Balkan Peace Team-Kosovo/a

Monthly Report, Mid-August-September 1999

CONTENTS

I. WORK OF THE TEAM
II. OBSERVATIONS & IMPRESSIONS
1. Situation for Minorities in Kosovo/a
2. Situation of Political Prisoners in Serbia
3. Political Update

I. WORK OF THE TEAM

Trip to Belgrade

During early September one team member paid a brief three-day visit to Belgrade, the first of what the team hopes will be regular visits to Serbia. Due to the damage caused by the NATO bombing campaign it; is currently not possible to travel directly by train from Budapest to Belgrade. The rail service now terminates at Novi Sad where travelers have to transfer to coaches to complete the journey to Belgrade by road. No problems were experienced crossing the border into Serbia from Hungary, but there was a long delay as customs and passport officials checked everybody's papers and documents.

While in Belgrade it was good to see familiar faces and to reconnect with student activists and local organizations such as Women in Black (WIB). It was heartening to see that the WIB office was as hectic as ever, with people coming and going throughout the day. While visiting Women in Black, BPT met with the two Brethren Volunteer Service (BVS) volunteers currently working with WIB.

Daily life in Belgrade's city center appeared, at least superficially, to be unaffected by the recent war. People were going around doing their shopping or relaxing in the city's many cafes and bars. However, one does get the feeling that there are many problems just below the surface. For example, the upcoming winter is causing a lot of fear among people. Will there be enough food? Will electricity and heating be reliable? When will I be paid next? These are the questions that many people are asking and are a source of much concern.

An interestingly telling sign of the depth of the insecurity being experienced by the residents of Belgrade in this post-war period involves this summer's solar eclipse. Numerous stories abound about the media-induced trepidation produced in Belgrade by the eclipse. For example, BPT was told that on the day of the eclipse the streets of Belgrade were deserted as people stayed indoors for fear of some terrible event occurring.

Serbia continues to suffer from international isolation. Many of the organizations that left Belgrade before or during the NATO war on Yugoslavia have been unable to return to the country to resume their work. This break with the outside world has been keenly felt within the activist community in Belgrade.

BPT intends to maintain its longstanding relationships with activists and organizations in Serbia, and to make connections with some of the newer groups. The team will attempt to obtain visas for future visits in order to serve, at the least, as a way of helping two-way information between activist communities in Serbia and Kosovo/a.

Meetings

BPT continues to meet regularly with a variety of local and international organizations. This section will be reserved each month to report on some of the meetings we have had with organizations and to highlight some of their work.

CIVIC HOUSE / RADIO KONTAKT

BPT met with several members of Radio Kontakt over the past month. They spoke of the difficulty in carrying through with the radio project since many of the Serbs have left or are planning on leaving Pristina. When we spoke with them earlier this month they were still waiting to receive the radio equipment that was being donated by the British government. The project has a multi-ethnic staff made up of Albanians, Serbs, Montenegrins and Slavic Muslims. They were interested in future peace building initiatives by BPT or other NGOs and we promised to keep in touch when we organized or heard of such projects.

ASSOCIATION OF EUROPEAN STUDENTS

Two Dutch students representing AEGEE, the Association of European Students, contacted BPT seeking to establish cooperative links. The AEGEE students were in Pristina to gather participants for their organization's peace-building and civic development project called "Bridges to Kosov@." This project seeks to establish a low profile, grassroots association of Kosovar Serb and Albanian university students with the objective of providing a framework within which future dialogue between the two communities can begin. The first phase of the project will bring a small group of students to Cyprus in order to examine the dynamics of that particular conflict, thus providing a point of departure for the beginnings of a discussion of the Kosovo/a conflict.

AEGEE presented to the Balkan Peace Team-Kosovo/a its project proposal, requesting both the team's feedback and the team's assistance in maintaining contact with the group of students it had tapped for participation in the project's first phase. Additionally, AEGEE extended an invitation to BPT to attend the Cyprus workshop. The Kosovo/a team has agreed to assist AEGEE by meeting regularly with the project participants in order to facilitate team building.

INTERNATIONAL FELLOWSHIP OF RECONCILIATION

While in the Netherlands for BPT's quarterly Coordinating Committee meeting, the Kosovo/a team met with the staff of one of the Balkan Peace Team's coalition partner organizations, the International Fellowship of Reconciliation (IFOR). Discussed at the meeting were various means by which the team could benefit from the particular human and material resources available within IFOR. Moreover, the team talked at length about its perception of the current situation in Kosovo/a and the peace-building possibilities it has identified thus far. We were appreciative of the IFOR staffs' suggestions for furthering the team's objectives. The meeting proved fruitful for both IFOR and the Kosovo/a team as information was shared and potentials for future collaborative efforts identified.

BPT COORDINATING COMMITTEE

The Coordinating Committee (CC) of the Balkan Peace Team met from September 10-12 in the Netherlands where the team discussed the need for an expanded team membership and for project development in Kosovo/a. Immediately following the CC meeting, the Kosovo/a team met with members of its sub-group to develop a team strategy for the next several months. The team presented several project ideas to the sub-group for consideration, and it was decided that in-field research would be undertaken by the team in conjunction with a visit from one or more sub-group members. Moreover, a detailed report of the team's project findings would be prepared for further discussion and fine-tuning at the next CC/sub-group meeting in November when final decisions regarding project implementation would be made.

II. OBSERVATIONS & IMPRESSIONS

1. Situation for Minorities in Kosovo/a

The situation for minority groups throughout Kosovo/a, particularly for members of the Serb and Roma communities, remains precarious. Minority group movement out of Kosovo/a continues, with fears over security being cited as the main reason for departure. However, the concerns being expressed by minorities as reasons for leaving their homes are concerns over restricted access to humanitarian assistance, medical facilities, education, and employment opportunities.

In addition to minority movement out of Kosovo/a, there has been an increase in the movement of minorities within Kosovo/a to areas considered to be safer, thereby creating ethnic enclaves. The growth of these enclaves is beginning to attract a degree of minority return; according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), however, most of these returnees are not moving back to their own homes but rather to one of the perceived areas of safety within the province. In addition, these newly formed enclaves are becoming easy targets for violence and many have come under the protection of the NATO-led Kosovo Force (KFOR) as a consequence.

The most recent statistics compiled by the UNHCR indicate that some 100,000 ethnic Serbs remain in Kosovo/a, out of a pre-war population of approximately 200,000 - many of whom are concentrated in the province's northern, Serb-majority municipalities. It is important to note that this figure of 100,000 indicates an upward revision of the preliminary findings of the UNHCR's assessment of the minority situation in Kosovo/a. The preliminary assessment, completed 19 July 1999, estimated that the Serb population in Kosovo/a consisted of approximately 45,000 people. The reason for the inaccuracy of the earlier figures is probably due to the fact that they were based on the number of Serbs leaving the province for the rest of Yugoslavia, and not on the number of Serbs still living in Kosovo/a - a rough survey of which has now been completed.

Outside the northern municipalities, tension continues to characterize the security situation for Serbs. For example, the level of violence perpetrated against the 3,400 Serbs who remain in Gnjilane has been rising at an alarming rate. The Serbs of this town believe themselves to be victims of an organized expulsion campaign due to recurring threats, the cutting of phone lines, assaults, forced evictions, arsons, and murders (the number of murders since the arrival of KFOR, according to sources in the Orthodox Church, totaling 17). Moreover, at least 20 cases of abduction in Gnjilane have been confirmed by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).

In Pristina, the UNHCR estimates the ethnic Serb population to be between 1,000 - 2,000 persons, down from the approximately 5,000 Serbs that were believed to still be residing in Pristina in June just after the withdrawal of Yugoslav forces. Many of those Serbs remaining in Pristina are elderly and thus have been extremely vulnerable to attack and intimidation. Incidents such as the recent beating of an elderly Serb woman living a few doors down from the BPT flat are not uncommon and are rarely reported in the media. This incident occurred during one of the frequent power outages in Pristina in mid-September when three Albanian men knocked on the woman's door announcing that they were KFOR and asked her to let them in. When she obliged, she was severely beaten. The woman was first taken to the Pristina hospital, but asked to be transferred to the KFOR field hospital in Kosovo Polje /Frushë-Kosovë because she did not feel safe under the treatment of Albanian doctors. When she was released, she left Kosovo/a for Southern Serbia.

As a result of the frequency of such brutal incidents in Pristina, KFOR has begun to register persons at risk during its patrols, in addition to establishing emergency phone lines, reinforcing doors to flats and houses to prevent break-ins and, in some cases, providing 24-hour protection. The number of violent occurrences reported to KFOR in Pristina has declined in recent weeks, but it is difficult to discern whether this drop is due to KFOR's efforts or to the continued flight of the Serb population from the city.

In addition to the actions being taken by KFOR regarding the protection of minorities in Kosovo/a, the multiethnic Kosovo Transitional Council established by the United Nations Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) has formed a sub-group on minorities. The status of this working group, however, is bound to be affected by the recent resignations of the Serb members of the Council over the transformation of the Kosovo Liberation Army into the Kosova Protection Corps (see Political Update section of this report for further details).

More promising are the actions and statements of local Albanian professionals and activists condemning the perpetration of revenge attacks against Serbs and Serbian property in Kosovo/a. For example, a group of local media professionals have launched an anti-house burning campaign and have produced a poster with the image of a fire-bombed house and the words: "In a world of nobody we are nobodies. Thus everything belongs to us. Let us defend the place where we live. STOP BURNING!" Additionally, the Council for the Defense of Human Rights and Freedoms has been issuing regular, strongly worded statements against the increasing violence being directed at members of the Serbian community, arguing that "the Albanian population as a majority has a special responsibility for the protection of the rights of minorities."

2. Status of Political Prisoners in Serbia

The status of Kosovar political prisoners transferred to Serbia at the end of the NATO - Yugoslav war remains a major issue in Kosovo/a. It continues to hold a prominent place in local media and is the source of numerous protests directed at the UN and western governments, demanding their immediate attention to get their release. The protests are held on a weekly basis and typically have a large contingent from Djakovica/Gjakova (where many of the prisoners are believed to be from). The most recent included a 24-hour hunger strike just outside the UNMIK headquarters. At one event in late August, Bernard Kouchner, the UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General, marched with hundreds of demonstrators, and promised them that the Kosovo Transitional Council will create a special working group on the issue. The working group will include family members of the detained along with various local and international NGOs working on the issue.

There is some dispute over the actual number of prisoners being held. Local human rights NGOs and the UN claim the number to be around 5,000, though they admit there is no precise data to back up this figure. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), which is the lead agency working on the prisoner issue, claims that the numbers probably are not much higher than the list of 1,924 names furnished to them by the Yugoslav authorities. According to the ICRC, about 1/3 of those on the list have been tried and sentenced, with the remaining still in process. They also stated that the war between the Yugoslav government and the Kosovar Albanians was considered internal and therefore, international conventions regarding prisoners of war do not apply. Neither the Military Technical Agreement between NATO and the Yugoslav and Serbian governments nor the UN Security Council Resolution 1244 that authorized the peace plan in Kosovo dealt with the issue of these prisoners.

Aside from the ICRC, the Belgrade-based Humanitarian Law Center has also made several visits to prisoners and has been monitoring trials, though it was rumored that the Yugoslav government had denied them access. However, after speaking with an HLC staff member in Pristina, BPT learned that the dispute was over needing permission to visit the prisoners, which a letter from UNMIK seems to have resolved. They had not, in fact, been denied access to the trials, only to the prisons.

The HLC has stated that all the prisoners they visited were non-combatants and did not have any ties to the Kosova Liberation Army (UÇK - Ushtria Çlirimtare e Kosovës). Most of the Serbian government's charges against these prisoners do implicate them in being active with the UÇK.

On September 16, the European Parliament adopted a resolution expressing their concern over the status of these prisoners and called on the UN Security Council to adopt a resolution stating that no progress on negotiations will be made with Yugoslavia until these prisoners have been released. They also called on the Finnish EU presidency to immediately begin talks with the Serbian government over the release of these prisoners.

The ICRC has planned a second round of complete visits to those detained starting the second week of September. ICRC is also doing an exchange of "Red Cross Messages" between the prisoners and family members.

3. Political Update

The UÇK formally disbanded on September 20th. Both KFOR and UNMIK commended the UÇK for their compliance with the demilitarization pact signed in June. However at the last minute, there arose a dispute over the future role of the UÇK's successor, The Kosovo Protection Corps (KPC). The dispute centered on whether the KPC would evolve into the Kosova Army or whether it would remain a body to respond to emergencies and disasters. The dispute resulted in a 48-hour extension of the demilitarization deadline. It took a visit from NATO Commander Wesley Clark to break the deadlock. This latest dispute between the UÇK leadership and the international community illustrates a developing trend of different interpretations of what will happen during this transitional administration. More of these disputes can be expected in the future, especially over the issue of what the future status of Kosovo will be.

The Kosovo Transitional Council (KTC) continues to meet about once a week, though it continues to be on a shaky footing. The KTC is made up of local leaders and serves a consultative role to the UN in Kosovo. The Serb members of the KTC have recently resigned in protest to the agreement regarding the Kosovo Protection Corps.

In late August a Serb Member of the KTC, Momcilo Trajkovic (Serb Resistance Movement) proposed the cantonization of Kosovo in order to protect the remaining ethnic minorities in Kosovo. Both Bernard Kouchner and Richard Holbrooke (who was visiting Kosovo/a at the time) and the Albanian population rejected the proposal. It was generally looked upon as a step towards partitioning.

The Albanian political scene in Kosovo continues to be fractious with Rugova and Thaçi taking turns at not showing up at the KTC meetings. Rugova still enjoys popular support in Kosovo though he continually alienates himself from his peers. Public appearances and statements are rare and it's difficult to discern any kind of leadership strategy.