[A-PAL] A-PAL Newsletter, No. 015

[kosova at jps.net]

Welcome to Albanian Prisoner Advocacy List -- Prisoner Pals Newsletter,
No. 015, March 20, 2000

This report highlights the developments on the prisoner issue for the week
of March 12, 2000.

==========================================
A-PAL STATEMENT:
==========================================
UN INTERIM ADMINISTRATION MISSION IN KOSOVO (UNMIK)
Developments today, 15 March 2000

KTC condemns sentencing of student leader: In a separate statement issued
after its meeting today, the KTC condemned the sentence by the district
court of Nis, Serbia, of Mr. Albin Kurti, Kosovo Albanian student union
leader, to 15 years of imprisonment. The Council said it was convinced that
the conviction of Mr. Kurti was unfounded and based on political
considerations rather than on evidence. It reiterated its demand, expressed
in an appeal to the Security Council on 23 February, that all Kosovo
prisoners detained in Serbia be immediately released or handed over to UNMIK
for their release or trial, as appropriate.
http://www.un.org/peace/kosovo/news/update.htm

==========================================
WEEK OF MARCH 12, 2000 TOPICS:
==========================================
* AFTER THE NIGHT: By  Fred Abrahams
* HUMANITARIAN LAW CENTER COMMUNIQUE: Albin Kurti senteced to 15 years in
prison
* CSCE: Hearing in Washington on Kosovo
* ERNST GUELCHER: Plenary Session of European Parliament
* KOSOVAPRESS: Macedonia draws request for extradition of Fazli Veliu
* FREEB92 DAILY NEWS: Albanians sentenced and released
* FREEB92 DAILY NEWS: Student activist detained
* REUTERS: Freedom Means Responsibility in Kosovo-US Official
* KOSOVAPRESS: Where is Ukshin Hoti?! Is he alive or dead?
* AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE: Rubin, Hill hear first-hand of Kosovar family's six
missing
* AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE: Kosovar Albanian women wait for word of missing men
* REUTERS: Ethnic Albanian lawyer beaten in his Belgrade home
* DELINA FICO: Petition to release Dr. Flora Brovina
* INDEPENDENT DIGITAL: Serbs hold hundreds of Kosovo 'hostages'
* AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL: 2000 United Nations Commission on Human Rights Time
to defend the defenders
* HUMANITARIAN LAW CENTER COMMUNIQUE: Belgrade lawer and wife severely
beaten
* AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE: Opposition activist appears on Yugoslav libel
charges
* IWPR'S BALKAN CRISIS REPORT: Milosevic Crushes Opponents
* WOMEN IN BLACK: Wars start in the spring, about mobilization, and threats
of war
* AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE: Serbian journalist jailed during NATO bombing
released
* ARTICLE 19: "Closedown Of Independent Serb Media Is A Warning", Says
Rights Group

==========================================
QUOTES OF THE WEEK:
==========================================
	Christopher Smith, CSCE, “your explanation of why the release of the
Albanian prisoners in Serbia was not addressed in the "Technical Agreement"
differed from that offered by subsequent witnesses.  You had said that the
subject was not included in previous discussion.  According to other
testimony, however, it was in early drafts of the agreement but when
Yugoslav/Serbian interlocutors objected, the Administration agreed to drop
the matter in order to expedite the cessation of the NATO air campaign.
Further, none of the U.S. participants involved in the negotiation of this
agreement had human rights concerns as a stated part of their portfolio.
(Full statement below)
	The UN administration in Kosovo is, for now, powerless to help Albanians in
Serb jails. No UN resolution or agreement signed by Belgrade and Nato takes
them into account. It is believed that the Kosovo interim administration
will soon ask for an internationally sponsored document that would enable
the return of the prisoners. "There is also another hope," Mr Boksi said.
"The change of regime in Serbia would certainly make things easier."
INDEPENDENT DIGITAL (Full story below)

==========================================
FULL REPORTS AND ARTICLES BEGIN HERE:
==========================================

AFTER THE NIGHT
By  Fred Abrahams

Of all the coffees one has in the Balkans, some stick in the memory,
floating above the haze of sugar and smoke.
     Such is my 1997 conversation with Xhevat, a former political prisoners
from Kosovo.  The meeting took place in Tetovo, but the talk was of
Prishtina.
     The Kosovo students were holding their non-violent demonstrations to
support education, sometimes greeted by violence from the police. Rugova too
was trying to convince them to stop provoking the situation.
     Xhevat sipped his coffee, sat back, and uttered the memorable phrase:
"There is no question," he said.  "After the students comes the night."
     I appreciated his concern and the importance of the students' peaceful
attempts to shake the scene.  After the failed education agreement, patience
with non-violence was wearing thin, and this youthful activism needed
support.  But I didn't know how dark the night can be.  Xhevat certainly
did.
     Nothing illustrates his point better than this week's conviction of
Albin Kurti, who led those demonstrations and then joined the armed revolt.
Fifteen years.  From devoted pacifist with rock star hair to defiant KLA
activist with a prisoner's shave.  Very dark indeed.
     Albin embodies the spirit of Kosovo's youth who crave a better life --
groping for a way to make a contribution in a complex play.
     And he represents the failure of the West to address the incendiary
issues in Kosovo before they burst into flame.  It is easier to bomb a
dictator than to support a student, I guess.  When the demonstrations
failed, it was only a matter of time before the violent approach took hold.
Nothing illustrates this predictable evolution better than Albin.
     In fact, a pacifist like Albin was thrust into a situation in which
pacifism fit the time like a square fits a circle.  How to tell students,
workers, intellectuals to endure more abuse without offering
any way out?  Non-violence in Prishtina after Prekaz, Likoshane, and Qirez?
     The student union's books on Ghandi and Martin Luther King Jr. were
burned by the police.
     Now Albin will spend time behind bars.  Ironically, the court found him
guilty of "terrorist activities" for his political work with the KLA and of
organizing "illegal" student demonstrations in 1997-1998, that historical
moment of dusk.  In the court's eyes, there was no distinction between the
two.
     There will be time to think and read in Pozarevac.  To consider
pacifism and the geometric realities that surround it.  Might he have been
more effective then and now as an independent defender of human rights?  And
what ideals will guide him when freedom returns?  The sentence is long, but
even prison cannot stop the turning of the earth. Like everyplace else,
after the night comes the day.

  Fred Abrahams
  Senior Researcher
  Human Rights Watch

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

HUMANITARIAN LAW CENTER COMMUNIQUE
Albin Kurti senteced to 15 years in prison

March 14, 2000

	Kosovo Albanian student leader Albin Kurti was yesterday sentenced to 15
years in prison by the District Court in Nis, which has assumed the
jurisdiction of the Pristina District Court.  Judge Sladjana Petrovic found
Kurti guilty of endangering the territorial integrity of FR Yugoslavia, for
which he received 13 years, and of seditious conspiracy in conjunction with
terrorism, for which he was given an additional four years’ imprisonment.
The court pronounced a cumulative sentence of 15 years and ordered Kurti
remanded in custody until it became final. Kurti’s court-appointed defense
counsel, Branislav Ciric, announced an appeal.
	Because of lack of evidence, the deputy district prosecutor yesterday
amended the indictment, withdrawing the count of seditious conspiracy and
terrorism during a state of war and instead charging Kurti with endangering
the territorial integrity of the country.  Since there was no evidence
presentation at the trial, neither the court nor the public know what
evidence, if any, the prosecutor had against the defendant.
	Albin Kurti stated before the sentencing that he did not recognize the
court, the prosecutor or his defense counsel.

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

CSCE (Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe)
Hearing in Washington on Kosovo

March 13, 2000

The Honorable John Menzies
Deputy  Special Advisor to the President and
	Secretary of State for Kosovo Implementation
U.S. Department of State
Washington, DC   20520

Dear Ambassador Menzies:

        Thank you very much for appearing before the Commission on February
28 to address issues related to Kosovo's displaced and imprisoned.  I
appreciate this opportunity to follow-up on some points raised in the
hearing and look forward to including this letter as well as your response
in the final hearing record.
        First, your explanation of why the release of the Albanian prisoners
in Serbia was not addressed in the "Technical Agreement" differed from that
offered by subsequent witnesses.  You had said that the subject was not
included in previous discussion.  According to other testimony, however, it
was in early drafts of the agreement but when Yugoslav/Serbian interlocutors
objected, the Administration agreed to drop the matter in order to expedite
the cessation of the NATO air campaign.  Further, none of the U.S.
participants involved in the negotiation of this agreement had human rights
concerns as a stated part of their portfolio.  It would be helpful if you
would clarify whether this, indeed, was the case.
        Second, also relating to the prisoners, you had noted that there is
evidence prisoners have been beaten or otherwise mistreated; others
described the treatment as torture.  The State Department's Country Reports
on Human Rights Practices for 1999 notes that the use of torture against
detainees is widespread in Serbia, but it fell short of confirming that some
of the 1,600 or more Kosovar Albanians have been victims of torture.  Again,
a clarification would be helpful.
	Third, in discussing the situation in Kosovo generally, the growth of
corruption and prostitution was mentioned.  Corruption and the trafficking
of women who are forced to work as prostitutes are ongoing and major
concerns of the Commission, as well as the OSCE.  While not specifically
mentioned at the hearing, the Commission has seen reports that some U.S.
personnel are frequenting brothels in Kosovo where trafficked women are
being held.  Has the United States given instructions to official
personnel - civilian and military - prohibiting them from visiting brothels
or nightclubs where prostitution is taking place?  Are there any wider
instructions for the international community as a whole, including members
of the OSCE missions?
        Fourth, many vulnerable groups are often overlooked in crisis
situations, and one relating to Kosovo are those young men who face
imprisonment in Serbia and Montenegro because they either left the country
when called into service, or deserted while in service.   It was noted that
NATO had, in fact, encouraged them to do this, by dropping leaflets and
broadcasting warnings of the consequences of fighting in Kosovo and
encouraging all civilians not to cooperate with the Milosevic regime in its
policies in Kosovo. Moreover, as the international community had condemned
the Yugoslav military's actions in Kosovo, those who did not wish to be
associated with these actions appear to be eligible as refugees.  Have any
of these conscientious objectors applied for refugee status in the United
States?  Would the United States Government consider recognizing and
welcoming some of these individuals as refugees?
        Another vulnerable group is the Romani population of Kosovo.  As you
know, the Commission leadership wrote to Secretary Albright on July 14,
1999, to express our concern about the Roma in and from Kosovo.  Frankly,
the Department's reply was unresponsive to the key issues we raised.  The
Department's letter essentially leaves the fate of Kosovo's Roma in the
hands of the UNHCR.  But many Roma (like many of the conscientious
objectors) are considered internally displaced and, thus far, the UNHCR has
not interpreted its guidelines on internally displaced persons to include
referring them to third countries for resettlement.  In addition, our
witnesses stated that the UNHCR will not recommend Roma or others for asylum
if they are in third countries such as Hungary, notwithstanding the fact
that a significant number of Hungarian Roma have already been found by
Canada to have a well founded fear of persecution.  In an effort to address
these problems, could a presidential determination be issued which would
permit the United States to consider certain categories of internally
displaced persons in Kosovo, Montenegro, and Serbia as refugees for the
purposes of the U.S. resettlement program?  In addition, would it be
possible for the United States to institute refugee processing out of
Podgorica, Montenegro (i.e., INS officers from Zagreb would conduct
interviews in Podgorica), as a means of facilitating the processing of
resettlement applicants?
        Finally, this hearing, as well as our earlier hearing on promoting
and protecting democracy in Montenegro, revealed the potential for renewed
conflict in either Montenegro or the Presevo region of southern Serbia.  I
hope that, in preparing for any international response to such conflicts,
the United States ensures that contingencies are made in advance to respond
to humanitarian crises, and that the criticisms of NATO's air campaign
raised recently by Human Rights Watch are taken seriously into account.
        As you had indicated in your testimony, Mr. Ambassador, the
situation in Kosovo has improved in the sense that the decade or more of
harsh Serbian repression was brought to an end.  At the same time, much
remains to be done to bring civil society, democratic governance and
economic recovery to the region.  I urge the Administration to take strong
action in this regard, in particular by supporting the democratic change in
Serbia itself that would open new possibilities for genuine peace and
stability in southeastern Europe.  The delivery of those indicted for war
crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide  are similarly critical to
ending the cycle of violence in Kosovo, Bosnia and elsewhere.
        Again, Mr. Ambassador, I thank you for participating in the hearing
and look forward to your response.

                                          Sincerely,
                                          CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH
                                          Chairman

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

ERNST GUELCHER
Plenary Session of European Parliament

March 14, 2000

To whom this concerns,

This is to inform you that in the Plenary Session of the European Parliament
tomorrow Wednesday 15 March Bart Staes (MEP) and Matti Wuori (MEP) will
adress the case of Albin Kurti (and his fellow-prisoners) at the occassion
of the Debate on the Council Statement on the Geneva Convention and the
International Humanitarian Law. All suggestions for further initiatives to
be undertaken by the European Parliament will be welcome.

Hope this helps,

Ernst Guelcher
(Green/EFA Group in the European Parliament - Peace and Disarmament; Human
Rights)

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

KOSOVAPRESS
Macedonia draws request for extradition of Fazli Veliu

March 17, 2000

Tetovë, March 17 (Kosovapress) - A deleagtion of Association Political
Prisoners, Xhevat Ademi, Kastriot Haxhirexha and Nuredin Aliu, they met with
Uarner Burkartin ambassador of Federal Republic of Germany in Shkupi. The
Albanian delegation handed the petition to the ambassador with over 10
thousand signatures, to release Fazli Veliu, where Germany by the demand of
Macedonia they will give back to the local authorities.
	As Xhevat Ademi announced that together with petition was sent and the
request of extradition of Fazli Veliu. Also all these documents has been
sent and to his lawyer in Switzerland. It is supposed that Fazli Veliu to be
released from prison at least on Monday.

http://www.kosovapress.com/english/mars/17_3_2000.htm

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

FREEB92 DAILY NEWS
Albanians sentenced and released

March 16, 2000

POZAREVAC, Thursday - The District Court in Pozarevac today sentenced six
Kosovo Albanians to 15 months each in prison on charges of conspiring
against the state. The six were subsequently released, having already served
more than that time in custody.

http://www.freeb92.net/archive/e/

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

FREEB92 DAILY NEWS
Student activist detained

March 16, 2000

SUBOTICA, Thursday - Police in the Vojvodina city of Subotica today detained
an activist from the student movement Otpor without explanation. According
to a statement from Otpor, two plainclothes policemen entered the movement's
offices and asked for documents relating to the lease of the premises. They
then apprehended the student on duty at the time. The two police refused to
provide identification.

http://www.freeb92.net/archive/e/

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

REUTERS
Freedom Means Responsibility in Kosovo-US Official

March 13, 2000
By Kurt Schork

(...)

'WE DON'T WANT MONEY, WE WANT PRISONERS BACK'

Merchants trying to rebuild their businesses in the old town said they
wanted more financial assistance from the international community. Families
of the missing and imprisoned had other, more urgent priorities.
     "We don't need help rebuilding," said an ethnic Albanian woman whose
son and husband went missing during the air strikes and who asked that her
name not be used for fear they might be punished if they are still alive
somewhere in Serbia.
     "We don't want American money. We want our husbands and children back.
They will rebuild Kosovo."
     Local leaders say 287 people from Djakovica are imprisoned in Serbia
and at least 703 are still missing.
     Rubin vowed that Washington would work to keep missing persons and
prisoners at the top of the international agenda.
     The U.S. diplomats visited members of the Sharani family in Djakovica,
five of whose male members remain missing.
     Bekrije, wife of the missing Isuf Sharani, expressed frustration at the
lack of progress in resolving the thousands of cases of missing persons
across Kosovo.
     "I can't say that I'm satisfied because the only missing persons who
turn up are dead," she told Reuters. "Whatever the international community
has been doing, I want it to do more."
     Rubin and Hill dined Monday at the Renaissance Restaurant in Djakovica,
one of the few establishments in the old town that survived the war more or
less intact.
     One sign of the high esteem in which the United States is held in
Djakovica were several of the standard items on the restaurant menu: Apache
salad, Phantom schnitzel and Tomahawk Tava (a meat dish) – all named for
U.S. weapons systems.

© 2000 Reuters Limited
http://news.excite.com/news/r/000313/11/international-kosovo-usa

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

KOSOVAPRESS
Where is Ukshin Hoti?! Is he alive or dead?

March 17, 2000

Prishtinë, March 17 (Kosovapress) -Since May 16, 1999 when the Albanian
intellectual, Mr. Ukshin Hoti ended his serving sentence to five years to
prison, nobody knows anything about his fate. The Albanian ex-prisoners and
prisoners claim that on that day, May 16, accompanied by three security Serb
officers he was released from the prison of Dubrava (Istog, Kosovë), where
he, together with other Albanian prisoners have been transferred from the
prison of Nishi (Serbi).
	After the beginning of the NATO bombardments on May 19, 1999 In the prison
of Dubrava has happened the horrible massacre: there, the Serb forces have
executed and massacred 173 Albanian prisoners. Release Ukshin Hoti! -today
are making the appeal thousands and thousands of protestors, who are holding
his portrait in their hands. He appears in the photo, amongst other 3500
missing and 2000 Albanian prisoners who are still kept as hostages in the
Serb jails. Where is our son, our father and our brother?- having nightmare
every night are waiting his children and his family. (During NATO
Air-strikes, the Serb criminals have killed Ukshin's father, Nazyf and his
brother Ragip, together with 30 of his cousins and other 174 villagers of
Krusha e Madhe (Ukshin's hometown), the district of Rahoveci. Is Ukshin Hoti
alive or is he executed ? – are expressing the doubt the Albanian
intellectuals today.
	Many questions, pain and fear, that have to do with him, until today remain
without answers. Meanwhile, many persons that have previously been
considered as missing have been found dead. Some of them have been found in
different locations or are identified as dead.
	Recently few of them have been released. At the end of the NATO-Serb
conflict, a military technical agreement was signed In Kumanova by Serbia
and NATO commanders on June 10, 1999. A second agreement on the status of
Kosova, Resolution 1244, was signed by the UN Security Council, These
agreements ended an international conflict over the fate of Kosova. But, in
the agreements, there was no explicit reference to how exactly several
thousand Albanian prisoners arrested during the war were to be released as
KFOR entered Kosova. The Albanian prisoners, the war hostages remained in
horror conditions.  And for professor . Ukshin Hoti, nothing known!
	The International Red Cross Committee keeps quiet! The Hague's Tribunal,
too. Nothing is undertaken by UNMIK or KFOR to investigate or clarify his
disappearance. The International Humanitarian Associations do nothing even
now, eight months after the end of the conflict.

Who is Ukshin Hoti?
	Professor Ukshin Hoti borne in 1943, in the village of Krusha e Madhe, the
district of Rahoveci. He graduated from the post -university politic and
science studies and he specialized in " International Relationships" from
the American Universities of Chicago, Harvard, Cambrixh-Boston and in
Washington D.C. from 1978 to 1979. Ukshin Hoti teaches in the University of
Prishtina and his is an outstanding Albanian publisher and psychologist.
	He is also author of the books "Lufta e ftohtë dhe detanti" ( The cold war
and detanti), 1975 dhe "Filozofia politike e çështjes shqiptare" ( The
Political philosophy), 1995. Ukshin Hoti is a political activist and
president of UNIKOMB Party of Kosova.Professor Ukshin Hoti, today is one of
the most courage intellectuals, decisive who respects the principals of
work.
	The Serb regime followed his activities in a very explicit way. He was
imprisoned in 1981 and in 1982 he was sentenced to 9 years in prison ( he
served the suffering sentence for 3,5 years). He was charged for supporting
publicly the student demands for Republic of Kosova. During the months March
and April , 1993 he was imprisoned again for organizing the homage for the
martyrs of Kosova who were killed by the Serb Regime. On May 15, 1994 he was
arrested again and on September 28, 1994 he was charged for his political
opinion and was sentenced to 5 years in prison. The Albanian intellectuals
have spoken with admiration for the figure and personality of Ukshin
Hoti.The academic Rexhep Qosja: "Ukshin Hoti- today is symbol of historic
conscience and Albanian steadiness and fight for freedom.
	The name of Ukshin Hoti is the most meaningful and impressive name in the
political life of Kosova, today. This determination of the Albanian people
of Kosova shows that the Albanian people knows very well how to differ those
live martyrs who are ready for sacrifice. " The Albanian outstanding writer
Ismail Kadare: "I am afraid that, precisely His name and his untiring work
was the unfortunate source of his destiny, his continual fight for freedom
has followed him step by step...It is absolutely unaccepted for a
personality like him, no matter to whom nation he belongs, to be kept in
prison. It is an offence of a whole nation. The Albanian nation needs more
than ever before, intellectuals like him. The intelligent people of a nation
are considered those of a high level such as Ukshin is. Men like him are
real princes of a nation.
	Unfortunately the real princes, often can be beaten to death.  "The fate of
Mr. Ukshin Hoti is related to the human morality. The International
Organizations must seek the account from Serbia. The must investigate and
found where is he. He is political prisoner. The Serb Regime must declare:
Is he alive or dead?!If he is kept as hostage, the Serb authorities must
tell. If he is killed, they must tell where are Ukshin's bones!There are
many International Conventions that oblige this.

http://www.kosovapress.com/english/mars/17_3_2000_2.htm

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

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Rubin, Hill hear first-hand of Kosovar family's six missing

March 13, 2000

DJAKOVICA, Yugoslavia, March 13 (AFP) - The family of six Kosovar men
missing since last May met US State Department spokesman James Rubin and
Balkans troublshooter Christopher Hill on Monday at their home in this
western Kosovo town.
     Pranvera Sharani, the wife of one of those missing, told Rubin and Hill
their horrific story of May 9-10, 1999 in hopes of getting news of the six,
who she said were abducted by Serb paramilitary and policemen.
     The two US representatives spent about 30 minutes with the family,
mostly listening to a story the family has repeated over and over for 10
months, Sharani told AFP.
     Speaking through a cousin, the women said Rubin told them the United
States would try to pressure Yugoslav authorities through friends of Serbia,
although he did not tell them who those contacts were.
     Pranvera said she was "glad that powerful men had come to the house to
share her pain."
     As Rubin and Hill heard their story, about 1,000 women who had also
lost men in the town held pictures in the street outside the family
compound.
     Of the roughly 1,500 men who disappeared from the town and its suburbs,
only about 20 have come back, their interpreter said.
     The six men, Skyver, Tahir -- the husband of Pranvera Sharani --
Mentor, Valon, Visar, and Isuf Sharani were taken away in the morning, about
24 hours after Serb paramilitaries first came and took them to the street,
where they lay on the ground for two hours with assault rifles pointed at
their heads.
     They were beaten with baseball bats, as were three other sons, boys in
their teens.
     The first three are brothers, Valon and Visar are sons of Skyver, and
Isuf is a cousin, they said.
     The Serbs ransacked their home and set fire to those of five neighbors
with rifle-fired grenades, before sealing off the neighborhood and warning
they would be back the next day.
     For about three hours, starting at 2:00 a.m., they fired in the air
"just to say we are here."
     On May 10, about 100 men showed up and told the women and children to
leave, the family told.
     Not seeing one son, Pranvera returned to the house where two policemen
she knew grabbed her and demanded she show them where the well-to-do family
had hidden money.
     "We know you, tell us where the money is," she says they demanded,
explaining that the family is well known, as Skyver and Tahir are a
respected engineer and architect.
     When a policeman saw her elderly mother-in-law looking for her from the
street, they told her to leave, and since then the family has had no news.
     The Sharanis, who own a printing business, go each week to the
provincial capital Pristina to speak with anyone who may be able to help,
and have already been received by the UN civil adminstrator Bernard
Kouchner.
     "If we knew they were in jail we would feel better," said Pranvera.
     With other families they also met US Secretary of State Madeleine
Albright, of whom Rubin is a close advisor.
     Two sisters, Safete and Medrete, said they had hoped to find their
brothers and nephews for the first 10 to 20 days following their abduction.
They "now just need to know if they are dead or alive," Safete explained.
     NATO-led KFOR peacekeepers arrived in Djakovica on June 16, but were
unable to help, Pranvera said.
     Roughly 2,000 Albanian Kosovars were believed imprisoned in Serb jails
as KFOR troops deployed, and ethnic Albanians say at least 5,000 are still
missing.

Story from AFP   Copyright 2000 by Agence France-Presse (via ClariNet)
http://www.clari.net/hot/wed/bg/Qkosovo-rubin.RUtI_AMD.html

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

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Kosovar Albanian women wait for word of missing men

March 14, 2000

DJAKOVICA, Yugoslavia, March 14 (AFP) - Almost a year after NATO warplanes
began to strike Yugoslav forces in Kosovo, Bedrije Sharani listened to
Pranvera, her daughter-in-law, recount the two days in May that took six men
from their family.
     Two powerful US representatives had left a half hour before, and would
call again on Albanian Kosovars to stop the violence that has tarnished
peace won by western forces and guerrillas from the former Kosovo Liberation
Army (KLA).
     Many here want to move forward and build on their freedom, but keep
coming back to the 5,000-odd Albanian Kosovar men they say are missing, like
those related to the woman around 80 or 90 years old sitting on the couch.
     They knew many of the roughly 100 men who came "nervously" last May 10
and abducted three sons, two grandsons, and a cousin from the typically
extended ethnic Albanian family, as the paramilitaries did not bother to
cover their faces.
     This devastated western Kosovo town and surrounding areas lost around
1,500 men as Serb forces withdrew under western pressure, and after
discussion, the family claims that only about 20 of those have returned.
     NATO-led peacekeepers from the Kosovo force KFOR arrived here on June
16, they say, and have not been able to help them, no more so than the UN
civil administrator or the US secretary of state.
     So while the West wants peace and a halt to attacks on Serbs, Romanies,
Gorans and other minorities, Kosovar Albanian families, friends, and
neighbors across the southern Yugoslav province want to know if these men
are dead or alive.
     Their cousin lists towns in Serbia where they believe some may be held
in prison -- Pozharevac, Sremska Mitrovica, Nis -- names that now weigh on
their hearts and will become powerful symbols unless a final accounting is
provided.
     On March 8, International Women's Day, over a thousand staged a silent
march in the volatile town of Kosovska Mitrovica to remind the UN's mission
in Kosovo and international media that their fathers, sons, brothers and
uncles had disappeared.
     Construction workers laid down tools as they passed, and men of all
ages dutifully stepped aside as the women spoke for all with a few slogans,
pictures and three red and black Albanian flags, which the KLA had adopted.
     As US State Department spokesman James Rubin and National Security
Council director Christopher Hill heard Pranvera Sharani tell Monday of
their loss, she said 1,000 other women stood in the street outside with
their own photos.
     The Sharani six are grouped on a poster, as the family owns a printing
business, the others are carried one by one, or posted on trees and
lightposts across Kosovo.
     Asked if she thought Rubin, Hill and other western leaders could help
them account for the men, Pranvera answered simply, "I hope so."
     Without such hope, former KLA extremists may find backing to attack
Serb police, civilians, and KFOR peacekeepers they associate with the forces
that came to their homes, stole what they found, and left mostly women and
children.

Story from AFP / William Ickes
Copyright 2000 by Agence France-Presse (via ClariNet)

http://www.clari.net/hot/wed/bx/Qkosovo-missing.RdpQ_AME.html

==========================================
REUTERS
Ethnic Albanian lawyer beaten in his Belgrade home

March 17, 2000

BELGRADE, March 17 (Reuters) - An ethnic Albanian lawyer and his wife were
brutally beaten in their flat in Belgrade by four masked men, a humanitarian
worker said on Friday.
	Husnija Bitici, who defends Albanians held in Serbian jails, and his wife
were attacked in their home late on Thursday, said Natasa Kandic, head of
the Belgrade-based Humanitarian Law Fund.
	She told Reuters that Bitici's wife let the men in when they said they were
neighbours.
	Bitici sustained serious head injuries in the attack and was operated on
overnight, but doctors said his life was not in danger. His wife, with
lesser injuries, is in intensive care.
	Kandic, who went to the Biticis' flat as soon as she heard of the incident,
said there were traces of blood on the walls, blood all over the room and
even human tissue on the floor.
	Bitici defended Kosovo Albanians who were detained in Serbia mostly on
charges of terrorism or conspiracy against the state.
	Most of them were arrested during NATO's March-June 1999 air campaign over
Yugoslavia's repression of the ethnic Albanian majority in Kosovo.
	Kandic said Bitici had been threatened by some Serb lawyers from Kosovo in
an effort to force him to stop accusing them of taking huge bribes from
ethnic Albanian prisoners' families to secure their release.
	Bitici also defended prominent Kosovo Albanian poet and humanitarian worker
Flora Brovina, who was sentenced to 12 years in prison last December, and
one of five ethnic Albanian students from Belgrade charged with terrorism.
	The Humanitarian Law fund estimates some 1,400 ethnic Albanians are still
being held in Serbian jails.

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

DELINA FICO
Petition to release Dr. Flora Brovina

March 14, 2000

Dear all,

	Please find in the message forwarded a petition that requests the release
of Dr. Flora Brovina, Albanian pediatrician, poet and women's rights
activist who is imprisoned in Serbia. The petition is initiated by two
well-known Polish intellectuals. The center that I work for, TCDS, is
organizing the petition. About 300 hundred people have signed so far.
	Among them many well-known intellectuals from the US, Italy, Poland, South
Africa, Israel, Croatia, Germany etc. Please read it and consider signing
it. Send your response (name, affiliation, country) as soon as possible to
Januszej at newschool.edu

Warmest regards,
Perqafime,
Delina



	To the International Community: Doctor Flora Brovina, a pediatrician from
Kosovo, was arrested in Prishtina, the capital of Kosovo, on April 20, 1999
during the NATO bombing campaign against Yugoslavia, and sentenced in a
Serbian court, on December 9, 1999, to 12 years in prison.
	She was accused of terrorism, but her only crime was that she was treating
Albanian women and children during the war. Dr. Brovina is a well-known poet
and social activist who has always advocated non-violence. In March, 1999,
she was one of the organizers of a march for peace in which 20,000 Albanian
women participated. She has published four books of poetry while working as
a pediatrician in a clinic she established in Prishtina. Every physician,
upon receiving a diploma, takes the Hippocratic oath, which states that a
doctor has the duty to treat people without regard to their nationality,
race, gender, religious denomination, or ideals. Punishment for treating
Albanian children--or even wounded soldiers--violates the moral principles
that govern all civilized societies. This sentence is not only a blow
against Flora Brovina but also against all physicians. For this reason we
strongly protest this course of action and demand that the sentence be
immediately revoked, that Dr. Flora Brovina be freed from prison, and that
she be exonerated. Marek Edelman, Poland* Jacek Kuron, Poland*
	Please join us in signing this letter and demanding her immediate release.
You can respond by fax or e-mail to the Transregional Center for Democratic
Studies, New School University, New York: Fax # (212) 229-5794 e-mail:
Januszej at newschool.edu * Marek Edelman is the only leader of the Warsaw
Ghetto uprising who survived it. He is a distinguished cardiologist, and a
prominent public figure in Poland. He lives in Lodz. * Jacek Kuron,
historian and educator, was a founding member of the Committee for Workers
Defense (KOR) in 1976, a crucial turning point in the eventual emergence of
Solidarity movement in Poland. A cabinet member in the first post-1989
democratic government, he has been a consistently popular public figure in
Poland. He lives in Warsaw.

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

INDEPENDENT DIGITAL
Serbs hold hundreds of Kosovo 'hostages'

18 March 2000
By Vesna Peric Zimonjic in Belgrade

A year after Nato began its bombing campaign to "liberate" Kosovo, more than
1,400 ethnic Albanians remain incarcerated in prisons in Serbia, many of
them facing trumped-up charges of "terrorism".
     Most of them, held in eight jails around the country, were rounded up
by Serb security forces in Kosovo in swoops which began in 1998 when the
Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) began its uprising. Many were locked up during
the 11 weeks of the Nato air strikes.
     All were transferred from Kosovo into Serbia proper by June, before the
arrival of the Nato-led K-For peace-keeping force and the United Nations
administration in the province. Many were sentenced by Serbian courts in
sloppy and irregular trials, sometimes with no evidence being
presented.
     The judges are, as a rule, Serbs who once worked in Kosovo but left
when their administration did in June. Pristina district court is now based
in the southern Serb town of Nis, while Prizren District Court is based in
Pozareva, in the east.
     Those recently jailed include the student leader Albin Kurti, 25, who
was given a 15-year sentence, and the poet and physician Flora Brovina, 50,
who got 12 years. The brothers Luan and Bekim Mazreku had their trial
postponed for several weeks. All the charges were "terrorism" and
"conspiring to commit hostile acts aimed at destabilising the security of
Serbia".
     Teki Boksi, an Albanian lawyer at the Belgrade-based Humanitarian Law
Centre (HLC), a non-governmental rights organisation, said: "Belgrade can
call the KLA a terrorist group. But the true KLA members and sympathisers
either took up arms from 1998 or were killed in clashes
with Serb security forces. The people who remain in Serb prisons are not
therefore significant figures, but the regime is keeping them for propaganda
purposes.
     "The worst part of it is that the trials are run by Serb judges who
left Kosovo... Those people are frustrated... They lost their homes,
property, almost everything."
     Ajri Begu, the husband of Ms Brovina, thinks that she, like many
others, could be "a bargaining chip, a hostage to be traded by the [Yugoslav
President, Slobodan Milosevic's] government for concessions".
     According to a report by the International Crisis Group, Mr Milosevic
is trying to undermine UN rule in Kosovo by keeping the Albanians in jail.
"Belgrade appears to have little interest in
releasing these prisoners, who have become hostages in... Milosevic's
efforts to keep Kosovo destabilised, jeopardise the success of the
international mission there and demonstrate Kosovo remains under his rule,"
it said.
     The HLC says 2,050 Albanian prisoners between the ages of 16 and 73
were transferred to Serbia by June. Around 600 have been freed. For some,
there were no grounds for a trial. Many were formally indicted and sentenced
to terms that matched the time already spent in prison.
     Families, and even lawyers, face intimidation when leaving Kosovo to
visit the prisoners. They are dependent on the whim of the Serbian police.
Myzacete Berisha, whose two sons who are being tried in Belgrade, said: "We
can be turned back for days on end; we try different crossings during the
day, hoping to meet a policeman who is not in a bad mood."
     The UN administration in Kosovo is, for now, powerless to help
Albanians in Serb jails. No UN resolution or agreement signed by Belgrade
and Nato takes them into account. It is believed that the Kosovo interim
administration will soon ask for an internationally sponsored document that
would enable the return of the prisoners. "There is also another hope," Mr
Boksi said. "The change of regime in Serbia would certainly make things
easier."

* Husnia Butyqi, the lawyer who defended the poet and physician Flora
Brovina, was said to be in a serious condition yesterday after being
beaten up by four masked men. (AP)

© 2000 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/World/Europe/2000-03/wserb180300.shtml

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

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL
2000 United Nations Commission on Human Rights Time to defend the defenders


March 17, 2000

	Geneva -- A Special Rapporteur for Human Rights Defenders would play a
pivotal role in protecting lawyers, journalists, students and activists who
continue to be threatened, intimidated and even killed in their fight to
protect human rights, Amnesty International said at a press conference
today.
     The human rights organization renewed its call to the UN Commission on
Human Rights to create a post of Special Rapporteur for Human Rights
Defenders who would intervene on behalf of those who are at the forefront of
the struggle to protect and promote human rights.
     "Last year we were told that the time was not ripe because the
Commission had to review its system of rapporteurs, experts and working
groups, " said Stephanie Farrior, Director of Amnesty International's Legal
and International Organizations Program. "But it is time the creation of a
Special Rapporteur's post stopped being held hostage to this review
process."
     "While this review is important it must not block the protection of
human rights defenders who provide the Commission with indispensable
information from the ground," added Stephanie Farrior.
     The Commission must put the victims and human rights defenders at the
centre of its agenda. Yet all too often the Commission fails to act
decisively and political compromise takes precedence over human rights.
     At this session of the Commission, Amnesty International will also
raise concerns about countries where there is a pattern of systematic and
severe human rights violations, with a particular focus on China, the
Federal Republic of Yugoslavia/Kosovo, Mexico, Russian Federation/Chechnya,
Saudi Arabia and Sierra Leone.
     "The Commission should speak out on the human rights situation in China
and other countries such as Saudi Arabia which have appalling human rights
records. In the interest of realpolitik the international community has
remained silent for far too long but no country should be seen as
'untouchable' by the Commission," said Stephanie Farrior.
     "Commission action will drive home the message that the standards
applied to China and other powerful countries are no different from those
applied to smaller, less powerful countries that are regularly censured by
the international community for their human rights record."

(...)

Federal Republic of Yugoslavia/Kosovo: Progress towards stability in Kosovo
is hampered by continued killing of people because of their ethnic origin, a
failure to resolve cases of "disappearances", and a general lack of
security. This is despite the UN Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo's
determination to establish an international administration from scratch and
the efforts of the NATO-led international security force (KFOR) in Kosovo to
provide protection. The lack of an effective judicial system perpetuates
impunity for human rights abuses.
     "The international community has failed to provide the resources for an
adequate international civilian police force or for a new judiciary. Until
that happens, violence against minority communities is likely to continue,"
Stephanie Farrior said.
     "NATO member states who persistently called on Yugoslav army personnel
during the military conflict to desert should now live up to their
international obligations and promote durable protection to conscientious
objectors who fled from the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia on the grounds of
their conscientiously held convictions or beliefs."

Mexico's (...)
Russian Federation/Chechnya:  (...)
Saudi Arabia:  (...)
Sierra Leone:  (...)

Amnesty International is also urging the Commission to:

	Adopt a resolution on the death penalty urging all states that have not yet
abolished the death penalty to suspend all executions and forbid the
imposition of the death penalty on the mentally impaired and persons below
18 years of age at the time the crime was committed.
	Form an Intersessional Working Group to finalize -- with the participation
of non- governmental organizations and within the tightest possible time
frame -- the draft Convention on "Enforced Disappearance", incorporating the
strongest guarantees.
	Adopt a resolution calling for the finalization of the Optional Protocol to
the Convention against Torture that provides for an effective inspection
system.
	Child soldiers: approve the draft optional protocol, which bans the use of
children under 18 in armed conflict, and recommend its adoption by the UN
General Assembly later this year. Amnesty International regrets that the
optional protocol fails to establish 18 as the minimum age for voluntary
recruitment into government armed forces.
	The 56th Session of the UN Commission on Human Rights will meet for six
weeks in Geneva from 20 March to 28 April 2000.

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

HUMANITARIAN LAW CENTER COMMUNIQUE
Belgrade lawer and wife severely beaten

March 18, 2000

	Lawyer Husnija Bitici and his wife Sanije were severely beaten up in their
Belgrade apartment by a gang of youths with short-cropped hair at about 8.30
p.m. on 17 March.  Bitici sustained serious injuries to his head and body
and was operated on at the Emergency Medical Center three hours later.
Doctors report his condition as grave.  His wife was also hospitalized.
	The police carried out an on-site investigation, and interviewed neighbors
and the Bitici’s children, who were not at home at the time of the incident.
Signs of violence were evident in the apartment: a pool of blood in the
hallway and a blood-stained blanket with which the attackers apparently
tried to stifle Mrs Bitici’s cries, and blood on the walls, curtains, floor,
furniture, pillow and blanket in the room in which Husnija Bitici was
beaten.  A blood-smeared length of plastic rope lay near the radiator.
After the attackers left, Mrs Bitici managed to open the door of her
apartment and call for help. Neighbors say she told them someone rang the
bell and, when she asked who it was, heard the reply, “Your neighbor,
 Vlada.”  She opened the door and was immediately assaulted in the hallway.
The Bitici children say the neighbors found their father tied to the
radiator.
	Natasa Kandic, Executive Director of the Humanitarian Law Center, who was
at the Bitici apartment shortly after the incident and spoke with doctors
treating Mr Bitici, says there are indications that the attackers were
carrying out threats made by some Kosovo Serb lawyers who are defending
ethnic Albanians before courts in Serbia.  Several lawyers phoned Husnija
Bitici and told him to stop advising families of accused Kosovo Albanian not
to hire lawyers who promised to obtain the release of their relatives for a
sum of 15,000 German marks.
	Husnija Bitici is defense counsel of two Albanian students who are on trial
before the Belgrade District Court.  The trial was scheduled to resume on 18
March but has been postponed until 30 March this year.

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

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Opposition activist appears on Yugoslav libel charges

March 13, 2000

BELGRADE, March 13 (AFP) - A Serbian dissident facing libel charges accused
the regime of President Slobodan Milosevic of intimidating political
dissidents when his trial opened Monday.
     Cedomir Jovanovic, a senior official in the opposition Democratic Party
(DS), is being sued by deputy information minister Radmila Visic for
publishing "lies" about her and her son in a leaflet distributed at
anti-government demonstrations.
     Jovanovic rejected the charges when the trial opened in a Belgrade
municipal court, saying he was not responsible for the leaflet's content as
he was merely in charge of the printing process.
     The trial, which was adjourned until April 20, was "part of the
continuing pressure" being exerted by the Milosevic regime against its
political opponents, Jovanovic told the court.
     If found guilty, he could face up to three years imprisonment.
     During the 1999 protests organised by the opposition Alliance for
Change, Serb dissidents published a daily leaflet entitled "Promene"
(Changes).
     The court heard Jovanovic was responsible for the producing the
leaflet.
     Last October, the leaflet published an article claiming Visic's son
Nebojsa, who works as a pilot in the United States, had "sold Serbia's
secrets, given to him by his mother, to NATO," during the 78-day war in
Kosovo.
     The leaflet also published a headline claiming Visic's son "navigated
(NATO) aircraft on Serbia."
     Visic is a senior official of the Yugoslav Left (JUL) party headed by
Milosevic's influential wife Mira Markovic.
     Jovanovic is the first opposition activist to be tried following a
number of libel charges filed by Serbian government officials at the time of
the anti-regime protests last year.
     The head of the opposition party New Democracy (ND), Dusan Mihajlovic,
was to appear in court on March 7 for "propagation of false information"
about Milosevic, but the trial was postponed.

Story from AFP  Copyright 2000 by Agence France-Presse (via ClariNet)
http://www.clari.net/hot/wed/bl/Qyugo-opposition-trial.Rmvl_AMD.html

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IWPR'S BALKAN CRISIS REPORT
Milosevic Crushes Opponents

March 10, 2000

The opposition and the independent media in Serbia fall victim to
state-sponsored repression.

By Vlado Mares in Belgrade

Earlier this month independent TV station Studio B broadcast footage of a
young democracy activist being beaten up by five youths. The vehicle the
attackers used was shown parked outside the Serbian Interior Ministry. The
official response was swift and brutal.
     A few days later, police broke into Studio B's offices, beat up two
employees and damaged broadcasting equipment belonging to the channel and
the popular radio station, B2-92. Studio B lost hundreds of thousands of
viewers while B2-92 was temporarily taken off the air as a result of the
action.
     It is the latest of a series of attacks on opposition controlled Studio
B. So far this year, the station has been fined for various offences under a
draconian information law and broadcasting equipment at its Mount Kosmaj
transmitter has been stolen.
     Another medium to face official wrath this month is the biggest-selling
Belgrade daily, Vecernje Novosti. Having backed the regime for years, it
became popular in recent months by opening up its editorial pages to
opinions critical of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic.
     This changed on March 3 when the paper was taken over and a new
editor-in-chief from Milosevic's Socialist Party of Serbia, Dusan Cukic,
appointed. Cukic, who is banned from travelling to European Union countries,
immediately brought Vecernje back in line. It now resembles any other regime
newspaper.
     Not a day seems to pass without the regime closing down a broadcaster.
On March 9, a radio and television station in Cuprija was shut and the day
before Radio Boom in Pozarevac was taken off the air.
     Regime critics feel the authorities' strong-arm actions against Studio
B and Vecernje Novosti reflect increasing nervousness in Milosevic's inner
cabinet.
     The crackdown coincides with plans by opposition parties to stage
anti-government demonstrations. With unrest in southern Serbia and possible
conflict in Montenegro, the last thing the regime wants is opposition
activism.
     In response to the opposition's plans, the authorities are making
contingency plans. Sources close to the police say that a 1,500-strong team
of militant government supporters, some linked to Belgrade's criminal
underworld, has been formed, tasked with disrupting and crushing possible
pro-democracy demonstrations.
     Similar groups of regime loyalists have in the past broken into the
offices of independent media and threatened journalists. Indeed, on one
occasion last year, an inebriated Marko Milosevic, the son of the Yugoslav
president, responded to newspaper criticism of his parents by breaking into
the offices of the Belgrade daily Glas Javnosti and, according to
eyewitnesses, threatening journalists with a gun.
     Perhaps the extent of the regime's present nervousness is best
illustrated by an incident this week in which police entered a Belgrade
secondary school to detain a pupil who had participated in a press
conference announcing forthcoming student protests.
     It followed concerted action against students belonging to the
pro-democracy movement, Otpor ("Resistance"). Otpor sources say some 200
members have been detained in recent months, spending a total of about 8,000
hours in prison.
     In an incident this week, Marko Milosevic is said to have forced an
activist into his car and taken him to his night-club, where he was severely
beaten threatened with a gun.
     Over the past two weeks, several officials and activists from the
opposition Serbian Renewal Movement in Belgrade have been detained for
questioning. And the number of break-ins at the homes of city officials has
risen dramatically in recent months. Curiously none of the burglars have
been apprehended.
     In Novi Sad, the capital of the northern Serbian province of Vojvodina,
66 opposition activists belonging to the League of the Social Democrats of
Vojvodina were arrested while putting up the posters in the town protesting
against the visit of Serbian Prime Minister Mirko Marjanovic.
     On the same day, three journalists and photographers with the Beta news
agency, the Belgrade daily Blic and Radio Free Europe were beaten up by
government supporters bussed in from nearby villages.
     Hostility towards the independent media has increased since the
official media reported on February 27 a statement from the Serbian
Information Ministry alleging on-going media aggression against Serbia by
the United States and its Western European allies.
     The stations Radio Free Europe, Voice of America, BBC and Deutsche
Welle, as well as several independent media outlets in Belgrade were
labelled "psychological-propaganda services" of the United States and its
allies.
     While this kind of attack is not new, political analysts in Belgrade
fear that it may herald further violence against dissidents and that, under
the pretext of a struggle against international enemies and NATO, Serbs will
shortly be faced with a fully fledged dictatorship.

Vlado Mares is a regular IWPR contributor from Belgrade.
IWPR Report, No. 123

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

WOMEN IN BLACK
Wars start in the spring, about mobilization, and threats of war

	“This spring we must have time to see the cherries trees and lime trees
blossom, if we do not than it is the end because we must not allow the
killings and shooting to go on, not here and not in Montenegro. The hands
must be put down and the hollowing reduced to a normal level…” writes these
days Borka Pavicevic, theatre director, coordinator of the Center for
Cultural Decontamination/Denazification a haven  for all of us, who are  the
Others, who are different in this city, a place where we can find a space
for diversity all these years.  These moving words have been written by
Borka an antiwar activist and  we share her feelings. Every spring, an even
more moving badge comes to my mind – the one, our radio B92 launched way
back in 1992 “It is spring and I live in Serbia… (now after it was overtaken
by the regime the radio is called
B2/92)”
	Words similar to Borka’s are being said these days by women all over
Serbia, the other Serbia. For the last ten days, they call us more than they
usually do repeating over and over again “We can not go on… I will not allow
them to take my son, my husband away…” Yesterday an activist from Leskovac
(southern  Serbia) told me; “I tore up the draft call that the postman
brought for my husband…” and another women from another city in Serbia said
“I did not want to accept the draft call, let my son go to jail, let him go
to ten years of jail,  I will not allow him you go to the front…”
	Each spring the fear rises. As it was the case in Troy, as Kasandra spoke
through the mouth of Krita Wolf: “With the beginning of spring, war broke
out…” These last  years, we have been living in constant expectations of
immanent war and the periods of “peace” or post peace are so short that they
are always transformed into preparations for a new war. We have learned to
recognize the signs and words of war, we have been listening to them and
experiencing them for too long a time.
	But we dare not voice the word war: “We are afraid every spring…”

SIGNS OF WAR EVERYWHERE: Spring is the time of year when war breaks out on
the Balkans.  Mobilization is taking place. People talk about it, the
newspapers write about it.
	As it did last spring, the mobilization started in southeastern Serbia
(“the south tracks). It is the region which borders with  Kosovo and KFOR.
In the center of the region, in Nish which is a city where the opposition is
in power, people have been talking for ten days “mobilization is taking
place.   The civil postmen bring them, not the military or police ones. The
draft call need not be signed. A man from Nish said: “Some of the postmen
told me: ”Either you accept the (the draft calls) or I will throw them into
your postbox or I will nail them to your door”.
	The same thing happened in the previous wars: “The draft calls were usually
first brought by the civilian postman, then by the military ones (military
police). At the end the police come to take you to war”, says a young man
from Nish. The mobilization has again started in Leskovac and the whole
Jablanicka county. Last spring, 4000 men were taken from this region and
sent to the war in Kosovo. When I was in Leskovac, in the last days of
February, people spoke about thousands of draft calls, even of 17 000 draft
calls which will be sent out in the next period.
	Some of the men who were forcefully mobilized last spring keep repeating:
“I will not go to another war or another front, even if the penalty is
 death” At the very north of the country in Subotica the draft calls are
also being sent out. Th party SPO (Serbian Revival Movement) commented; “We
pose the question in whose name and for what cause is this being done? Is
someone again preparing a new war? We demand that the Military Headquarters
of the Yugoslav Army explains to the people why this mobilizations taking
place?”
	The situation is similar in other parts of Serbia, of different intensity
and it seems that it depends on the military area you belong to.  It seems
now that most draft calls are being sent in the area of the Third Army, as
was the case last spring. The tension in Montenegro started in February when
a small number of deserters were arrested. (It is known the Montenegrin
Parliament passed the amnesty law in November 1999). While I was in
Podgorica, at the beginning of February, many people said that more
extensive arrests of Montenegrin deserters would provoke serious conflicts
between the Yugoslav Army and the Montenegrin police. For the time being,
the army is keeping the tension at a medium intensity level, but the tension
is present everywhere. Judging by what the people say and what the
newspapers write,  it seems that the mobilization is not taking place there.
The army is obviously aware that there would not be any response, that for a
long time now the young people from Montenegro  would not dream of proving
their patriotism in such a way; deserting from the Army of Yugoslavia in
Montenegro is socially acceptable and such acts are supported by all, except
by pro Serbian patriotic parties.

“REGULAR ARMY MANEUVERS” As in all the previous years (naturally up to the
military intervention by NATO) the regime in Serbia claimed that “Serbia was
not in war”, the military authorities always called mobilization “regular
military activities and drills”. The military sources claim “that
mobilization is not taking place, but just the usual peace-time calls for
military maneuvers are being sent to just a small number of men in the
regular formations of the Yugoslav army for the exercise drills”. Of course
such cynicism provokes contempt in people.
	Military sources are specially angry at the civil (opposition) authorities
in Nish for publicly warning that   mobilizations is taking place. One
officer of the Yugoslav army from the 3rd Army who wanted to remain
anonymous, explained the situation to the daily newspaper Danas (1. 03.
2000) “If mobilization was taking place or a state of emergency was
proclaimed , people would be walking around Nish in camouflage uniforms and
with pistols. The person who sees in the mobilization of one man as the
mobilization of a hundred probably has a guilty conscience. The Yugoslav
Army is not responsible for those who are afraid, but some other
professional institutions are”. Probably people who are experts in
patriotism, since at the Congress of the ruling party SPS, held in February
2000, the division of people in this country into two categories was
promoted : the patriots and the traitors. The later, whose numbers are
increasing,  are threatened by sanctions and penalties. General V.
Lazarevic, the commander of the 3rd Army warned on the 3rd of March 2000
that “ the 3rd Army will take legal action against all those who spread lies
and provoke anxiety in the people. Action will be taken against individuals,
newspapers and journalists who spread such information. No mobilization is
taking place”.
	As it did last spring, the military authorities claim that the army will
take the “March class of soldiers, draftees” and thinks it will thus cover
up the mobilization.
	Voices of resistance are rising against one more mobilization. Nenad Canak,
the president of the Social-Democrat League, well know since 91 for his
antiwar and anti nationalistic stands and actions, encouraged many young men
with his statements. On the 2nd March 200, he called on the draftees not to
report for mobilization.  “When I say this, it turns out that I do not want
to obey the laws of this country. However, I call upon the citizens not to
obey Milosevic’s laws. Simply, there  are laws which can not be obeyed. The
Yugoslav army did not defend anybody. There are only corrupt generals. When
I say this I do not have in mind all those poor young men whose duty it is
to go to the army”. In the beginning of March, in one day during a protest
actions in Novi Sad 60 activists of the Social-Democrat League have been
detained by the police.
	At one of the meetings of the democratic opposition held in Belgrade at the
beginning of March an encouraging message was heard (and it was surprising,
coming from an ineffective opposition in Serbia): “We do not want rifles we
want elections; we want common sense.

24TH  OF MARCH IS APPROACHING: Will there be another military intervention?
Will we be bombed again? When will we be bombed? Maybe we will not be
bombed. These are the questions people ask themselves and others, comfort
themselves and others.
	People are just waiting for this month of March to pass and the anniversary
of the bombing, the 24th of March to pass. This regime has a pathological
affinity to provoking conflicts so it can just stay in power. There have
been so may incidents in a short time, there is such a production of events
that it is difficult to absorb them all. The unsolved murder of a well known
public figure and high government official  (Pavle Bulatovic, Minister of
Defense, killed in February); permanent arrests and beating up of students
from the movement “Resistance”; threats and beating up of journalists; the
continuos financial penalizing “of the disobedient “ daily newspapers and TV
stations; the threats and harassment of independent electronic media; the
appearance of new “pirate” media; the satanization of the opposition, the
constant talk of the immanent return of the “Serbian rule over Kosovo”; the
closing down of the air space and airports from time to time and the cut off
of all trade with Montenegro; the allocation of military and police forces
in the south of Serbia., which is the region we have been very active in
since last summer and have made many connection with the people there.
	Twenty days ago, when the production of events had a lower intensity, and
we were in Novi Pazar where we held a workshop on ulticulturalism and
inter-cultural cooperation, we “decided” (the Women in Black from Belgrade
and  the women from Sandjak the south of Serbia) that our pacifist song be
an old folk song from Vranje  “What I would like to do” in which the young
man is wooing Bozana with the words  of the song  “to sing and riffles to
throw away…” We wanted to show that in the past of the Balkans there were
traces of women’s solidarity with the others, who were different, in this
case with men who did not want to go to war…. I keep thing about that
melodious, folk song which the nationalist did not contaminate because the
words do not fit into their policy of hatred towards the others.
	So there are more threats, more fears hat the answer to violence could be
even greater violence. “For all of us in the Balkans that would be a
terrible tragedy. For the western allies that would be just one more
interference in a regional conflict. So it is much better to prevent the
conflicts than to later deal with the consequences” says an anti war
activist from Podgorica, Srdjan Darmanovic. We the anti war activist know
the feeling very well, we are tired of healing the wounds of war and are
eager to work on the prevention of war and not its consequences.

(The material used was taken from : the daily newspaper “Danas”, weekly
“Vreme” from Belgrade, “Vijesti from Podgorica, the statements of people,
activists).

Stasa Zajovic (Women in Black)

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

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Serbian journalist jailed during NATO bombing released

March 17, 2000

ZAJECAR, Yugoslavia, March 17 (AFP) - A Serbian journalist jailed for a year
for "spreading false information" during last year's NATO bombing campaign
against Yugoslavia was released from prison Friday.
     The release of Nebojsa Ristic, editor-in-chief of the opposition-run TV
Soko in the southern Serbian town of Sokobanja, came 26 days before the end
of his one-year sentence.
     Ristic was sentenced for putting up placards saying: "Free press made
in Serbia" and "Resistance" in the TV studio, accompanied by anti-regime
insignia, which was judged to be a criminal act in a time of war.
     On his release Ristic said he "was treated as a prisoner, not as a
traitor" and insisted he would go back to work.
     His release coincides with a government clampdown on media outlets
which fail to follow the official line, focusing on television and radio
stations controlled by political rivals.
     Most of the media hit by the regime's latest clampdown are run by the
opposition-led local authorities, who won control of more than 20 towns
throughout Serbia in 1996 local elections.

Story from AFP  Copyright 2000 by Agence France-Presse (via ClariNet)
http://www.clari.net/hot/wed/ck/Qyugo-media-release.R66r_AMH.html

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

ARTICLE 19
"Closedown Of Independent Serb Media Is A Warning", Says Rights Group

March 16, 2000

ARTICLE 19 today alerted international figures and bodies to the need for
immediate diplomatic action to prevent further attacks on the independent
media in Serbia by the authorities in Belgrade. A catalogue of actions
carried out by the authorities which ARTICLE 19 has provided to the world
leaders includes, in the last fortnight alone, the enforced closure of at
least six independent broadcasters, levying of prohibitive on many media
outlets, and the annexing by the government press of a well-respected
national daily newspaper.

Andrew Puddephatt, Executive Director of ARTICLE 19 said:

“We are convinced that this is a warning signal - that once the
non-government media in Serbia has been silenced the government will take
the opportunity to tackle other pro-democratic forces. This is particularly
relevant since local elections could be held as soon as May.”
	"There is also a possibility that the crackdown is preparing the ground for
action by Serbia across the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, which would have
serious implications for democratic gains in Montenegro," he added.”
	The escalation in closure or expropriation of independent media is a clear
warning sign of the Serbian government's determination to remove any
remaining dissenting voices and witnesses. In the past decade, the Yugoslav
authorities have consistently used and manipulated the media, including that
funded out of the public purse, to obtain support or tolerance for policies
which range from those undermining public order to direct incitement.
	Over the last two years, ARTICLE 19 has issued alerts of this nature on the
same grounds and been proved right, notably when we raised the alarm early
in 1998 about the Serbian government's suppression of the Kosovan
independent media - an action which allowed the escalation of human rights
abuses in Kosovo to go unchallenged for some time.

ENDS

For further information contact Fiona Harrison on +44 20 7278 9292

	a.. Letters have been sent to OSCE Representative on the Media Freimut
Duve, US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, UK Foreign Secretary Robin
Cook, Greek President Constantinos Stephanopoulos, Russian Acting President
Vladimir Putin, UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression and Opinion
Abid Hussain and EU High Commissioner for Foreign and Security Policy Javier
Solana.
	b.. An example of actions already targeting a wider sphere than the media
is the recent summons issued to Democratic Party official Cedomir Jovanovic
on charges which carry a possible prison sentence of three years.
	c.. See Forging War, by Mark Thompson (ARTICLE 19/University of Luton
Press, 1999).

Reply to:
Ilana Cravitz <ilana at article19.org>
Communications Officer

ARTICLE 19, The International Centre Against Censorship
33 Islington High St. London N1 9LH, UK
Website: www.article19.org
Direct line: +44 20 7713 1355
Switchboard: +44 20 7278 9292
Fax: +44 20 7713 1356

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

Additional updates of the Kosovar political prisoners, including those
sentenced, missing and released, may be found at:
http://www.khao.org/appkosova/appkosova-database.htm
http://www.khao.org/appkosova/appkosova-report0037.htm
http://www.khao.org/appkosova/appkosova-report0038.htm
http://www.khao.org/appkosova/appkosova-report0041.htm

Very useful statistics and update from ICRC on missing persons from Kosova
can be found at:
http://www.reliefweb.int/w/rwb.nsf/480fa8736b88bbc3c12564f6004c8ad5/60c532db
df49f6878525688f006f80d4?OpenDocument

Archives of the A-PAL Newsletters may be found at:
http://www.khao.org/appkosova.htm

Albanian Prisoner Advocacy List -- Prisoner Pals Newsletter, No. 015