[ALBSA-Info] Serb Jailed for Role in Kosovo Massacres

[Iris Pilika]

Thursday June 14 5:10 PM ET
Serb Jailed for Role in Kosovo Massacres
By Beth Potter

PRISTINA, Yugoslavia (Reuters) - An international panel in Kosovo sentenced 
a Serb man accused of war crimes to 20 years in prison on Thursday for his 
role in the killing of more than 60 ethnic Albanians, a U.N. prosecutor 
said.

Cedomir Jovanovic, 61, an alleged member of a Serbian paramilitary group and 
in police uniform at the time, was convicted in connection with three 
separate incidents on March 25, 1999, said prosecutor Thomas Hickman.

A U.N. spokesman had previously said Jovanovic had been convicted of 
involvement in the killing of more than 90 people on that date -- a day 
after NATO (news - web sites) launched a bombing campaign to halt Belgrade's 
repression of Kosovo's Albanians.

According to Hickman, men in police uniform including Jovanovic came upon 26 
members of the Zhuniqi and Spahiu families trying to flee from the Kosovo 
village of Bela Crkva. He said all but a two-year-old boy had been killed, 
and that there was a witness to the massacre.

``In that group, there was a child who survived because he fell under his 
mother when she was shot. He was two years of age,'' Hickman told Reuters. 
In the second incident, an old man was killed, he said.

Later the same day, Jovanovic's group came upon a large number of people and 
killed 36 men after separating them from the women and children, Hickman 
said.

In the same trial, Andjelko Kolasinac, 50, a former local leader in the 
central Kosovo village of Orahovac, received a five-year sentence for a 
lesser charge involving getting rid of personal belongings left behind by 
families who were expelled to neighboring Albania, Hickman said.

The indictment originally named eight suspects, but six escaped from a jail 
in Kosovo last year.

The conviction is the first made by an international three-judge panel for 
war crimes in Kosovo. Both men can appeal.

NATO launched its 1999 bombing campaign to halt Belgrade's repression of 
Kosovo's Albanian majority. Albanians in the province have told reporters 
that many of the worst atrocities in the province came just after the 
bombing started.

Kosovo remains legally part of Yugoslavia, but is now a de facto 
international protectorate.



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