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To the International Community:

• Immediately deploy all the remaining 1,800 civilian police and 1,000 special police who have been authorized by the UnitedNations;
• Consider expanding the size of the international civilian police force;
• Make clear and repeated public statements that a multiethnic Kosovo in which the rights of all its inhabitants are respected isone of the principal objectives of both UNMIK and KFOR;
• Demand that the leadership of the Kosovo Liberation Army take all measures to deter attacks on Serbs and Roma, including cooperating fully with criminal investigations by international civilian police and KFOR;
• Instruct national KFOR contingents to ensure that its public order functions and the protection of minorities are carried out effectively in all KFOR sectors in Kosovo; and
• Provide international protection to ethnic minority groups forced to flee Kosovo for fear of persecution. In particular, put inplace measures to secure the protection of Serbs and Roma who flee to the neighboring provinces of Serbia and Montenegro;and ensure that those fleeing to neighboring countries or elsewhere in Western Europe have access to a full and fair asylumdetermination procedure and are treated humanely with full respect for their human rights.

To the NATO-led Kosovo Force:

• Improve and standardize complaint mechanisms and improve response times in security incidents involving public order;

• Ensure uniformity of response by all national contingents to security incidents;

• Investigate all murders, abductions, and "disappearances," until such time as the international civilian police force is fullydeployed;

• Fully cooperate with the international civilian police force in providing security and other public order functions as required;and

• Increase the frequency of patrols in areas with at-risk populations; where security conditions allow, use jeeps rather thanarmored personnel carriers and smaller teams for patrols.

• Where possible, emphasize protection in place rather than relocation;

• Produce timely and detailed public reports on abuses against minorities in the framework of the Ad Hoc Task Force onMinorities

Investigate KLA commanders and soldiers suspected of involvement in attacks on minorities and inform KFOR and UNMIKof the results of those investigations and the identities of those believed responsible for such attacks;

• Fully cooperate with criminal investigations and prosecutions by military and civilian police in cases of killings andabductions;
• Suspend from active duty personnel under investigation by KFOR and/or UNMIK for crimes against the civilian populationpending the conclusion of inquiries; and

• Meet with Serb and Roma leaders to work out strategies for the reconciliation of the Serb, Roma, and Albanian populationsof Kosovo, and publicly condemn all acts of violence or harassment targeting Serb and Roma civilians.

It is also important to note that the KLA has been linked to earlier abuses against Serbs, Roma, and Kosovar Albanians during 1998and during the first three months of 1999. Specifically, reports by the Humanitarian Law Center, the International Committee of theRed Cross, and Human Rights Watch's own research indicate that dozens of Serbs, and a smaller number of Roma and Albanians,were detained by the KLA between mid-1998 and March 1999.⁽²⁾ At least 130 Serbs went missing during this time and are presumeddead.

DISPLACEMENT

Although estimates vary, it appears that well over 164,000 Serbs have fled Kosovo since early June.⁽³⁾ Most have gone to Serbiaproper or Montenegro. In addition, there has been substantial displacement of Serbs within Kosovo. Most of the Serb populations inthe municipalities of Pec, Prizren, Urosevac, and Istok have fled their homes, as have large numbers from Pristina and the town ofGnjilane. In the town of Obilic, which had a pre-conflict Serb population of 5,000, only some 1,000 Serbs remain.

Serbs displaced inside Kosovo are mostly concentrated in Serb majority villages and towns such as Kosovo Polje, Dobratin(Lipljan/Liplan municipality), Gracanica (Pristina municipality), Velika Hoca (Orahovac/Rahovec municipality), and Gorazdevac(Pec/Peje municipality). Others have taken shelter in Serb areas of major towns, including approximately 3,000 in the northern partof the town of Orahovac, and several thousand in the section of Kosovo Mitrovica north of the Ibar river. Significant Serbpopulations remain in Kosovo Kamenica, Leposavic, and Zubin Potok municipalities. In addition, fewer than one hundred of the6,000 Serb refugees from Croatia settled in Kosovo remain, according to UNHCR, after two collective centers for such refugees wereburned.

No reliable estimates exist for the total number of Roma who have left Kosovo since early June, but there has clearly been significantdisplacement.⁽⁴⁾ The European Roma Rights Center (ERRC), which conducted fieldresearch in Kosovo in early July, has reported that none of the Roma communities it visited holds more than half of its pre-conflictRoma population. Between 150 and 200 Roma have abandoned the Pec-Klina-Istok area for Montenegro since the beginning of July. In Zac village (Istok/Istog municipality), 200 Roma have moved to the center of the village for safety. In mid-June, approximately4,000 Roma from villages around Pristina took shelter in a school in Kosovo Polje.⁽⁵⁾ As of mid-June, 350 Roma had taken shelter in a UNHCR camp near the cemetery in Djakovica (Djakova in Albanian) and some have requested evacuation, although another 1,000 Roma in the town wish to remain. Roma families have also been evacuated from Pec by international organizations.

Thefirst wave of fleeing Serbs and Roma, who left as KFOR entered Kosovo, appear to have left the province out of generalized fear rather than threats or intimidation. Many later evacuees, however, fled for more concrete reasons. N.K., a Roma man from Obilic, said he and his family abandoned their town on June 20 when Albanian civilians came to their house and told them to leave. Asdescribed below, KLA members are also alleged to have forced many Serbs to flee.

One important issue with regard to the outflow of both Serbs and Roma from Kosovo is that of their reception in Serbia proper. Already swamped with hundreds of thousands of refugees from Croatia and Bosnia, and in the midst of an economic crisis and theaftermath of the NATO bombing campaign, the Yugoslav government is ill-equipped to feed, clothe, and house an additional groupof displaced persons. There are reports that displaced Serbs from Kosovo have been prevented from entering the city of Belgrade,and some Kosovo Serbs have been returned to Kosovo by the Serbian authorities. The presence of Kosovo Serbs, many of whom feelbetrayed by the Serbian government, would also serve as a potent symbol of the government's failure in Kosovo.

Given societal hostility in the former Yugoslavia toward the Roma, their treatment in Serbia is likely to be even more problematic. The European Roma Rights Center claims, in particular, that Roma fleeing Kosovo have already been forcibly returned by Yugoslavauthorities.⁽⁶⁾ Human Rights Watch has received similar reports from Roma leaders in Kosovo Polje.

Moreover, the protection of minority groups who flee into neighboring countries, and elsewhere in Western Europe, can also not be guaranteed. In a worrying development, the Italian government announced on July 20 that it would treat anyone who entered thecountry from the former Yugoslavia without a visa as an illegal immigrant and would return them to their country of origin. Theannouncement came during a week in which 1,200 Roma from Kosovo reportedly entered Italy.⁽⁷⁾

KILLINGS

Numerous Serb civilians fleeing Kosovo during the initial days of KFOR's presence in the province expressed fears of being killed. "We're in a panic," one Serb said candidly as he readied his family to depart Prizren for Serbia. "Our defense forces are leaving, andwe'll be at the mercy of the KLA. I have two children; what can I do?"⁽⁸⁾

A rash of killings of Serbs since mid-June has shown that such fears are not unfounded. While some of those killed may have been implicated in abuses against ethnic Albanians during the armed conflict, many of the Serb victims were innocent civilians. Indeed, in many areas of Kosovo--the southern town of Prizren being a notable example--practically all military-age men have already fled. Those left behind are typically the oldest and most vulnerable members of the Serb community.

The most recent killings of Serb civilians took place on July 23 near the village of Gracko, in central Kosovo. Fourteen farmers wereshot dead as they harvested hay in the single biggest massacre since KFOR entered the province. The farmers were reportedly shot atclose range at about 9:30 p.m. As of this writing, it was unclear who was responsible for the attack. On July 25, the BBC reportedthat KFOR had promised to station peacekeepers in Gracko in response to requests for protection from villagers, but that thepeacekeepers had not been deployed in the village at the time of the killings, despite requests from the Serb population.

Another egregious example of ethnically-motivated violence in post-conflict Kosovo was the brutal murder of two elderly Serbresidents of Prizren on June 21. Marica Stamenkovic, seventy-seven years old, and Panta Filipovic, sixty-three years old, lived inneighboring homes on Markovic Svetozar Street, in what was until recently a majority Serb area of Prizren. Both victims had livedwith their spouses in Prizren for decades; Filipovic was born there. Having decided to stay in Prizren while other Serbs fled the city,the two victims and their spouses became the target of KLA harassment. Within days of KFOR's entry into Kosovo, uniformed KLAmembers began appearing at their homes demanding money and arms. While KFOR has found that some persons arrested in KLA uniform have proven to be criminals unaffiliated with the KLA, nothing indicates that these persons were not KLA members.

Filipovic's wife Maria, fifty-nine years old, told Human Rights Watch that two separate groups of armed and uniformed KLAmembers visited her house on June 15, writing down her and her husband's names and identification numbers, and telling the couplethat they would be permitted to remain in Prizren. A few days later, on June 18, a group of four men in KLA uniforms appeared andtold Panta Filipovic to hand over his arms. When Filipovic said he had no arms to give them, one of the men hit him in the stomachwith the butt of an automatic weapon.

That same week the Stamenkovic household was also visited three times by the KLA. On June 14, a single KLA soldier visited.According toTrifun Stamenkovic, the husband of Marica Stamenkovic, "He asked for arms and he threatened to kill me."⁽⁹⁾ Laterthat week other armed KLA members came by the house asking questions about the Stamenkovics' sons in Serbia and stealingmoney from the couple.

The murders occurred in the mid-morning of June 21. Both Marica Filipovic and Trifun Stamenkovic were out of the house whentheir respective spouses were killed; both had gone into town to shop. Trifun Stamenkovic, eighty-five, told Human Rights Watch:

Maria Filipovic and Trifun Stamenkovic abandoned their homes, taking refuge in a local theological seminary under the protection of German KFOR troops. When interviewed by Human Rights Watch three days after the killings,neither one had plans for the future.

Another set of killings took place on June 19 in the village of Belo Polje, near Pec. Visiting the village a day later, a Human RightsWatch researcher viewed the bodies ofthree ethnic Serb men, each of whom had been killed by a shot between the eyes at point-blank range.⁽¹¹⁾ The men were Radomir Stosic, fifty, his uncle Steven Stosic, sixty, and their forty-six-year-old friend Filip Kosic. Serb villagers who claimed to have witnessed the attack told Human Rights Watch that ten uniformed KLA soldiers entered thevillage and "executed" the three men at approximately 5:30 p.m. One man was killed in the street in front of the Stosic home;another was killed by the front door of the house, and the third was killed inside the house, on the second floor. A fourth Serb, MilcoStosic, Radomir's brother, was seriously injured in the attack. He was reportedly taken by helicopter to a hospital in Pristina, butHuman Rights Watch was unable to ascertain his condition. Local ethnic Albanian villagers interviewed by journalists claimed thatthe men had belonged to a paramilitary Serb gang that had burned Albanian homes in the area. Ethnic Serbs from Belo Polje deniedthe allegation, claiming that no paramilitaries lived in their village.

According to the Serbian Orthodox Church in Pec, approximately thirty Serbs were killed in the Pec municipality in the months ofJune and July, although the circumstances of their deaths are mostly unknown.⁽¹²⁾ Malica Miric, twenty-six, was allegedly killed bytwo men, one in KLA uniform, in Belo Polje on June 26. Milena Vujsevic was allegedly killed by unknown assailants in her Pechome on June 27. Human Rights Watch has not been able to confirm these allegations.

There have also been reported murders in the eastern part of Kosovo, where substantial numbers of Serbs remain. In the village ofPones in Gnjilane municipality, six cowherds were abducted by KLA soldiers on June 19, at around 8 a.m. According to one of the cowherds, the men were questioned and beaten (see section on abductions, below). Two of the cowherds, Momcilo Dimic (approximately sixty years old) and Cedomir Denic (approximately fifty years old) were later found dead. In the town of Kosovo Kamenica, thirty-year-old Nenad Arsic and fifty-year-old Milovoje Simic were killed on June 19. Relatives of the dead men toldHuman Rights Watch that the two were abducted at gunpoint and later murdered by KLA soldiers.⁽¹³⁾ The circumstances of Simic'sdeath may be more complicated than his relatives suggest, however. According to a KFOR officer familiar with the case, Simic wasinvolved in an ambush of KLA vehicles by armed Serb civilians in the town which left Simic and three KLA soldiers dead. Inaddition, a number of Albanians claim that Simic was a known paramilitary. KFOR officials in the town had no information aboutthe death of Arsic, however, and Human Rights Watch has no reason to dispute the version of events provided to its researcher by hiswidow.

Human Rights Watch has received additional reports of the murder of Serbs in Kosovo. Eight Serbs have been killed in the town ofObilic since early June, according to KFOR officers in the town. The most recent killing occurred on June 30. According to KFORofficers in the area who have investigated the incidents, the killings were organized attacks rather than spontaneous reactions byreturnees and KLA units were implicated in the killing. In Lipljan, a Serb male was decapitated in the middle of the town's busymarket on Monday, July 9, sometime between 11 a.m. and 3 p.m, according to KFOR military police in the town. As of July 16, nowitnesses had come forward. There are numerous reports of killings where it has been difficult to identify the perpetrators becauseso many Serbs have fled or are afraid and Albanians are unwilling to speak.⁽¹⁴⁾ Serb residents of Dobratin village told Human RightsWatch that Dragan Madenovic, a forty-year-old night watchman, was killed in the village of Donja Gusterica (Lipljan municipality)on June 23.⁽¹⁵⁾

There have been multiple killings of Serbs in Kosovo's capital, Pristina. On June 23, the body of Milenko Lekovic, a Serb professorfor the economics faculty, was found in the faculty's basement, along with the bodies of Miodrag Mladenovic, a Serb guard in thebuilding, and Jovica Stamenkovic, a Serb waiter from a cafe in the building. Lekovic and the other men had been shot and beatenwith a blunt instrument.⁽¹⁶⁾ Human Rights Watch has also received a report about the killing of four elderly men from the village ofSlivovo in Pristina municipality. According to their relatives, the four men, Zivion, Zivko, Trajan and Mita Simic, were reportedlyabducted and later killed sometime during the third week of June.

There are also reports that Roma have been murdered since early June. Relatives of thirty-four-year-old Bajram Berisha and twenty-four-year-old Vesel Berisha told Human Rights Watch that the two men were killed in Mitrovica in the third week of June byunknown assailants. Ibish Beqiri, sixty years old, was abducted by unknownassailants in the beginning of July, and his body was later discovered in Gramocel.⁽¹⁷⁾ The European Roma Rights Center reports thatthree Roma from the town of Djakovica are believed to have been killed in the town since early June.⁽¹⁸⁾ There are also unconfirmedreports about the murder of three families who were burned in their homes in the village of Dubrava (Istok/Istog municipality).

ABDUCTIONS, DETENTION AND ABUSE

1.The near-lynching of a Roma family in a refugee camp in northern Macedonia in early June is a clear example. Members of thefamily were reportedly suspected of complicity in abuses against Albanians in Kosovo.See "Pullout talks in trouble," BBC News,June 6, 1999.

2.Human Rights Watch,Humanitarian Law Violations in Kosovo (New York: Human Rights Watch, September 1998), pp.75-84.

3.On July 16, Reuters reported that some 75 percent of Kosovar Serbs--approximately 150,000 people--had fled the province. "Italian Troops Find 748 Bodies In Kosovo So Far," Reuters, July 16, 1999. On July 20, the UNHCR's Belgrade office reportedlyestimated that the number of Kosovar Serbs and Roma who had fled to Serbia and Montenegro had reached 169,824, while theYugoslav Red Cross estimated the number in Serbia at about 100,000. Beti Bilandzic, "UNHCR Warns of Critical Refugee Problemin Serbia," Reuters, July 20, 1999; see alsoChris Hedges, "Tardy Kosovo Rebels Force Extension of Arms Deadline,"New YorkTimes, July 23, 1999 (estimating that 80,000 of Kosovo's 200,000 Serb residents had left the province since June).

4.A recentNew York Times article gives a rough idea of the dramatic decrease in Roma numbers: it estimates that some 6,000 to7,000 Roma remain in Kosovo, compared to 1991 Yugoslav census numbers of 30,000 to 40,000 for the province. Carlotta Gall,"Kosovo War Over, Gypsies Are Left Amid Vengeful Neighbors,"New York Times, July 11, 1999.

5.On July 21, the center's remaining population of around 2,000 was transferred to a tented facility with better conditions fivekilometers away. Despite security guarantees from KFOR, many of the remaining Roma were reluctant to move to the new site,fearing its isolated location and reactions from surrounding Albanian villages.

6.European Roma Rights Center, "Press Statement: The Current Situation of Roma in Kosovo," July 9, 1999, p. 1.

7.Philip Willan, "Italy bars the refugee route for fleeing Kosovan Gypsies," Guardian, July 22, 1999.

8.Human Rights Watch interview, Prizren, June 14, 1999.

9.Human Rights Watch interview, Prizren, June 24, 1999.

10.Ibid.

11.After witnessing the funeral of the three Serbs in Belo Polje, Human Rights Watch accompanied a group of Italian KFOR soldiersto the village of Drenovac, about forty-five minutes' drive away, where two other Serb civilians were reportedly killed on June 18. The bodies of the two civilians, Bosana Javanovic, seventy-seven years old, and her son Vojslav Javanovic, forty years old, had beenfound by Bosana's other son. But when the KFOR troops arrived in Drenovac along with priests brought in to conduct funeralservices for the two, they discovered that the bodies had disappeared.

12.Human Rights Watch interview, Father Jovan, Pec Patriarchate, Pec, July 17, 1999.

13.Human Rights Watch interview, Biserka Arsic and Goran Simic, Kosovo Kamenica, June 29, 1999.

14.With some killings, such as the brutal slaughter of four middle-aged men found near the village of Bela Crkva in southernKosovo, even the ethnic identity of the victims may never be known. A Human Rights Watch researcher viewed the remains of thefour men on June 21, which, judging from the bodies' condition, was less than a week after they were killed. At that time, it was notknown whether the men were among the very last ethnic Albanians killed by departing Serb security forces, or whether they wereethnic Serbs. Local villagers said simply that they did not recognize the men, who had been executed at close range. If indeed thevictims were Serbs, it is likely that their bodies would never be identified, given the large-scale Serb exodus from southern Kosovoand the understandable reluctance of remaining Serbs to travel outside of protected areas.

15.Human Rights Watch interview, Dobratin residents, June 24, 1999.

16.David Rohde, "Three Serbs Found Slain at University in Pristina," New York Times, June 25, 1999.

17.Human Rights Watch interview, Djakovica, July 24, 1999.

18.European Roma Rights Center, "Press Statement: The Current Situation of Roma in Kosovo," July 9, 1999.

19."Kosovo peacekeepers find illegal jail, beaten prisoner," CNN, July 19, 1999.

20.Human Rights Watch interview, Prizren, June 14, 1999.

21.Human Rights Watch interview, Prizren, June 14, 1999.

22.Human Rights Watch interview, Prizren, June 23, 1999.

23.Human Rights Watch interview, Prizren, June 23, 1999.

24.Human Rights Watch interview, Prizren, June 24, 1999.

25.The group of detainees also included a number of ethnic Albanians whom the KLA reportedly suspected of collaboration in Serbabuses.These men had all been beaten, many severely.

26.Human Rights Watch interview, B.V., Pones village, June 29, 1999.

27.Human Rights Watch interview, Father Jovan, Pec Patriarchate, Pec, July 17, 1999.

28.Letter dated July 16, 1999 from the Women in Black, Belgrade (received via email).

29.Human Rights Watch has been given the names of six Roma men whose whereabouts are unknown as of July 20, 1999. Four arefrom the Duka family in Stanovic village in Vucitrn municipality and two are from the Busaku family in Pristina. The two Busakumen went missing on June 30, 1999. The European Roma Rights Center report "The Current Situation of Roma in Kosovo, July 9,1999," lists eight additional Roma men whose whereabouts were unknown as of July 6, 1999.

30.Human Rights Watch interview, H.G., Kosovo Polje, June 29, 1999.

31.Human Rights Watch interview, S.A., Djakovica, July, 24, 1999.

32.In order to protect his identity, the witness' real initials have not been used.

33.Human Rights Watch interview, F.F., Kosovo Polje, June 29, 1999.

34.European Roma Rights Center, "Press Statement: The Current Situation of Roma in Kosovo," July 9, 1999, p. 1.

35.In order to protect her identity, the witness' real initials have not been used.

36.Human Rights Watch interview, Ljubizda village, June 30, 1999.

37.Photographs of the destroyed church are available on the internet at: <http://www.decani.yunet.com/slovinje.html>.

38.Human Rights Watch interview, KFOR military police officer, Lipljan, July 16, 1999.

39.Human Rights Watch interview, Istok town, June 28, 1999.

40.Human Rights Watch interviews, Djakovica, July 24, 1999.

41.UNHCR Preliminary Assessment of the Situation of Ethnic Minorities on Kosovo, July 26, 1999.