel, while the northern end is still the site of sniping
and fleeting gun battles, according to refugee accounts and recent
visitors to the city, which is about 30 miles southwest of Pristina, the
provincial capital. At least 30 homes of ethnic Albanians located near
the central police station have been destroyed, while Serbian
neighborhoods remain relatively untouched.

As in several earlier clashes between the guerrillas and Serbian
security personnel, refugees from the fighting have begun offering
unconfirmed allegations of atrocities in the midst of the battle.
Hidajete Ramaj and Skender Sylka said in an interview at a refugee
center south of Orahovac today that they each witnessed the
execution-style slaying of seven ethnic Albanian men by an irregular
unit of Serbian policemen.

The slayings allegedly occurred after the policemen had stayed for three
days in one of two homes in a family compound and plundered most of its
contents. "There were 15 men in the basement . . . and we wanted to go
surrender. We had no weapons," Sylka said. The police beat on the door
to their house and "when we came out with our hands up, they were
holding automatic weapons and wearing gray scarves tied around their
head. They opened fire and we tried to go back into the house. Then they
threw a grenade into the front room of the basement" and it wounded a
young boy, he said.

Ramaj said her husband, Xhemajl, was the first to emerge from the
basement and the first to be gunned down. "He was saying, 'Wait just a
minute, we've got to talk. There are women and children inside,' " she
said. "We have two boys and three daughters. Now I don't know what to do
or where to go." Both witnesses said the police set the corpses on fire
before leaving, although some were only partially burned and had to be
buried afterward.

These allegations could not be verified. But other refugees have
separately provided unconfirmed accounts of additional atrocities,
including the hanging and burning of ethnic Albanians on lamp posts and
the sniping of innocent civilians in fields or on city streets. Members
of an international monitoring team have been told that at one point in
the fighting, Serbian militia tied ethnic Albanians to posts and placed
them in the middle of a key road as shields.

Several sources in the city of Prizren, southeast of Orahovac, also
reported today that Serbian militia had bused more than 500 people away
from the fighting in two convoys and separated them by sex. Women and
children were released immediately, while more than 150 men were
detained for questioning at a firehouse in Prizren. Some were later
released, but others remained in detention tonight -- a circumstance
that one of the monitors said was highly worrisome.

"We are doing everything we can to stay on top of this situation"
through the night, the official said.

According to an independent human rights expert in Prizren, who said he
has spoken with scores of refugees, the battle for Orahovac began in
earnest on Friday evening, hours after the guerrillas had tried to seize
control of the city by demanding that all Serbian civilians turn in
their arms. The guerrillas had already dug trenches and established a
checkpoint here at Bela Crvka -- a village of roughly 2,500 people -- to
control access to the city from the south, while other fighters
converged on it from the north.

Serb residents in the suburban villages of Retia and Repterusa
reportedly agreed to surrender their arms, but Serbs in the nearby
village of Hoca instead called for Yugoslav army and militia help, and
other Serbs rang a bell in a downtown church. Government forces and
armed civilians swiftly established a special military headquarters at
the Park Hotel, and began shelling several villages held by the Kosovo
Liberation Army from both inside and outside the city as dusk fell.

Bela Crvka was furiously attacked and many of its homes now have no
roofs; others were burned to the ground. According to unconfirmed
reports, the guerrillas suffered more than 50 casualties before
withdrawing, while the Serbs lost more than 40 policemen and regular
army troops. Until now, such troops have only occasionally been directly
involved in battles with the guerrillas. But the fact that many took
part in the defense of Orahovac underscores the government's commitment
to keeping the cities of Kosovo out of rebel hands.

Kosovo, a province of Serbia, Yugoslavia's dominant republic, has a
population that is 90 percent ethnic Albanian. Serbs control the police
and other key governing institutions.

The debris of the battle also makes clear that the government still has
access to vastly superior firepower, including long-range artillery and
Praga armored vehicles carrying antiaircraft cannon capable of
penetrating virtually any building. According to Serbian sources, the
Kosovo Liberation Army has recently acquired German-made Armbrust
antitank missiles and Russian antiaircraft Gatling guns, but evidently
lacks large numbers of either weapon.

Besides the setback at Orahovac, the Kosovo Liberation Army also was hit
hard this week by the government's ambush of an estimated 750 insurgents
who were attempting to infiltrate into southern Kosovo from Albania.

At least 30 guerrillas were killed, and hundreds more are said to be
missing.

Said one member, "It was the result of a traitorous act."

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From: Filipovic Vanja <vfil...@haverford.edu>
Subject: BosNet KOSOVA UPDATE: Kosova in the Media

----------------------------------------------------------------------
B o s N e t - July 27, 1998
______________________________________________________________________

DEPARTMENT OF STATE
DAILY PRESS BRIEFING INDEX
Monday, July 27, 1998

Briefer: James P. Rubin

KOSOVO
7 US deeply concerned about increased fighting over the weekend
7 Intense fighting has occurred on Pristina-Pec road
7-8,9-10 Belgrade government today tried to inspect diplomatic cargo
bound for Diplomatic Observer Mission
8 Sec. Albright has had discussions with counterparts on stemming
flow of weapons

[....]

QUESTION: Do you have anything on the fighting in Kosovo? There seems
to be a major battle going on.

MR. RUBIN: We are deeply concerned about the increased fighting that
has taken place in Kosovo over the weekend. We are concerned in
particular about the increased involvement in the fighting by the Serb
army. We are especially concerned about the large number of displaced
persons this new fighting has caused, and that they are currently
inaccessible to humanitarian assistance because of the fighting.

We urge both sides in the strongest possible terms to cease the fighting
and work towards a negotiated settlement. Neither side can afford to
think that the status of Kosovo is something that can be resolved on the
battlefield; it simply cannot. We believe it can only be resolved at
the negotiating table, and that is why Ambassador Hill has been meeting
with officials in Belgrade; he'll be in Pristina today for meetings with
the Kosovar Albanian leaders and Belgrade again tomorrow to meet with US
allies and Serb officials.

Beginning on Saturday, there was a Serb-initiated operation to open
regained control of several major roads. This operation appears to have
a Serb military component to it, and there are reports of villages being
shelled and destroyed. The most intense fighting has occurred on the
road between Pristina and Pec. Fighting also continues around the town
of Orahovac, which is now under Serb control. We surmise that the
fighting is retaliation by the Serbs for recent activities by the
Kosovar rebels over the past week. It is our view that both sides must
realize that to continue the fighting is only going to damage the
prospects for the people there.

With respect to an additional incident, we do understand there was an
incident at the Morina border checkpoint over the weekend in which FRY
security officials - that is, Federal Republic of Yugoslavia security
officials - fired across the border into Albania. At this point, t is
unclear whether Albanian border guards returned fire. We have seen
reports which were yet unable to confirm that the military authorities
from Serbia have apologized to the Albanian Government for the incident.
We're investigating it and will provide more details as they become
available.

QUESTION: Can you say whether Hill has made any headway in his efforts
to --

MR. RUBIN: Well, he's working very hard; it's hard to give you a
snapshot. Certainly, one of the examples of the problem we're dealing
with here is that earlier today in contravention of a prior
understanding, Belgrade customs authorities insisted on inspecting a
shipment of diplomatic materials to be used in support of the Kosovo
diplomatic observer mission. Our embassy refused to accept this breach
of diplomatic protocol, and the shipment was returned to Stuttgart.

This, again, is an example of Belgrade's actions at odds with its
commitments. They indicated they would give the international community
the support and access it needed to send observers to the region. The
materials in the shipment returned to Germany are essential for the
observer mission to become fully operational. It is our view that
Belgrade's clear intent here is to restrict the ability of the United
States and other members of the international community to observe
developments in Kosovo and collect real-time information about events on
the ground.

This is in violation of both the Contact Group demands and President
Milosevic's personal commitment to Russian President Boris Yeltsin to
allow the international community free and unrestricted access. This
is unacceptable.

QUESTION: Does the involvement by the Yugoslav army mark a kind of
turning point in this conflict?

MR. RUBIN: I would not regard it as a turning point. Clearly, there
have been Serbian forces that include heavy equipment in the Kosovo
region for some time. They were involved early in the year when we
first began to condemn these activities and develop a sanctions policy
with our European allies to demonstrate our abhorrence of this policy.
There continued to have been the use of heavy equipment by the Serb
side. So it is not a turning point, but it is a major problem.

QUESTION: Has the United States enlisted any of its allies to try to
restrict the flow of arms and money to the KLA? And is there any money
coming from this country that has raised concern?

MR. RUBIN: Well, I will have to look into the specifics of what we
believe is coming from the various countries. I know Secretary Albright
has had discussions with her counterparts about the importance of making
sure that the outside support doesn't outstrip the desire by our
countries to get a peace agreement; and that we should try to discourage
the kind of outside support that will only redound to the disadvantage
of the people there - that is, postpone the day when we can get a peace
agreement and accelerate the fighting. That is something we think is
not in the interest of the Kosovar Albanians. I know she's had
discussions with her counterparts about that; and I'll try to get you
some more detail later.

QUESTION: To follow on that - so if the Swiss are arresting Kosovars
there and freezing bank accounts, is that something the US would approve
of?

MR. RUBIN: Well, we certainly don't want to see funds going to
extremist organizations that are not interested in making peace. That
has been our view for some time.

QUESTION: Jamie, are you surprised by the actions of the customs
officials?

MR. RUBIN: Well, let me say as follows - surprised, I don't know if we
can ever be surprised by the gap between President Milosevic's words and
President Milosevic's actions. But so far, there has been cooperation
prior to this time in the setting up and working of that observer group.
So this certainly put a stop to that cooperation.

QUESTION: Can you say where the inspection took place?

MR. RUBIN: In the Belgrade airport.

[......]

=========================================================================
07.27.98.

Serbs Attack Rebels in Biggest Offensive So Far

NYT - By MIKE O'CONNOR

PREKAZ, Yugoslavia -- In the biggest offensive of the conflict in the
Serbian province of Kosovo, Yugoslav army and paramilitary police units have
attacked rebel positions across the province, apparently trying to free large
sections of major roads that have been under rebel control for months.

In some places the rebels, ethnic Albanians who call themselves the Kosovo
Liberation Army, are reported to be resisting. But generally, government
forces are reported to be clearing roadblocks and advancing.

Tens of thousands of refugees from the last six months of fighting are now
in a rebel-controlled area, with combat taking place on several sides. Relief
workers say the refugees may be in danger if the government troops continue to
move forward.

Where government forces will stop was a matter of intense diplomatic
speculation and concern Sunday because it was feared that the government would
renege on commitments to limit military actions while diplomats try to arrange
for negotiations between the government and the rebels.

Two months ago NATO threatened to use force against Yugoslavia because
Western governments said the Yugoslav forces had behaved so brutally against
civilians during a crackdown on the rebels that they were enhancing the
rebels' standing.

Serbia, the larger of the two republics that make up Yugoslavia, has
rescinded the autonomy once enjoyed by the province, 90 percent of whose
residents are ethnic Albanians.

"It all depends on civilian casualties now," said a European diplomat, who
spoke on condition of anonymity. "You can't really blame a government for
wanting to reclaim its main roads, and if that's all that happens, well, no
one will say much. But if they start killing a lot of civilians, then that's
going to be a problem for us and for the government."

Government officials said the fighting was on roads leading from the
provincial capital, Pristina, to the cities of Pec and Prizren, and on the
road from Mitrovica to Srbica as well as the road to Decani.

By midafternoon Sunday the military action in the villages of Srednja Klina
and Gornja Klina, near Srbica, left two elderly people shot to death and two
more wounded, one by a sniper and the rest from the shelling, villagers said.

Many of the houses and cottages from which the villagers had fled were being
blown up one at a time by soldiers in tanks. The turrets swiveled in a
leisurely way from target to target, giving gunners time to reload casually
and shoot.

The attack began on Saturday, villagers said, when soldiers and police
officers arrived suddenly. "Our watchmen warned us the tanks were coming, but
there was no time," said a resident who would not give his name. "Then
soldiers were lighting the haystacks on fire, and the people were in panic.
Most of us ran away, some up this mountain and some up the other one."

No resistance was evident. The guerrillas, outgunned, withdrew to safety on
the back slope of a mountain overlooking what amounted to target practice on
people's homes.

Sweating as he tried to get up the last stretch of the mountain so he could
look down on his village with the rebels, Hajzer Jashari said: "We had to
leave my mother down there when we ran. She's old. Maybe they will kill her."

Jashari is a lawyer who works in a nearby town. The threads of his life have
been twisted in the same way as those of many ethnic Albanians in Kosovo. Like
them, he has gone from being a citizen of Yugoslavia to considering himself a
citizen of something called the Republic of Kosovo, which the government and
the West say cannot be allowed to secede.

"Yugoslavia was my country," he said.

"I was part of it; I was in the army," he added, as tanks of that same army
fired a shell into his village about every 10 minutes.

"It was a good country," he went on. "All right, Albanians in Yugoslavia did
not have the same rights as Serbs, but we thought we had a future." He
crouched down in a tire rut alongside a hill that gave minimal protection from
snipers.

"But when Milosevic came to power, it was clear that this would be a place
for Serbs only. He told them to support him and he would protect their
interests." Jashari referred to President Slobodan Milosevic of Yugoslavia,
who built his power base as the leader of Serbia, whose presidency he assumed
in 1990. "Since then, there is no place for us here. Now, we will make a
country for Albanians here, and we have decided to fight until we get it."

Western countries have criticized Milosevic for policies that they contend
systematically deny ethnic Albanians their civil rights, but the West insists
that the Albanians negotiate some kind of autonomy within Serbia. For their
part, most of the Albanians in the province appear to want nothing less than
an independent country.

Under a walnut tree, away from the sniper fire from the new government
positions in the valley, a group of men were sitting at midday Sunday, some on
the patches of browning grass, others on brightly colored foam mats brought
from home.

It was the clan conference that ethnic Albanians call in times of crisis.

Adult males from this village and a few from the villages just taken by the
government were consoling one another and the family members of the dead.

Voices were quiet. There was discussion, but no appearance of dispute,
because it seemed that the big question -- what to do next -- has been long
resolved. The said they would take the reversal in stride and continue to
fight.

To the traditional leaders at conferences like this, one more category has
been added these days.

The clan elder, in a dark suit and a vest from which a keychain was
suspended, had the place of honor. Next to him was one of the best-educated
men, an economist, whose learning gave him stature here. But also in the front
rank was a man with a thick red beard, in camouflage uniform. As this clan and
others in Kosovo discuss how to proceed, the counsel of warriors has become as
important as that of the wise and the educated.

"The Serbs may want to take the roads back, but they will massacre people to
do it," said Ferat Imeri, the economist. "That is the essence of the Serb
tactics. They kill and then they talk and then they kill again. It was the
same in Bosnia, but in Kosovo we will fight until we win."

=========================================================================

July 27, 1998, Monday; Page A07

RUSE TRIPS REBELS IN KOSOVO

By Roy Gutman. WASHINGTON BUREAU

Orahovac, Yugoslavia

Orahovac, Yugoslavia - This town of about 22,000 people appears obscure
on the map, but it is near the heart of the biggest area seized by the
rebel Kosovo Liberation Army.

It is also where the KLA's mystique was broken by its biggest defeat, a
rout inflicted with the help of a ruse by Serb forces, who Albanian
refugees say staged a series of provocations that baited a trap for an
overeager ethnic Albanian force that underestimated the capabilities of
its well-armed and battle-hardened opponent.

The apparent use of false uniforms by the Serb side, phony rumors that
led to the flight of Albanian refugees, and a deceptive withdrawal by Serb
police all contributed to the KLA's errors, including a faulty claim that
it had captured the town and the assertion, as its troops were being
expelled last Tuesday, that its fighters were still largely in control.

Accounts by refugees, fighters and political experts in Malisevo, a
guerrilla stronghold about 25 miles south of the provincial capital
Pristina, indicate that the immediate benefit to the Serbs of solidifying
their control over Orahovac may be the political price their Albanian
opponents must pay. The KLA, which has sprung almost out of nowhere,
asserts control over a large swath of central Kosovo, has gained tens of
thousands of volunteers in the past five months and could mobilize
hundreds of thousands more if it had weapons.

But after last week's events it has lost prestige. Well-placed sources
said political leaders in Prizren, the key city of southern Kosovo because
of its proximity to Albania, went to the KLA and asked it not to pursue
plans to capture the town after the debacle in Orahovac.

In addition to its public humiliation, the KLA's loss of Orahovac has
military implications. Orahovac controls a vital route to Prizren, which
in turn sits astride the main resupply route for the Yugoslav army and
police. The takeover of the town ensures the freedom of movements for
Yugoslav military forces for some time to come.

Like almost every town in this Serbian province, Orahovac was under the
control of centrally appointed Serb officials despite its lopsided
Albanian majority, but KLA operatives moved fairly freely in and around
the town. According to a number of sources, the KLA itself was planning
the armed takeover of Orahovac, but not until its military supplies and
forces were in place.

But the Serbs apparently got wind of the plan.

Fighting began on July 17, a KLA volunteer who served on the front
lines near Orahovac said. It was a day when no military action had been
planned.

"I had been given the day free," said the 44-year-old volunteer, who
asked that his name not be used.

"They came to get me at 8 p.m.," he recalled. "No one had given the KLA
the order to go in before that."

What prompted the order, the volunteer said, was a report that a group
of gypsies who live in Orahovac "has been dressed up in KLA uniforms" and
started shooting at Serb houses. "The Serbs started shooting back. The
gypsies sent word that they needed help - but it was a trap." The
volunteer said he was one of 150 troops who arrived in Orahovac that
evening.

A slightly different version of the story was told by a senior Kosovo
Albanian political official, who also asked not to be identified by name.
This official said it was the Serbs who put on the KLA uniforms.

Albanian refugees also reported a series of odd events. One was the
arrival several days before the fighting of more than 100 Serb policemen
at Orahovac's Park Hotel. Some of the police began shooting in the air or
firing and missing pedestrians on July 16, the night before the fighting.
Serb civilians on July 17 and 18 repeatedly fired shots in the direction
of the Serb police and also at the mainly Serbian village of Hoxe e Male.
Serb police then returned fire, but at Muslim homes, the refugees said.

On July 18, according to an Albanian refugee, a report spread through
the city that the KLA had departed from Orahovac, causing many residents
to panic.

"The report was untrue, but families from the periphery crowded into
the center of town, thinking it was safer," said Naser Dema, 36. "It was a
big mistake. I don't know where the report came from."

That day, the Serb police withdrew from the streets to the police
station, and the KLA, in a monumental error of judgment, announced it was
in control of the town. In fact, the Serbs were bringing in at least 30
tanks and hundreds of troops, while the KLA had hardly begun to reinforce
its positions.

As late as last Tuesday, even while the Serb forces were overrunning
Orahovac, a KLA commander in Malisevo told Newsday: "The battle continues,
and the town is 70 percent in our hands." In fact, the battle ended that
night.

Serbs paint a different picture.

According to the official version of events, the KLA began the conflict
on July 16 by kidnaping some 90 Serbs and then by attacking the village of
Hoxe e Male and disarming its Serb civilians. "There were maybe 1,000
KLA," said Zoran Grkovic, Serb president of the Orahovac city council.
"They put up barricades on all sides of the town and they fired at our
shops and houses to make Serbs afraid," he added. Serb forces fired back,
he said.

He acknowledged that "perhaps a dozen" Serb police had arrived at the
Park Hotel in advance, well below the Albanians' reports of up to 150, but
asserted that because of KLA activities, the police "couldn't go out." He
said that the Serb police withdrew to the police station but were unable
to explain how the Serb-controlled media center in Pristina could report
the recapture of the town by Sunday night, the 19th of July.

Before meeting two visiting reporters Friday, Grkovic gave a tour of
the office of the mayor, where books about Serbs had been thrown on the
floor and a framed photograph of Slobodan Milosevic, the Yugoslav
president, lay broken on the floor behind his desk. Two days earlier, when
the international press was invited for a tour of Orahovac, the mayor,
Andjelko Kolasinac, did not mention the damage or give any sign that his
office had been ransacked.

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