[From nobody Fri Sep 28 16:27:28 2007 Return-Path: <a-pal-admin@alb-net.com> Received: from rly-xd04.mx.aol.com (rly-xd04.mail.aol.com [172.20.105.169]) by air-xd03.mail.aol.com (v77_r1.36) with ESMTP; Tue, 22 May 2001 00:40:18 -0400 Received: from alb-net.com (alb-net.com [199.173.50.4]) by rly-xd04.mx.aol.com (v77_r1.36) with ESMTP; Tue, 22 May 2001 00:39:50 2000 Received: from alb-net.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by alb-net.com (8.11.3/8.11.3) with ESMTP id f4M4atA10979; Tue, 22 May 2001 00:36:55 -0400 (EDT) Received: from smtp-server.maine.rr.com ([204.210.65.66]) by alb-net.com (8.11.3/8.11.3) with ESMTP id f4LNxqA06504 for <a-pal@alb-net.com>; Mon, 21 May 2001 19:59:52 -0400 (EDT) Received: from [66.30.16.78] (ptldme-cmt3-c3-66-30-16-78.maine.rr.com [66.30.16.78]) by smtp-server.maine.rr.com (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8FF843C7F7 for <a-pal@alb-net.com>; Mon, 21 May 2001 20:04:56 -0400 (EDT) Mime-Version: 1.0 Message-Id: <v04220800b72f5a95aa62@[66.30.16.78]> To: a-pal@alb-net.com From: Alice Mead <amead@mail.maine.rr.com> Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="============_-1221633346==_ma============" Subject: [A-PAL] newsletter Sender: a-pal-admin@alb-net.com Errors-To: a-pal-admin@alb-net.com X-BeenThere: a-pal@alb-net.com X-Mailman-Version: 2.0.5 Precedence: bulk List-Help: <mailto:a-pal-request@alb-net.com?subject=help> List-Post: <mailto:a-pal@alb-net.com> List-Subscribe: <http://www.alb-net.com/mailman/listinfo/a-pal>, <mailto:a-pal-request@alb-net.com?subject=subscribe> List-Id: Albanian Prisoner Advocacy List -- Prisoner Pals <a-pal.alb-net.com> List-Unsubscribe: <http://www.alb-net.com/mailman/listinfo/a-pal>, <mailto:a-pal-request@alb-net.com?subject=unsubscribe> List-Archive: <http://www.alb-net.com/pipermail/a-pal/> Date: Mon, 21 May 2001 19:52:28 -0400 X-Mailer: Unknown (No Version) --============_-1221633346==_ma============ Content-Type: text/enriched; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable <fontfamily><param>Geneva</param><bigger><bigger> A-PAL NEWSLETTER-ALBANIAN PRISONER ADVOCACY MAY 21, 2001 =20 <bold>2ND ANNIVERSARY OF THE DUBRAVA MASSACRE=20 </bold> Two years later: The lack of justice surrounding this horrifying incident is an international disgrace.=20 In remembrance of the Dubrava massacre at Istok, Kosova which took place on May 22 and May 23, 1999, we remind readers everywhere of the terrible suffering these prisoners endured. The ICTY investigation report has not yet been released. The Association of Political Prisoners in Prishtina and the Peja group of Dubrava prison survivors are staging demonstrations in Istok and Prishtina this week, demanding the release of the remaining 139 Albanians still in Serb prisons. Until some form of true justice for this horrible war crime takes place, the survivors cannot forget what happened. Listed below: <bold>The Albanian prisoners, falsely tried and falsely accused of terrorism, are still being guarded by some of the same men who tried to slaughter them at Dubrava.</bold> I have visited 70 Dubrava survivors staging a week long hunger strike in front of the prison last fall. I also visited the mass grave nearby where investigators had left behind a disgraceful mess of blankets, shoes, pants, and upturned soil. The report on Dubrava done by Human Rights Watch should be published in two months, according to Fred Abraham. "In a nearby village named Rakos, the war crimes tribunal has reportedly found 97 bodies in a mass grave, thought to be the bodies of inmates from the prison. Investigators from the tribunal at The Hague have exhumed the site, and they have also investigated what happened at the prison. But they have not yet released any public findings." (NY Times article included below) <bold><underline>DUBRAVA MASSACRE SURVIVORS STILL IN SERB PRISONS </underline></bold>Bedri Kukalaj-age 23. Shot in the jaw and eye. Belgrade Central Prison. Starving, unable to eat. Sentenced to 10 years. Request for humanitarian release ignored. Nait Hasani-age 36. Wounded in the chest. Belgrade Central Prison. Xhavit Kolgeci-age 27. Nish Prison. Sentenced to 11 years. Milazim Kolgeci-age 40. Nis prison. Sentenced to 12 years. Aslan Lumi-age 48. Nish Prison. Sentenced to 12 years. Besim Rama- age 36. Nish Prison. Sentenced to Nish Prison. Ismet Berbati-age 36. Nish Prison.=20 Besim Zymberi-age 33. Belgrade Prison. Sentenced to 14 years. Very poor health. Request for humanitarian release ignored. Agim Recica-age 38. Belgrade Prison. Sentenced to 13 years. Ejup Salihu-age 27. Belgrade Prison. Sentenced to 5 years. Luan Mazreku-age 23. Nish Prison. Sentenced to 20 years without evidence. Case is up for appeal. Bekim Mazreku-age 23. Nish Prison. Sentenced to 20 years. Case up for appeal. Idriz Asllani-age 48.=20 Dubrava Prisoner-Disappeared May 16, 1999-Professor Ukshin Hoti **************************************************************** November 8, 1999 <bold>Stench of Horror Lingers in a Prison in Kosovo By CARLOTTA GALL-New York Times </bold>DUBRAVA, Kosovo -- The high, red brick walls of Dubrava prison tell little. Like the modern police buildings outside, they bear signs of bomb damage from NATO attacks in May this year, but that is only half the story.=20 Just inside the prison walls there are piles of abandoned clothes, drenched by months of rain but still giving off a stench of human corpses. The smell pervades the prison buildings inside, a reminder of the horror that gripped the prison for five days in late spring, when NATO bombing and the Serbian rampage against Kosovo's Albanians combined to turn this prison into what a former prisoner and Spanish peacekeepers who now guard the buildings depict as a site of murderous mayhem. Naser Husaj, a former public prosecutor from the nearby town of Pec and at the time one of Kosovo's most prominent political prisoners, was in Dubrava prison in May. Returning to the prison for the first time since his release a month ago, he described a terrifying ordeal in which prisoners were trapped first by NATO bombing, which killed at least 23 prisoners, and then by masked Serbian police forces, who killed more than 100 other Albanian inmates in running battles raging through the prison for two days. "They were taking advantage of NATO's action," he said of the Serbian guards. "They wanted to kill us all." The blood and smell of death remain, nearly six months later. Bedding and clothes are strewn all over the extensive grounds where prisoners dragged them out to sleep outside in an attempt to avoid the NATO air strikes. And in the basements of the buildings, the blood lies still sticky on the floor, bullet holes scar the walls, and impact marks of grenade explosions crater the floors. Husaj, founder of the Kosovo Albanian nationalist party Balli Kombetar, was serving a five-year sentence imposed by the Serbian authorities, for heading what they branded a "fascist quisling" organization. He spent three years in Dubrava from 1995 to 1998, then a year in a Serbian prison, before being brought back to Kosovo during the NATO air campaign. Released at the end of his sentence last month, he returned this weekend to the prison for the first time and told his story. "The first attack started on May 19," he said of the NATO bombing. "They hit pavilion C, a cell block, and three people were killed. On May 20 there was no bombing, and then on the May 21 at 8 a.m. we heard a plane. The guards ran away, and we ran out into the middle of the grounds. They were hitting blocks all day." He said all the guards had left the compound, including the watchtowers, though some remained outside and kept strict security around the prison. Some prisoners who were already out of their cells for regular cleaning or cooking duties then freed other prisoners from their cells. Some 20 people were killed that day, he said, pointing out a bomb crater that still stank of human flesh where several people had been killed. They carried the bodies up to the far end of the grounds and laid them out by the sports field. That night the entire prison population, some 900 men, slept in the grass up by the sports fields, which is inside the prison compound. The next morning at 8 a.m. the guards returned to just the watchtowers, and ordered the prisoners to assemble in a long line in rows of four to prepare to be transferred to another prison. Husaj was standing at the back to one side with several fellow political prisoners when suddenly the guards opened fire. "They started to shoot with a machine gun at the prisoners," he said. "They threw grenades over the prison walls, and another machine gun was shooting from a hole in the wall," he added, pointing out the spot. "Seventy people died in that shooting." Husaj explained the shooting as Serbs using the NATO bombing as an opportunity to take revenge and exact punishment on the Albanians, and pass it off as a NATO atrocity. But it is not clear whether the guards had full control over the 900 prisoners who were now freed of their cells. The Spanish peacekeeping soldiers guarding the prison confirm Husaj's account. But the incident may have begun as a prison riot, they said, and it was clear from makeshift weapons found later that some of the inmates attempted to fight. "I turned and ran down the slope and into that building, block B," he said. "Who could escape just ran." But they were unable to leave the compound. Hundreds of prisoners fled into the buildings, hiding in basements and cells, and later bringing in the wounded. For the next 36 hours, anarchy reigned as masked policemen moved into the grounds, seeking out and attacking prisoners with automatic weapons and grenades. Prisoners barricaded themselves into rooms and basements, seizing wooden bars, metal pipes and pieces of glass as weapons. In the basement of the cultural center, under insulated heating pipes and industrial washing machines, the weapons still lay around: a spade, metal spikes, wooden bars and stretches of metal piping, wrapped with rags for a better grip. Pools of dried blood still stained the floor, amid discarded clothes. Two small round craters from a hand grenade pockmarked the cement floor. "We thought they wanted to kill us all," he said, describing the state of terror of most prisoners. Only a small percentage of the prisoners, from one block, were hardened criminals, he said; the rest were Albanians picked up for minor crimes or for political reasons. Some prisoners trying to escape were shot climbing the walls, he said. Others finished it for themselves. "That day four people went crazy and hanged themselves in their cells," he said.=20 Husaj himself was nearly killed when three masked policemen spotted him on the steps of the restaurant building. They fired a grenade, which hit the entrance wall. He stumbled bleeding down to the basement, where scores of others were sheltering, and slept that night in a tiny inner laundry room. The police stormed the building the next morning. "They came in masks, with grenades and machine guns," he recalled. "They attacked the building with rocket-propelled grenades and shot through the windows straight into the basement." The stench of death from the basement is still overpowering. The green linoleum floor is still sticky with blood, which has been smeared around in an attempt to clean it. Husaj moved quickly in the dark, showing a familiarity with the underground rooms. But even he gagged as he showed where he saw six people gunned down in one corridor. "Let's get out of here," he said, his face white and gaunt in the shadows. After that, the Serbs shouted that the prisoners, holed up in the basement, had five minutes to surrender or they would be killed. The prisoners then gave themselves up, walking out with their hands on their heads, and they were later transferred to Lipljan prison in central Kosovo. As they left the, police counted those missing. It came to 154, he said. Reliving his ordeal, Husaj said he was still not sure what was more terrifying, the fear of being trapped in the prison when it was being attacked by NATO planes, or the fear of Serbian police troops who chased him and tried to kill him. "We were afraid of both," he said. "The prison blocks were not so strong, and if NATO hit them they could kill 300 people at once. And then if NATO hit them, the guards might shoot us again." "The Serbs killed us like chickens," he went on. "They used the bombing as an excuse." There is also ample evidence that the Serbian guards killed a large number of inmates when they reasserted control. When they arrived in June, Spanish troops discovered one body in the prison, whom they nicknamed Frederico. He had been lying there at least a month, and his throat had been cut, they said. The basement where he had been found was where the prisoners had taken the wounded, Husaj said. In a nearby village named Rakos, the war crimes tribunal has reportedly found 97 bodies in a mass grave, thought to be the bodies of inmates from the prison. Investigators from the tribunal at The Hague have exhumed the site, and they have also investigated what happened at the prison. But they have not yet released any public findings.=20 "It was necessary to come here," Husaj said as he was leaving. "But you must not think too much about what happened, otherwise you go crazy." =20 Copyright 1999 The New York Times Company The Original Article may be found at: http://search.nytimes.com/search/daily/bin/fastweb?getdoc+site+iib-site+64+0= +wAAA+Kosovo </bigger></bigger></fontfamily> --============_-1221633346==_ma============-- ]