[kcc-news] Kosova: Fleeing civilians spoke of summary executions on the street (fwd)

[Mentor Cana]

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Summareis from Reuters and AP ...
_____________

Armed Serbs wearing black masks and white jumpsuits drove thousands of
ethnic Albanians out of their homes in the Kosova town of Srbica on
Saturday, local witnesses said.

A column of refugees stretched for miles through the hills of the central
Drenica region as men, women and children fled in freezing cold with only
the clothes on their backs, a Reuters news team in Lausa, just west of
Srbica, reported. 

Automatic weapons and machine-gun fire and detonations echoed from the
direction of Srbica. Fleeing civilians spoke of summary executions on the
street, but there was no independent confirmation of those reports.

Some of the new refugees fled on foot, some in private cars and most in
tractor-drawn wagons which shuttled back and forth between Lausa, the first
village west of Srbica, and Vojnik, a village some 10 km (six miles)
further west.

``They wore white uniforms with black masks. We didn't run away. They
forced us to leave. They came at 8.30 a.m. (0730 GMT). We were sitting in
our homes when they broke in and forced us to leave at gunpoint,'' said
Selim Dragaj, 37. ``They said to me you can take your shoes and go to
Albania. Albania is what you wanted and Albania is what you are going to
get.''

The Drenica area has been a bastion of separatist ethnic Albanian
guerrillas but they have been pushed back by Serbian security forces in a
recent offensive, and Saturday's withdrawal of international monitors from
Kosova may have been a key factor in the reported Serb assault on Srbica's
inhabitants. 

An AP reporter saw a Yugoslav convoy heading toward the fighting. About 30
tanks, armored vehicles and trucks with anti-aircraft guns were on the
move. Serbian security forces, backed by armor including tanks, blocked the
highway between Kosova's capital Pristina and Belgrade. Reporters were
halted by police about 10 km (six miles) north of Pristina. Tanks, armored
personnel carriers (APCs) and army troops were deployed on and near the
highway. Heavy small - arms fire tore through the air in the vicinity.

Serbian police in battle gear backed by tanks and APCs earlier blocked a
Reuters news team trying to drive north along the Glogovac-Srbica road from
the Komorane highway junction in central Kosova. The corridor was believed
to have been in guerrilla hands as recently as Friday. 

Civilians were seen fleeing shelling in the hills west of Srbica in
north-central Kosova as fighting intensified in a dangerous vacuum caused
by the withdrawal of international truce monitors.

Yugoslav federal army troops with armor were arrayed along the main highway
west of Pristina that runs through Komorane en route to Pec in the far west
of Kosova. The area between Luzane and Podujevo has seen regular clashes
between government troops and guerrillas since mid-December, when a
Yugoslav army armored brigade moved into the area in violation of a
cease-fire agreement.

A buildup of government troops in the region since then has led some
analysts to worry that a government offensive against suspected KLA
positions in the area is about to start.

Aid workers trying to go north to Belgrade from Pristina to leave the
country were blocked by Saturday's fighting.

Reuters reporters met some 30 ethnic Albanian refugees from the village of
Poklek, outside Glogovac, about 20 km (12 miles) west of Pristina. Mostly
women and children, they were trudging through the snow as shells exploded
in the distance.

The refugees said security forces began bombarding a nearby village at 7
a.m. (0600 GMT) Saturday from the Koretica area where the Serbs were known
to have armor and artillery.

``Only God knows how much we have suffered and we're still suffering now,''
said Sanije Hoxha , an elderly woman leaning wearily on a cane,. 



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