| Feb 1989 |
Azem Vlasi, a popular ethnic Albanian and former Kosovar leader, was dismissed as a member of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia (LCY). Albanian zinc and lead miners, in the Kosovo city of Trepca, began protests demanding a reason for Vlasi's dismissal. The Kosovo League of Communists (LC) Presidium President, Rahman Morina negotiated a temporary truce. |
| Feb 1989 |
Protests resumed at the Trepca mines with over 1500 miners conducting sit-ins and hunger strikes. The demonstrators called for the resignation of Morina, who was seen as pro-Serb. |
| Feb 21, 1989 |
Strikes that began in the Trepca mines soon spread, and over 7000 ethnic-Albanian students from Pristina staged a sit-in protest at a sports stadium. The demonstrators were protesting the planned changes in the Serbian constitution and also were demanding the resignation of some Kosovo LC members whose allegiance was felt to be to Serbia. |
| Feb 27, 1989 |
Rahman Morina, along with the Kosovo LC party leader, and a Kosovo member of LCY central committee resigned their offices, resulting in the end of the Trepca miners' strikes. The need for "special measures" was announced by the federal Collective State Presidency to deal with the Kosovo unrest, and Federal Police reinforcements entered Kosovo to guard key installations. |
| Feb 28, 1989 |
In reaction to the unrest in Kosovo, an estimated 700,000 Serbian demonstrators massed outside the Federal Assembly Building to protest against Albanian separatist aspirations within Kosovo, and to call for a greater show of force in the province. |
| Mar 1, 1989 |
In an emergency Federal Assembly session, the Macedonian member of the Federal Assembly claimed to possess a "detailed plan" for an armed revolt in Kosovo. He claimed that ethnic Albanian denunciations of the LC of Kosovo leadership was being encouraged by the Albanian Intelligence Service, with the final aim of creating a Greater Albania. The Albanian Foreign Ministry denied the allegations. To further discourage the formation of demonstrations, federal authorities instituted movement restrictions and compulsory work orders for Kosovo's ethnic Albanian population. Demonstrators in Serbia blamed the popular Kosovar leader, Azem Vlasi, for fomenting the protests and strikes in Kosovo. The protests subsided when Serbian LC leader, Slobodan Milosevic, promised Vlasi's arrest for his support of the 1988 demonstrations. |
| Mar 2, 1989 |
Azem Vlasi was arrested along with alleged strike leaders. The resignations of Rahman Morina and other Kosovo leaders were also rejected by Kosovo's LC on the grounds that they were forced by the Trepca strikers and student protesters. |
| Mar 9, 1989 |
Miners in Kosovo began strikes despite the show of force by police and special troops. By the 19th, a total 25,000 miners were striking to protest Vlasi's arrest and increasing Serbian influence in the Province. Many strikers were jailed and arrested, and a school boycott was organized by ethnic Albanians to protest Serbian control over their curriculum. |
| Mar 23, 1989 |
The Kosovo Provincial Assembly (under Serbian influence) endorsed changes to the Serbian constitution, which would give Serbia central control over the internal affairs of Kosovo in the realms of defense, security, international relations, justice and planning. Following the announcement, multiple clashes between demonstrators and armed police were reported in Urosevac and Pristina. |
| Mar 27, 1989 |
To stem unrest and demonstrations, Serbian and Federal authorities instituted curfews within Kosovo. Gathering places such as universities, markets, and stadiums were temporarily closed to discourage assembly. The totals for the February and March demonstrations included 29 killed, 200 injured, and 254 arrested. On the 28th, the Serbian Republican Assembly ratified the Serbian constitutional changes giving Serbia greater control over Kosovo. |
| Apr 1989 |
Financial incentives were being offered for Serbs to settle in Kosovo in order to offset their emigration from the Province, which escalated to record heights beginning with the 1981 ethnic Albanian riots and demonstrations. |
| Jun 28, 1989 |
The 600th anniversary of The Battle of Kosovo was celebrated by over 1,000,000 Serbs who attended the proceedings held in Kosovo. Albanian Kosovars, and other Yugoslav non-Serbs, viewed the procession as an event displaying Pan-Serb nationalistic goals. |
| Oct 30, 1989 |
Demonstrations and rioting characterized Kosovo, (with 500 injured), as Azem Vlasi and 14 others were put on trial for alleged influential roles in the February-March strikes. |
| Nov 21, 1989 |
Albanian Presidium President, Ramiz Alia, denied any Albanian inclinations for a Greater Albania. He stressed the need for a positive atmosphere between the two countries, but defined the Kosovo situation as blatant discrimination against ethnic Albanians. |
| Jan 1990 |
Clashes between armed troops and unarmed ethnic-Albanian demonstrators were reported at the end of January. Protests continued in Glogovac and Stanovac with a total of 26 deaths, and 94 civilians injured. Serb police reinforcements were sent to the province (numbering 2000) to aid federal troops already stationed in Kosovo. |
| Mar 1990 |
On the 22nd, over 400 students and children were treated for displaying symptoms characterizing poisoning. The out-break was seen as a Serb plot to exterminate ethnic-Albanians, and fulfill nationalistic goals and desires. Serb officials called it "mass hysteria" and propaganda perpetrated by Albanian separatists. The out-break was followed by protests and assaults on Kosovar Serbs and Montenegrins by 4000 ethnic-Albanians. |
| Apr 3, 1990 |
The Chairman of the Kosovo Provincial Assembly, along with four other key members of the Kosovo provincial leadership, resigned their posts citing the overly aggressive treatment of Albanian protesters and demonstrators. |
| Apr 13, 1990 |
Fadjil Hodza, a former prominent state and federal official was arrested and charged with inciting and encouraging elements in the 1989 uprisings in Kosovo. |
| Apr 17, 1990 |
Serbian state President, Slobodan Milosevic declared that Serbia's own internal affairs secretariat had taken over the security duties of federal troops in Kosovo, thus altering Serbian influence in the former autonomous province to one of basically direct rule. Official figures also showed Serb emigration from Kosovo to be 2,188 during 1989. |
| Apr 18, 1990 |
"Special Measures" placed on Kosovo were declared lifted by the Federal Collective Presidency of Yugoslavia. |
| Apr 24, 1990 |
Azem Vlasi, former head of LC of Kosovo, along with 13 others charged with influencing 1988-89 demonstrations, were released after being acquitted of the charges levied against them in 1989. |
| Jun 1990 |
Ongoing strikes in Kosovo, and attacks on Serbs within the Province motivated the Serbian Assembly to declare a situation of "special circumstances" and temporarily dissolve the Kosovo Assembly on the 26th. The Serbian government overtook the affairs of Kosovo's Assembly, and began to take effective control over other provincial governing bodies. |
| Jul 2, 1990 |
A referendum was conducted to gauge the support for a new constitution for the Serbian Republic. Of the 86 percent turnout, authorities claimed 96.8 percent support for the constitution. One hundred and fourteen members of the dissolved Kosovar Assembly rejected the constitutional proposals, and declared Kosovo to be an independent republic within the Yugoslav federation. |
| Jul 5, 1990 |
The Serbian Assembly permanently dissolved the Kosovo Assembly, and permanently transferred the Province's political power to Serbia proper. Independent television, radio, and newspaper sources within Kosovo were shut down. The Serbian Communist Party changed its name to the Serbian Socialist Party, and on July 17th elected Slobodan Milosevic to be its president. The change in name lacked any substantive change in the hard-line Communist and authoritarian platform of the party. A new Serbian Constitution was approved by referendum in July. It abolished the autonomous status of the Kosovo and Vojvodina provinces and effectively reduced the role of provincial governing bodies to approving the policies emanating from the Serbian Presidency and Parliament. Other attributes of the Constitution were the creation of multi-party election system, and increases in the power of the President. |
| Aug 1990 |
On the 29th, a delegation from the United States headed by Senator Robert Dole met at Pristina with local leaders. Over 5,000 Albanians protested Serbian direct rule outside the delegation's hotel. The uprising was quelled by police units using tear gas, batons, and water cannons. |
| Sep 3, 1990 |
A general strike, with over 200,000 participants and a boycott of the school system were organized and encouraged by Albanian opposition parties and the Independent Trade Union of Kosovo. Demonstrators were protesting the dismissal of Albanians in the civil service and police, and the need for workers to sign pledges of loyalty to Serbia. The Serbian officials retaliated by not allowing strikers employed by state owned enterprises to return to work. |
| Sep 7, 1990 |
Albanian, Turkish, and Moslem members of the dissolved Kosovo Provincial Assembly met in a secret session, and on the 13th proclaimed a Constitution of the Republic of Kosovo. This move was met with arrests of some of the deputies involved. Serbian officials vehemently condemned the move for its illegality. |
| Sep 28, 1990 |
The new Serbian Constitution became effective. |
| Dec 1990 |
On the 9th and 23rd, elections held within Serbia gained the ruling Socialist Party 194 out of 250 seats in the Serbian Assembly. Slobodan Milosevic, also won with 65 percent of the vote. The Socialist Party of Serbia enjoyed the backing and support of the Serb dominated Yugoslav National Army. The elections did not allow for representatives of Albanians to run for elected office, and thus the ethnic-Albanian population of Kosovo effectively boycotted the elections. |
| Sep 10, 1991 |
Six thousand Albanian teachers were threatened with dismissal for their refusal to comply with the Serbian curriculum. Over 350,000 Albanian pupils were not allowed to re-enter school because of a lack of adherence to the Serbian set curriculum. |
| Sep 26, 1991 |
The dissolved Kosovo Assembly organized a referendum on sovereignty for the Province. Over 99 percent of the voters (87 percent of the electorate) approved sovereignty for the Serbian controlled province. The referendum was deemed illegal and unconstitutional by Serbian officials. |
| Oct 19, 1991 |
Kosovars proceeded to elect a provisional government headed by Bujar Bukoshi. The provisional government was recognized by Albania on the 22nd. |
| Apr 1992 |
On the 28th, Bujar Bukoshi traveled to Albania and met with the new Albanian President, Sali Berisha. The President of Albania stressed Kosovo's right to self determination. |
| May 24, 1992 |
New elections were held in Kosovo. The Democratic Alliance of Kosovo (DSK) gained most seats (96 percent) in the 130 member Kosovo Assembly. DSK leader Ibrahim Rugova was elected President of the Province. Serbian violence in the Province following the elections drew criticism and official protest from Albania. |
| Jun 1992 |
Serbian authorities surrounded the Kosovo Assembly building and arrested several deputies on the 26th, citing the illegality of the Assembly's operation. |
| Jul 1992 |
On the 21st, Serbian leaders rejected appeals for an international conference regarding the future of Kosovo. |
| Aug 1992 |
Yugoslav Prime Minister Milan Panic returned from a trip to Albania on the l0th. He announced that the state of emergency placed upon Kosovo would be lifted, and urged Kosovo leaders to begin a dialogue with Serbian officials. The appeals were rejected by Kosovar leaders who demanded that such meetings should be held under international auspices. |
| Sep 16, 1992 |
Ibrahim Rugova met with Lord Owen and Cyrus Vance in Geneva. Rugova reiterated the views of Kosovo leaders regarding the treatment of Kosovo as an independent republic within the Yugoslav Federation, and not a province of Serbia. |
| Oct 1992 |
Clashes occurred in the Kosovar capital of Pristina. Albanians demanding the re-opening of schools under a non-Serb curriculum clashed with armed police. |
| Oct 29, 1992 |
Talks engineered by FRY Prime Minister Milan Panic, aimed at monitoring human rights and lifting discriminatory laws within Kosovo, took place in Pristina with Serbian and Albanian participation. Cyrus Vance and Lord Owen attended the meetings, which resulted in the return of Albanian children to classes held in the Albanian language. |
| Mar 1993 |
Ethnic Albanians continued to be forced out of jobs controlled by State owned enterprises in the month of March. Serbian militia, led by Zeljko Raznjatovic, increased harassment of Kosovo Albanians in what was termed by Kosovar leaders to be "ethnic cleansing in the quiet". The results were alleged Albanian emigration from Kosovo reported to be up to 500,000. |
| May 1993 |
2 Serb policemen are killed in an ambush near the central Kosovo town of Glovac by unidentified attackers. |
| Jun 1993 |
Led by Adem Demaci, a prominent Albanian writer, a group of 20 writers and journalists staged a nine day hunger strike to protest Serbian censorship and control of Albanian publications. |
| Jul 1993 |
The Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, which had entered Kosovo to monitor the human rights situation, was forced to leave on the 28th. Yugoslav authorities refused to extend the organization's mandate, citing the exclusion of Yugoslavia from membership status. |
| Jul 1993 |
In 3 separate incidents several Serbian policemen are shot and attacked with hand grenades in Kosovo. |
| Jul 2, 1993 |
Yugoslavia refuses to extend the mandate of Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) human rights observers in Kosovo and elsewhere. |
| Aug 14, 1993 |
The Democratic League of Kosovo says that 600 Serb police and troops had occupied the Mitrovica market and bus and train station. They further accuse the Serbs of beating about 60 people. Serbian police say that it was a raid on black marketeers. |
| Aug 23, 1993 |
The CSCE cites Yugoslavia for human rights violations in Kosovo. Note Many governments and human rights groups cite Yugoslavia for human rights violations in Kosovo. Such reports will not be further noted here unless otherwise noteworthy. |
| Aug 31, 1993 |
Reuters reports that Yugoslavia, including much of Kosovo, has been suffering from its worse drought in 70 years. |
| Sep 1, 1993 |
Thousands of Albanians in Kosovo gather outside schools to protest against a curriculum imposed by the Serb-dominated government. 18,000 high school students refuse to enroll. There are reports of police beating and arresting teachers in several towns. Albanians have responded to this situation by setting up their own schools in private homes. They say that the teachers have been the targets of violent attacks by Serb police and nationalists. |
| Oct 1, 1993 |
Serb police arrest over 30 Albanians in Kosovo on suspicion of preparing an armed uprising. |
| Oct 12, 1993 |
Amnesty International reports that it has been denied access to Kosovo. |
| Nov 4, 1993 |
Yugoslavia bars Albanian leader Ibrahim Rugova from leaving Yugoslavia to meet with French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe. |
| Nov 23, 1993 |
The International Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights condemns Yugoslavia for a policy of "Serbianization" in Kosovo. Human rights abuses include torture and summary killings. Restrictions have been imposed on the freedom of movement of ethnic Albanians, on using the Albanian language, and on holding private property. Since 1990, ethnic Albanians have been eliminated from Kosovo's police force and judiciary system. Most Albanian language newspapers and periodicals have been shut down and Albanians working for television and radio stations have been replaced by Serbs. About 1,800 Albanian hospital staff have been replaced with Serbs and the use of the Albanian language in heath care has been banned. Some 22,000 to 26,000 Albanian teachers have been fired for failing to adhere to a new school curriculum which de-emphasizes the teaching of the Albanian language and culture. Also, the government has been encouraging Serbs to move into the region. |
| Dec 2, 1993 |
Underground Albanian President Ibrahim Rugova says that sanctions should not be lifted against Yugoslavia until the Kosovo problems have been resolved. Note Throughout the period covered by this update the issue of human rights in Albania have been linked to the sanctions against Yugoslavia stemming from the civil war in Bosnia. However, the human rights violations in Kosovo tend to be a lower priority. |
| 1994 |
According to human rights activists 17 ethnic Albanians have died in police custody in 1994 as a result of police brutality. |
| Jan 8, 1994 |
Final results for national parliamentary elections are released. President Milsevic's Socialist Party wins the most seats (123/250). The Albanian coalition wins 2 seats. Most Albanians in Kosovo boycotted the elections. |
| Mar 21, 1994 |
Bujar Bukoshi, Prime Minister of the self-proclaimed Republic of Kosovo, calls for an international presence in the region to prevent the conflict in the Balkans from spreading. |
| Apr 14, 1994 |
A human rights group reports that human rights violations in Kosovo have increased dramatically since human rights monitors were expelled in July 1993. Police raids on homes and marketplaces occur daily as part of a Serb drive to push Albanians out of border areas. Civilians also report harassment and shootings by army troops and mass arrests on trumped-up charges. |
| Apr 30, 1994 |
Hardline Serbian nationalist Zelko Raznjatovic calls for the deportation of over 700,000 "disloyal" ethnic Albanians to Albania. |
| May 2, 1994 |
Two Yugoslav soldiers are shot dead in Serbia. It is believed that the killer is an ethnic Albanian. |
| May 13, 1994 |
A German court rules that ethnic Albanians in Kosovo are persecuted and should be granted political asylum in Germany. |
| Dec 1, 1994 |
Reuters reports that Serbian police have arrested about 100 ethnic Albanian former high level state officials accused of being members of an ethnic Albanian secessionist movement. One of those arrested has died in custody. |
| Dec 16, 1994 |
11 ethnic Albanians from Kosovo are jailed for up to five years for plotting and running an illegal government. |
| Jan 29, 1995 |
Reuters reports that the Serbs have increased the level of oppression on ethnic Albanians in Kosovo. About 200 former Albanian government officials, including many high ranking policemen, have been arrested over the past two months on suspicion of forming a "parallel" interior ministry. Human rights activists say that the detainees have been tortured, beaten, and interrogated without their lawyers present. These arrests were made after a petition by Serb nationalists in Kosovo accusing the Yugoslav government of failing to fulfill its promise to check the Albanian political movement and settle Serbs in the province. |
| Feb 5, 1995 |
Reuters reports that despite government incentives, more Serbs are leaving Kosovo than settling there. |
| Feb 16, 1995 |
A Serb policeman goes on a shooting spree killing an Albanian. |
| Apr 28, 1995 |
Seven ethnic Albanians are jailed for running an illegal ministry of internal affairs in Kosovo. |
| Jun 8, 1995 |
15 ethnic Albanians are jailed for up to three years for plotting against the state. |
| Jun 20, 1995 |
A nine-year-old boy is shot dead by Serb soldiers when he approaches their barracks to retrieve a stray goat. |
| Jul 17, 1995 |
68 ethnic Albanians are jailed for up to eight years for setting up a parallel police force in Kosovo. |
| Aug 1995 |
Albania reports that thousands of Serb refugees are being resettled in Kosovo. |
| Sep 1995 |
A statement issued by the Committee for Human Rights and Freedoms in Kosovo warned that large scale conflict could break out in Kosovo if the process of resettling Krajina Serb refugees continued. It said that between the 9th and 31st August, some 8,356 refugees from Krajina had been resettled in 23 locations in Kosovo, and before that some 2,947 Serb refugees from Bosnia had been resettled there. In 4 recent incidents refugees forced their way into houses and flats belonging to ethnic Albanians. After making a decision to settle up to 100,000 Serbs in Kosovo as a means of changing the ethnic composition of the region's population, the Serbian regime decided to settle more than 20,000 Serbs from Krajina in Kosovo. Already 10,000 of them have been forced to go to Kosovo. A number of governments have reacted to this situation by urging the Serbian regime to cease the forced resettlement of Krajina Serbs in Kosovo. Serbian authorites are doing everything possible to permanently resettle them in the region with the promises of employment, housing, building sites, mortgages, farm land, and other incentives. Serbs are also removing all exhibits from the memorial centre and museum in Kosovo. |
| Sep 14, 1995 |
In a meeting in Washington with Sec. of State Warren Christoper, the first words heard by Albanian Pres. Berisha, were "autonomy for Kosovo." In the meeting it was discussed that U.S. interest in Albania passes through Kosovo. |
| Sep 1996 |
Macedonian President, Kiro Gligorov, dismissed as speculation any Bulgarian involvement in the assassination attempt on him in1995. |
| Jan 31, 1997 |
Sulejman Ugljanin, chairman of the Moslim National Council of Sandzak, a Muslim-populated area straddling Serbia and Montenegro, has said he fears that Milosevic may provoke fresh conflicts in Sandzak and Kosovo in order to unite the Serbian opposition and government against Sandzak Muslims and ethnic Albanians in Kosovo. Ugljanin claims this is the cause of recent increasing attacks and murders that have been occurring in Kosovo lately. |
| May 26, 1997 |
Rugova said at a meeting that Kosovo is de facto independent. It has succeeded in achieving many goals it set out 5 years ago. Elections will be held at the most favorable moment. He welcomed the interest of the international community in Kosovo, and the wish of the European Parliament to open its own office in Pristina. Speaking specifically about Serbian violence in Kosovo, Rugova denounced Serbia's renaming of Albanian schools and asked for an end to the political trials and the release of all Albanian political prisoners. |
| Aug 11, 1997 |
Albanian language newspapers in Kosovo have published a statement by the Kosovo Liberation Army claiming responsibility for attacks on Serbian police. These statements were undersigned as the communiqué of the Headquarters of the Kosovo Liberation Army and said that their guerrilla units targeted--Serbian state security officer on July 3 at the Podujeve-Kerpimeh road, at the Bunari i Bradashit locality; [he was not reported hit] --2 Serb police officers and their companion, on July 4 at Runik of Skenkeraj; [policemen were reported wounded by the Serbian police and press] --an attempt on the life of Idriz Nishori, "the collaborationist notorious for his anti-national activity" which occurred at Konoran of Gllogovc, UCK said. --UCK also said attempts on the life of 2 other collaborators had been made earlier. |
| Sep 19, 1997 |
Adem Demaci, head of PPK, said today that Serbian authorities were manipulating the attacks on police in Kosovo and using them for propaganda purposes, since the perpetrators of the attacks had still not been identified. |
| Dec 3, 1997 |
TheYugoslav delegation walked out of a Bonn conference. The president of the LDK says this shows Yugoslavs do not respect the international community and its efforts to solve the Kosovo problem. |
| Dec 13, 1997 |
A report by the Pristina based council for the Defense of Human Rights and Freedoms reported 34 persons (Albanians in Kosovo) found dead at hands of Serbian regime 4 died of torture in Serbian police custody, 10 were shot dead in unexplained circumstances, 8 were shot by Serbian police, 4 shot dead by unidentified gunmen, one was found massacred, 3 were shot dead without prior warning by the Serbian Army at border zones, 1 was killed by a Serbian civilian with a knife, 2 others committed suicide - one after having been severely beaten in a Serb police station, the other after having received a summons to report to police. The report also said that since January 1997 the Serbian police have arrested arbitrarily 1,012 persons, raided 402 Albanian households, summoned 437 to so-called informative conversation, 452 have received bodily injuries, 56 police raids on educational institutions, 33 journalists have been obstructed in their journalistic work, and 762 people have been taken to police for interrogation. |
| Jan 22, 1998 |
An ethnic Albanian was shot dead and 2 girls wounded in Prekaze municipality. Ethnic Albanian leader Rugova, said it was a "barbarous act by the Serbian police"; the Serbian Interior Ministry issued a statement in Belgrade denying any police involvement in the incident. |
| Jan 25, 1998 |
The PPK has invited its members to express their protest against all who have been trying to resolve the Kosovo issue through conflict and war by keeping the lights throughout Kosovo switched off for 5 minutes. This is an attempt to demonstrate to Serbia and the international community that they are unanimous in their struggle against violence. |
| Jan 29, 1998 |
Macedonia believes that action towards Albanians of the Serbian Army will be fast and cruel, causing a mass overflow, as many as 40,000, of the Albanian population from Kosovo to Macedonia. Although many military experts believe Macedonia should close its northern border, the government has announced that it has a plan in place for the expected refugees. |
| Feb 1998 |
Some people believe that a statement issued by Macedonian Pres.[ that Macedonia would, in the event of an armed conflict in Kosovo, create a corridor for refugees through its territory to Albania] means that Macedonians are intending on helping Serbs ethnically cleanse Kosovo. |
| Feb 2, 1998 |
The PPK issued a call for 3 days of protest with one minute motionless silence at midday starting from 1/29/98, "in protest at the militarist scenarios of the Belgrade regime to start a conflict in Kosovo." Leader of the PPK, Salihaj, said he foresaw, "the PPK will meet the DSK and the other parties and will coordinate with them because the situation is very serious." |
| Feb 7, 1998 |
Tony Lloyd said the EU was ready to open an office in Pristina, which would be good for both the Albanians and Serbs in Kosovo. After confirming the increasing rate of violence, Lloyd also declared that the EC had refused to accept that Kosovo was an issue belonging only to Yugoslavia. |
| Feb 10, 1998 |
Leadership of the LDK and PPK met in Pristina to discuss current developments in Kosovo. The expressed concern over increased movements and provocations of Serbain forces. |
| Feb 18, 1998 |
Rugova met with the Chief of the U.S. mission in Belgrade in Pristina to talk of increasing violence, elections, and the implementation of an education accord. |
| Feb 19, 1998 |
The Albanian foreign minister said Albanians do not want a war in Kosovo, but they will support the Albanians in Kosovo by first demanding intervention from the international community to stop war and Serbian aggression, by helping them with humanitarian aid, ensuring assistance to people that might leave Kosovo, and in other ways. |
| Feb 22, 1998 |
Rugova met with a special representative of the Clinton administration and with Secretary of State, Madelaine Albright and talked of wanting independence for Kosovo and an end to the violence and repression by Serbian forces. The importance of friendly ties between Kosovo and the U.S. was stressed, and the U.S. was urged to monitor presidential and parliamentary elections to be held 3/22/98. The special envoy also stated that the police and other organs of the state authority bore responsibility for the violence in Kosovo, and condemned the terrorism of the Kosovo Liberation Army. |
| Feb 27, 1998 |
Bulgarian foreign minister Nadezhda Mikhaylova has proposed measures to help resolve conflict in Kosovo, fearing the conflict could spread to other Balkan states. |
| Mar 2, 1998 |
Rugova said his party's recent congress reinforced its commitment to independence from Serbia. He also called for preventative action from the international community to avoid armed conflict with Serbia. |
| Mar 6, 1998 |
Yugoslavia's president Slobodan Milosevic warns the West of his determination to crush "terrorism" in the separatist province of Kosovo. (The Toronto Star) |
| Mar 6, 1998 |
Hundreds of paramilitary police, backed by helicopter gunships and dozens of armored personnel carriers, attack ethnic Albanian villages about 20 miles west of Pristina. Police says, at least 20 ethnic Albanians and two Serbian police officers are killed in the fighting in Serbia's southern province of Kosovo. Five days ago a similar police attack was launch against the Drenica region which killed four police officers and 25 Albanians.(The Washington Post, March 6) |
| Mar 7, 1998 |
US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright issues a stern warning to Serbia over its crackdown in Kosovo province, saying it would have to pay a price for its actions. (Agence France Presse) |
| Mar 8, 1998 |
Shaken villagers fleeing a Serb crackdown in Kosovo province describe terrifying police attacks against ethnic Albanian separatists, including random shootings and the burning of houses. The Kosovo Albanians' information centre says, about 5,000 residents have evacuated the area.(The Toronto Star) |
| Mar 8, 1998 |
A session of the international Contact Group on the former Yugoslavia opens in London to discuss the situation in the Serbian province of Kosovo. Violence in this province erupted a week ago when Serbian security forces moved on ethnic Albanians in central Kosovo in what they described as an anti-terrorist operation in the province.(Agence France Presse) |
| Mar 9, 1998 |
The United States, France and Britain call for urgent international action to halt fighting in Serbia's Kosovo province before it spreads.(The Toronto Star) |
| Mar 10, 1998 |
The bodies of 60 Albanian villagers including 12 children and 14 women are dumped on the steps of a police station in a new explosion of Serb violence.(The Mirror) |
| Mar 11, 1998 |
The Kosovo Liberation Army (UCK) says, it would not give up its fight for the independence of the Albanian-populated southern Serbian province and urge local political leaders to join it. The UCK, whose chief Adem Jeshari Serb police claims to have killed in a fighting in the province's central region of Drenica, also calls for international recognition of Kosovo as a separate state.(Agence France Presse) |
| Mar 15, 1998 |
A Serb delegation returns to Belgrade from Kosovo after the charade of inviting "responsible Albanians" to talks comes to nothing. (The Sunday Telegraph) |
| Mar 15, 1998 |
In a third mass protest in two weeks, more than 50,000 Kosovars gather in the provincial capital, Pristina, to demonstrate against the recent Serbian assault in Dernica that left about 100 people dead. Many of the victims have been tortured and executed. Nearly half were women, children and the elderly. Albanian students and political parties are planning regular demonstrations for a separate state. (The Sunday Telegraph) |
| Mar 16, 1998 |
Refugees reach Kosovska Mitrovica, on the edge of the Drenica region. They say, they would settle simply for the right to remain alive. They report that Serbs are firing from helicopter gunships as well as shelling villages.(Newsweek) |
| Mar 20, 1998 |
Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic makes a last-minute bid to duck new international sanctions, agreeing to pull back special police from the troubled Kosovo province even as violence broke out at rival ethnic rallies. (The Toronto Star) |
| Mar 20, 1998 |
About 30,000 of the province's minority Serbs protest in Pristina. Chanting " Kosovo is Serbia!" they carry Serb flags and sing Serb nationalist songs. Hours before the Serb rally, 25,000 ethnic Albanians stage their own protest, denouncing "Serb terror and repression in Kosovo. " Fights between Kosovo Serbs and Albanians break out after that protest, and at least four reporters are beaten, apparently by plainclothes Serb police.(The Toronto Star) |
| Mar 23, 1998 |
Macedonian Albanians issue call to arms. (The European) |
| Apr 2, 1998 |
Albanian Prime Minister Fatos Nano says that the Albanian government is for a wider autonomy of Kosovo. He says, Serbia turns out a loser from the results of the contact group at the recent meeting in Bonn.(BBC) |
| Apr 15, 1998 |
A few thousand Serbian Albanians demonstrate peacefully in the main street of Pristina.(BBC) |
| Apr 17, 1998 |
The representatives of seven political parties from Serbia issue a proclamation against the referendum on whether to accept foreign mediation in Kosovo, which has been called by the Serbian assembly for 23rd April.(BBC) |
| Apr 17, 1998 |
Albanian TV reports that Serbian forces are deploying fresh reinforcements in the central Kosovo region of Drenica. It also reports that over 20 ethnic Albanian villages remain isolated.(BBC) |
| May 2, 1998 |
An Albanian newspaper urges the government to put the army on a high state of alert and arm the population in the north of the country in response to events in the Serbian province of Kosovo. The newspaper calls attention to Serbian commandos who have crossed the Albanian state border and appeared in an Albanian village. |
| May 7, 1998 |
Montenegrin President Milo Djukanovic says that if Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic makes the army intervene in the conflict in Kosovo, he [Djukanovic] would "prevent Montenegro's involvement in internal political conflicts on the territory of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY)".(BBC) |
| May 20, 1998 |
Despite several hundred protesting Serbian students throwing rocks at their Albanian colleagues, the buildings of three university faculties in Pristina are handed over for use by Kosovo Albanians. Albanian students are returning to the university buildings they have been thrown out of seven years ago. Albanian group member Abdul Ramai says, the buildings are currently unusable because Serbian students have caused damage to them in an attempt to prevent their handover...(BBC) |
| May 20, 1998 |
Kosovo Albanian leader Ibrahim Rugova is criticized by his own party for meeting Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic without foreign mediation and for failing to consult adequately on his negotiating position.(BBC) |
| Jun 7, 1998 |
Serbian gunners shell villages in Kosovo with heavy artillery. Fighting flares along the province's southern border with Macedonia. Serbian sources say, in a border clash between Serb-led Yugoslav army troops and an armed group attempting to illegally enter the province from Macedonia two men were killed. They are the first reported dead along the Yugoslav-Macedonian frontier.(Los Angeles Times) |
| Jun 12, 1998 |
NATO defense ministers, trying to squeeze Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic into halting a bloody crackdown in Serbia's Albanian enclave, order a series of mock bombing raids in the Balkans and the review of plans for possible military action there.(Newsday) |
| Jun 17, 1998 |
President Slobodan Milosevic promises to make concessions over Kosovo to forestall military action by the West. But he fails to meet one key demand the withdrawal of Serbian security forces accused of attacking ethnic Albanians in the province.(The New York Times) |
| Jun 20, 1998 |
Kosovo Albanian nationalist leader Adem Demachi says that the Kosovo Liberation Army (OVK) alone can decide Kosovo's future. He offers to become the OVK's political representative, adding that the autonomy for Kosovo favoured by the international community is not a solution, and instead advocates a confederation of Serbia, Montenegro and Kosovo.(BBC) |
| Jun 20, 1998 |
The top political leader of Kosovo's ethnic Albanians Ibrahim Rugova appeals for direct NATO intervention in the province to prevent further massacres and protect the people of Kosovo.(Los Angeles Times) |
| Jun 23, 1998 |
Kosovo Prime Minister-in-exile" Bujar Bukoshi urges that the illegal Kosovo Liberation Army [UCK] be placed under the political control of the Kosovo Albanian parties. (BBC) |
| Jun 26, 1998 |
A small knot of mothers and fathers gather outside the headquarters of the Yugoslav Army General Staff in central Belgrade requesting that their draftee sons be moved out of barracks in the breakaway Serbian province of Kosovo.(Inter Press Service) |
| Jun 30, 1998 |
A military clash between Kosovo separatists and Yugoslavia's frontier force occurs in the border area between Yugoslavia and Albania. More than 10 Kosovo separatists are killed, many are wounded.(Xinhua News Agency) |
| Jul 3, 1998 |
The village of Ade is placed under Serbian police protection after being held by ethnic Albanian terrorists for a week. Ethnic Albanian terrorists used Ade near Obilic to shoot at the Belacevac and Dobro Selo coal mines' security guards and policemen and hamper coal deliveries to the Obilic thermoelectric power plants. Terrorists kidnapped 13 plant workers in the area in the past two weeks. Serbian police invited the Ade inhabitants freely to return home, guaranteeing them full safety.(BBC) |
| Jul 3, 1998 |
The heads of the Kosovo Albanian political parties meet in Pristina with the leader of the Kosovo Albanians, Ibrahim Rugova, in a bid to coordinate a joint strategy for the Kosovo crisis. Ethnic Albanian party leaders fail to agree on a joint strategy. (BBC) |
| Jul 3, 1998 |
A spokesman for the ethnic Albanian rebels in Serbia's province of Kosovo says that the rebels do not agree with Kosovo Albanian leader Ibrahim Rugova's passive resistance to Belgrade, but they do support his demands for Kosovo's independence. (BBC) |
| Jul 16, 1998 |
Nebojsa Rodic, deputy secretary of the Serbian Assembly, says that the citizens of Kosovo -Metohija cannot have more autonomy than is envisaged by the Serbian constitution and that Kosovo cannot enjoy the rights that fall under the federal state's jurisdiction.(BBC) |
| Jul 18, 1998 |
A spokesman for the Kosovo Liberation Army says that the Army is organized with a military hierarchy rather than consisting merely of armed groups, and it is gaining new members every day. He says, he expects rebel soldiers to be in Kosovo's capital, Pristina, "within a short time" , and calls on Kosovo's politicians to stop trying to establish control over the rebels.(BBC) |
| Jul 18, 1998 |
Kosovo Albanian leader Ibrahim Rugova states that the setting up of the parallel parliament of Kosovo Albanians is "important for all citizens of Kosovo". Rugova says that the next to be elected are other important organs, "including a new Kosovo government". (BBC) |
| Jul 23, 1998 |
The most serious operation undertaken by the ethnic Albanian rebel movement begins in the town of Orahovec on the 17th July and ends on the 21st, with the police retaking control of the town. Police sources announce that 2,000 people from Orahovec, both Serbs and Albanians, have left the cite of the conflict and evacuated safely. The same source says that 51 people have been kidnapped, including "Serbs, Romanies and Albanians" . Police says that they have also brought in for questioning 223 ethnic Albanians from Orahovac, and that following interrogation, they have "detained" 26 of them. All of them have been brought in under the suspicion that "they had taken part in terrorist operations, or aided them". (BBC) |
| Jul 23, 1998 |
Army sources report that during the night between 17th and 18th July, at least 1,000 armed "terrorists" have attempted to enter the territory of FRY from Albania in the region of Mt Djeravica. According to official information at least 30 Albanians were killed on that occasion and a large quantity of arms was confiscated. Officials in Tirana say that during the incident several grenades fell on Albanian soil. In a second incident, at least 700 armed people have made several attempts at crossing the border between Albania and Yugoslavia. At least 20 armed Albanians died. The number of victims among the Albanians, according to some sources in Pristina, was several times larger.(BBC) |
| Jul 25, 1998 |
Fresh fighting is reported in the south and west of Kosovo between ethnic Albanian rebels and Serb forces. Each side accuses the other of launching the attacks.(Agence France Presse) |
| Aug 1, 1998 |
Serbian police finds in the village of Orlate the bodies of Ratko and Branko Staletovic, father and son, kidnapped by terrorists two months ago.(BBC) |
| Aug 1, 1998 |
Dr Fehmi Agani, the group coordinator of the council of advisers set up by President of the self-proclaimed Republic of Kosovo, announces that the council (G15) ceases its work. The group deems it has been "superseded" by new developments in Kosovo. Political parties are consulting to form a coalition government in Kosovo, or a joint executive body.(BBC) |
| Aug 3, 1998 |
Heavy Serbian forces raid offices of the local branches of LDK [Democratic League of Kosovo] and the Council for the Defence of Human Rights and Freedoms (CDHRF) in Ferizaj [Urosevac], and arrest Sahit Krasniqi, Milazim Haliti, Fatmir Sylejmani, members of the LDK presidency, as well as Bekim Berkolli, deputy chairman of the local chapter of the human rights council.(BBC) |
| Aug 3, 1998 |
Tomislav Vuckovic, president of the trade union of the Stari Trg mine near Kosovska Mitrovica, says the mine is under attack by Albanian terrorists almost every night. All the miners in Stari Trg are armed and are on call round the clock to help the security guards defend the mine.(BBC) |
| Aug 5, 1998 |
Serbian crackdown on the Malisheva [Malisevo] area leaves at least 17 Albanians dead, most of them women and the elderly, and many more wounded. Many villages are burned during Serb shelling. The displaced population - many of whom live in the open - is facing a humanitarian catastrophe, as basic food and medical supplies are lacking.(BBC) |
| Aug 5, 1998 |
President Rugova says, the situation in Kosova is becoming dramatic amidst the continued Serbian military and police offensive in the villages of Drenica, Decan [Decani], Gjakova [Djakovica] and the Albanian villages along the Kosova-Albania border. Rugova says, Serbian forces are killing Albanian civilians, burning and destroying entire villages in these parts of Kosova, resulting in a forced displacement of a great number of people. President says,"Belgrade is carrying out a large-scale ethnic cleansing against Albanians in Kosova" and calls for an urgent intervention by the United States and its allies to halt the Serbian offensive and provide "international protection for the people of Kosova" .(BBC) |
| Aug 10, 1998 |
Main Kosovo Albanian party, the Democratic League of Kosovo, calls for NATO intervention (BBC) |
| Aug 10, 1998 |
The leader of the Kosovo Albanians, Ibrahim Rugova, tells a regular news conference in Pristina that the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army is ready to join the parallel government of the Kosovo Albanians. He adds that the current situation in Kosovo is very difficult, especially after the Serbian offensive on Orahovac and Malisevo and villages in the Drenica area. He notes that tens of thousands of displaced people are waiting for humanitarian aid, adding that in Drenica and Metohija scores of people have been killed and wounded. He says that the village of Junik in the municipality of Djakovica [western Kosovo] is under siege by the military and police forces. He adds that apart from mass killings and arrests, the Serbian jails have been turned in camps with hundreds of Kosovo Albanians.(BBC) |
| Aug 12, 1998 |
Annan repeatedly pushes for a greater U.N. role in monitoring the Kosovo conflict. Despite U.N. worries, the 15-nation Security Council is no nearer to granting the United Nations a mandate to intervene in Kosovo.(Inter Press Service) |
| Aug 18, 1998 |
Kosovo Albanian opposition politician Mehmet Hajrizi wonders why Kosovo Albanian leader Ibrahim Rugova has abandoned the idea of setting up a coalition government and instead appointed a small negotiating group to hold talks with the Serbian side. Hajrizi says the Kosovo Albanian parties have been on the point of agreeing on a coalition government, which was to have included representatives from all political parties, as well as from the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) and the student movement. Hajrizi says he does not believe talks about Kosovo could take place without involving the KLA.(BBC) |
| Aug 18, 1998 |
Serbian radio says, the latest team appointed by Kosovo Albanian leader Ibrahim Rugova to take part in negotiations with the Serbian side has nothing new to offer. It says the team is made up of Rugova loyalists, whose goal remains an independent Kosovo. (BBC) |
| Aug 18, 1998 |
Fehmi Agani, member of the Kosovo Albanian team for negotiations with the Serbian government delegation, says that Kosovo Albanian leader Ibrahim Rugova "enjoys the unconditional support of many units" of the Kosovo Liberation Army. Assessing when negotiations between the Kosovo Albanians and Serbian authorities might begin, Agani says that "they will certainly not take place as long as the Serbian units continue repression in Kosovo". According to Agani, the Albanian side has still not decided which one of the models offered by the international contact group it would accept.(BBC) |
| Aug 27, 1998 |
The prime minister of the self-declared Republic of Kosovo, Bujar Bukoshi, says Kosovo independence is the only option that will ensure stability and a long-term solution in the Balkan region. In a message to the people of Kosovo, he says it is essential to formalize the status of the Albanian rebels in order to coordinate political objectives with the situation on the ground.(BBC) |
| Sep 14, 1998 |
Dr Fehmi Agani, chief adviser to the ethnic Albanian leader, Ibrahim Rugova, says that Rugova's negotiating position is that Kosovo should become a federal member state of Yugoslavia for a three-year transitional period followed by a referendum in Kosovo. However, Adem Demaci, the leader of the political wing of the Kosovo Liberation Army, says that the Yugoslav authorities would be forced to the negotiating table in a year or two on worse terms than currently offered to them. (BBC) |
| Sep 17, 1998 |
President Bill Clinton says the United States will back NATO military intervention in Kosovo if diplomacy fails to avert a catastrophe in the Yugoslav province. (The Toronto Star) |
| Sep 26, 1998 |
The top UN refugee official urges Serbia to allow displaced people in Kosovo to return home.(Agence France Presse) |
| Sep 30, 1998 |
International pressure is building on Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic to end military assaults on the towns and villages in the breakaway Serbian province. The Sept. 23 U.N. Resolution 1199 calls for a ceasefire in the province and action to halt a humanitarian catastrophe. The NATO military alliance threatens ominous "additional measures" if Belgrade does not act to end the conflict. (Inter Press Services) |
| Sep 30, 1998 |
Serbian paramilitary police move back to barracks, bringing an effective halt to air and land military operations against the ethnic Albanian insurgents. The withdrawal is announced at the end of the Sept. 28 special session of the Serbian parliament. The withdrawal is in line with Serbian Prime Minister Mirko Marjanovic’s proposal for a provisional executive council, headed by a Serbian government official, while a political agreement on the province’s autonomy is worked out. Fehmi Agani, chief negotiator for the Democratic League of Kosovo says, he would not joint the provisional government and does not expect other Albanian parties to do so.(Inter Press Services) |
| Oct 1, 1998 |
Calls for urgent action on Kosovo from the international community are sparked by the discovery of the bodies of ethnic Albanian civilians, including women and children, slaughtered by Serb forces. This is one of two separate Kosovo massacres discovered in one week. NATO ambassadors ask for an urgent intelligence report on the situation in Kosovo. In Washington the Pentagon speeds up a decision on NATO strikes. The UN Security Council expects Secretary General Kofi Annan to deliver a crucial report on whether Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic has complied with the council's demand to stop the repression in Kosovo. A negative report from Annan is widely seen as a likely trigger for a NATO attack. Serbian authorities deny any involvement in the killings and say that an enquiry had been opened into the reports. According to ethnic Albanian human rights workers, at least 1,472 ethnic Albanians have been killed in the fighting in Kosovo this year. The victims include 162 women and 143 children.(Agence France Presse) |
| Oct 5, 1998 |
The United Nations say that as many as 7,000 buildings in 269 villages have been damaged or destroyed since mid-September, and estimated that, some 9,000 home might be uninhabitable by mid-November. The Office of U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Sadako Ogata estimates at least 200,000 Albanians have fled their homes in the recent fighting, and are suffering from the onset of severe weather.(Inter Press Services) |
| Oct 5, 1998 |
Human Rights Watch accuses Yugoslav army units of executing civilians, systematically destroying civilian property and attacking aid workers. The report says that at least 100 ethnic Albanians have "disappeared" in Kosovo since February, about half of whom were last seen in the custody of the security forces. (Inter Press Services) |
| Oct 5, 1998 |
Secretary-General Kofi Annan presents a report detailing increasing brutality in the Yugoslav province, without specifying whether President Milosevic has violated Security Council resolutions. The report provides with supporting arguments the opinion of either side in the Security Council, whose five permanent members Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States are divided on the Kosovo crisis.(Inter Press Services) |
| Oct 5, 1998 |
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization begins preparations for possible military action. (Inter Press Services) |
| Oct 6, 1998 |
The Yugoslav government calls for the declaration of an "imminent threat of war" and extra taxation powers in the face of possible military action by Nato over the crisis in Kosovo. (Financial Times) |
| Oct 7, 1998 |
Both houses of the federal Parliament of Yugoslavia meet on Oct. 5, concluding that the country faces an "imminent danger of war," while the federation's Supreme Defence Council, headed by Milosevic, warns the country to be "ready to defend itself".(Inter Press Service) |
| Oct 13, 1998 |
The Western Allies prepare to bomb Serbia.(The Herald) |
| Oct 15, 1998 |
Between 250,000 and 400,000 ethnic Albanians have been driven from their homes in Kosovo since February by Serbian forces pursuing the KLA.(Christian Science Monitor) |
| Oct 27, 1998 |
International observers say Serb police units are still being withdrawn from Kosovo, hours before a NATO deadline for Serb compliance with international demands expired.(Agence France Presse) |
| Oct 27, 1998 |
NATO puts military action against Yugoslavia on hold after judging that Belgrade has sufficiently complied with international demands to drastically reduce its military and police presence in Kosovo.(Agence France Presse) |
| Oct 29, 1998 |
Serbs from Kosovo say that with their security forces in retreat from the province, only the world could protect them from revenge by majority Albanians.(Birmingham Post) |
| Nov 13, 1998 |
The Pristina town committee of the Serbian Radical Party announces that it is shocked that terrorist activities continue even after the signing of the agreement on a peaceful solution to Kosovo crisis and under the noses of the OSCE observers.(BBC) |
| Dec 14, 1998 |
Guerrillas crossing the border from Albania are trying to smuggle large amounts of arms and ammunition into Kosovo. The army intercepts and ambushes them during a route border patrol. The incident leaves 36 of some 140 KLA guerrillas dead. Most of the others disperse in the forest but dozen are arrested.(Inter Press Services 13 January 1999) |
| Jan 11, 1999 |
Talks between Serbian forces and the Albanian rebels on the release of eight army soldiers held hostage are conducted in the village of Stari Trg amid mounting tension by officials from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OECD). The organization is in charge of monitoring a truce agreed on Oct. 12 by Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic and U.S. special envoy Richard Holbrooke. Belgrade refuses to negotiate the soldiers' fate as prisoners of war, as demanded by their abductors, the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), in an attempt to gain recognition as a warring army instead of a rebel faction. (Inter Press Services) |
| Jan 11, 1999 |
Belgrade's military units partially re-enter the province of Kosovo after the KLA kills an elderly Serb in December. The KLA kills one policeman on Jan. 7 and another three on Jan. 8, which the OECD considered "terrorist acts." (Inter Press Services) |
| Jan 11, 1999 |
The KLA does not recognize the authority of Ibrahim Rugova, leader of the moderate Albanian Democratic League, who seeks a political solution with Belgrade that would lead to autonomy for Kosovo province.(Inter Press Services) |
| Jan 13, 1999 |
An agreement to release eight government soldiers is announced after five hours negotiations between the OSCE's Kosovo Verification Mission and the Kosovo Liberation Army. Unconfirmed reports say that an agreement to free nine ethnic Albanian rebels has also been reached.(Inter Press Services) |
| Jan 13, 1999 |
A wave of violence punctuates the three-month truce in Kosovo. In December six Serb teenagers are killed in the Kosovo town of Pec in a bomb attack blamed on the KLA. In another incident, several Serb policemen are ambushed and killed. On January 11 a leading Albanian journalist Enver Maloku is murdered in front of his house in Pristina.(Inter Press Service) |
| Jan 29, 1999 |
The six-nation Contact Group, a major power consortium coordinating peace efforts in the Balkans, issues an extraordinary ultimatum directing Milosevic and the ethnic Albanians to meet before the end of this week in a French chateau and to agree before Feb. 19 on a plan offering substantial self-rule to the ethnic Albanian community. NATO issues a clear but unspecific warning of military action if the warring factions in Kosovo do not go to the conference table.(Los Angeles Times) |
| Jan 31, 1999 |
NATO authorizes its secretary-general to order airstrikes any time he chooses to back a diplomatic drive for peace in the Serbian province of Kosovo. The action by NATO's North Atlantic Council means that Javier Solana can act without having to go through the time-consuming process of seeking approval from the capitals of the 16 nations of the alliance. (Los Angeles Times) |
| Feb 3, 1999 |
A spokesman for the Kosovo Liberation Army announces that KLA would attend the peace talks on the status of Kosovo. This is the first time when rebels agree to participate in negotiations. The rebels' acceptance of the international community's summons to the talks at the chateau of Rambouillet means that all the main players on the Albanian side have agreed to attend. The Serbian parliament is awaited to vote on the decision Serbs to attend the peace talks. (The Independent) |
| Feb 3, 1999 |
The leadership of the Kosovo Liberation Army announces its intention to call a referendum on the independence of Kosovo from Yugoslavia after any interim autonomy plan, expected to last three years, runs out. (The Independent) |
| Feb 3, 1999 |
Adem Demaci, the KLA political spokesman, says he would recommend to the military command to stay away from the peace talks. (The Independent) |
| Feb 7, 1999 |
17 representatives of Kosovo Albanians and 13 representatives of Serbia and Yugoslavia meet for peace talks in Rambouillet. The foreign ministers of France and Great Britain chair the meeting. Three mediators take part a Russian, American and EU envoys.(BBC 6 February 1999) |
| Feb 8, 1999 |
Serbian parliament condemns NATO's threats and agrees to attend the Kosovo talks in France. The Serbian parliament concludes that the Contact Group's plan for Kosovo is an attack on Yugoslavia's sovereignty and territorial integrity, and it particularly condemns the international community for placing " terrorists" on the same level as the legal authorities of a sovereign country.(BBC) |
| Feb 17, 1999 |
Secretary of State Madeleine Albright sends the U.S. mediator leading Kosovo peace talks to Belgrade to offer Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic a choice between NATO peacekeepers or NATO air strikes.(Newsday) |
| Feb 21, 1999 |
The United States and its allies extend crisis talks for three more days as Serbia and ethnic Albanians make some progress but balk at key elements of a three-year interim peace plan. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright says Serbia bears the "lion's share" of the blame because its delegation refuses to discuss the dispatch of up to 30,000 NATO troops, including 4,000 Americans, to supervise the peace accord that restores autonomy to the ethnic Albanian province from the rest of Serbia. (Newsday) |
| Feb 21, 1999 |
Resumed fighting are reported from Kosovo. Albanian women and children flee the village of Studencane south of the provincial capital, Pristina, as mortars and automatic weapons fire rake the Albanian settlement. (Newsday) |
| Feb 21, 1999 |
NATO officials express concern about "substantial" military movements by the Yugoslav army in Kosovo, and say there is evidence that certain military units have moved from Serbia proper back into Kosovo. (Newsday) |
| Mar 3, 1999 |
Kosovar Albanian guerrillas oust the hard-line political leader Adem Demaci who blocks a U.S.-brokered agreement on the Serbian province's future.(Newsday) |
| Mar 4, 1999 |
At a news conference Adem Demaci says, he resigns from his post as representative of the Kosovo Liberation Army guerrillas, because he considers the peace process to be a betrayal of ethnic Albanian aspirations for freedom and independence. He says, he "disagrees with the text of the agreement on Kosovo that was endorsed by the Kosovo Albanian delegation in Rambouillet" . He stresses that "the West will deceive the Kosovo Albanians, because, instead of deploying NATO troops, they will bring into Kosovo some French or Italian troops...." He stresses that he does not see in what way the KLA could transform itself into a political organization.(BBC) |
| Mar 24, 1999 |
The Yugoslav Prime Minister, Momir Bulatovic, declares a "state of imminent war emergency" as the two days negotiations between the American envoy Richard C. Holbrooke, and President Milosevic come to crux. In the streets of Belgrade there is increased nervousness and anger with the West but there are few signs of war preparation.(The New York Times) |
| Mar 25, 1999 |
"On 24th March 1999, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization with the United States at the lead mobilizes its airborne military forces and launches military strikes against Yugoslavia.(BBC) |
| Mar 25, 1999 |
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan argues that the primary role in dealing with threats to international peace and security is held by the 15-member Security Council. In less than 24 hours, however, he concedes that the Kosovo Contact Group comprising Britain, France, Germany, Italy and the United States, with Russia as a disgruntled participant "is in the lead" for now. (Inter Press Services) |
| Mar 26, 1999 |
Greek Foreign Minister George Papandreou demands a moratorium to allow time for a fresh diplomatic initiative. He is followed by Italian Prime Minister Massimo D'Alema, who argues that the "significant results" of the first night's bombing should now "clear the way for politics and diplomacy to have their say." (The Washington Post) |
| Mar 26, 1999 |
Yugoslav government says, it is severing all diplomatic ties with Britain, France, the United States and Germany. It also announces that all journalists from these four countries must leave Yugoslavia immediately.(The Washington Post) |
| Mar 26, 1999 |
Zeljko Raznatovic, known as Arkan, who in the Bosnian war ran a paramilitary organization heavily involved in ethnic cleansing, states publicly that he is angry about the bombings and ready to "kick some ass."(The Washington Post) |
| Mar 26, 1999 |
Local police arrest a Western television producer in her room at a hotel in mid-afternoon. Dozens of reporters pack up and flee across the Croatian or Hungarian borders. A group that the opposition leader Draskovic has described as "a window to public opinion in the United States and allied nations” has been drummed out of Yugoslavia. Journalists line up in armored cars as they prepare to leave Pristina, Kosovo's capital, after Belgrade ordered them out of Yugoslavia. (The Washington Post) |
| Mar 27, 1999 |
The UN Security Council overwhelmingly defeats a Russian resolution demanding an immediate halt to NATO attacks on Yugoslavia and the urgen resumption of negotiations on Kosovo. (Newsday) |
| Mar 29, 1999 |
Fears that Kosovo's Albanians are about to endure the same "ethnic cleansing" that Bosnia suffered earlier this decade are fuelled by the arrival there of Serbia's most famous paramilitary general, Zeljko Raznjatovic, better known as Arkan. (Irish Times) |
| Mar 30, 1999 |
The Brotherhood organization helps hundreds of Ukrainian young men to go to Yugoslavia, the leaders of this organization claim. The organization is deliberately not registered as it would violate the Ukrainian legislation.(BBC) |
| Mar 31, 1999 |
China urges the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) to immediately cease its military action against Kosovo so as to put the process of solving the crisis there back on the track for a political settlement.(BBC) |
| Apr 2, 1999 |
The United States warns that it would be a "grave mistake" for Russia to send military aid to Belgrade.(Agence France Presse) |
| Apr 2, 1999 |
Serbian state television reports that the three American Army soldiers captured by Yugoslav forces while patrolling the Macedonia- Kosovo border will face military trial. President Clinton says there is no basis for their seizure and demands their release.(The New York Times) |
| Apr 2, 1999 |
Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic meets the moderate leader of the Kosovar Albanians Ibrahim Rugova in Belgrade. The two leaders come to the "common conclusion" for the need to solve the Kosovo problem by political means. They especially emphasize that the crisis could be successfully resolved on a long-term basis only by political means. On the eve of his meeting in Belgrade, Rugova tells journalists that the time had come for NATO "...not to kill people, but to help find a solution..." to the Kosovo problem. (Russian Press Digest) |
| Apr 2, 1999 |
Some 130,000 Albanians have fled from Kosovo after March 24, the day NATO set its armed operation into motion.(Russian Press Digest) The continuing exodus of ethnic Albanians from Kosovo overwhelms the province's neighbors. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that 298,400 refugees have entered Albania, Macedonia and Montenegro since March 24. Another 12,485 have gone to Croatia, Bosnia and Turkey, bringing the total to 310,885, or one-sixth of Kosovo's preconflict population of 1.8 million.(The New York Times 3 April 1999) |
| Apr 3, 1999 |
NATO air strikes hit the center of Yugoslavia's capital, Belgrade. The Yugoslav Defense and Interior Ministries and the Serbian republic's police headquarters are severely damaged. |
| Apr 3, 1999 |
Albanian television says, the political leader of the Kosovo Liberation Army, Hashim Thaqi, has announced the formation of a "government" for Kosovo headed by himself and excluding followers of Ibrahim Rugova. The report comes a day after Mr. Rugova was shown on Yugoslav television in talks with Mr. Milosevic.(The New York Times) |
| Apr 4, 1999 |
NATO forces destroy a bridge over the Danube River in Yugoslavia. Bad weather continues to hamper many attacks. NATO says it is planning to send a force of 6,000 to 8,000 troops to Albania to provide security and emergency relief for the masses of Kosovo Albanians who have been driven there from Yugoslavia.(The New York Times) |
| Apr 4, 1999 |
United Nations refugee officials appeal urgently for more vehicles at the Albanian border with Kosovo, saying a huge bottleneck of displaced people is building up. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees says, an average of 40,000 refugees are now crossing the Albanian border daily, while only about 15,000 are being transported out.(The New York Times) |
| Apr 4, 1999 |
Macedonia, deluged by refugees, says it would take more refugees only if they could be transferred to other countries. It declares a partial army mobilization to fortify its borders. Britain says, it has begun talks on the establishment of a Kosovo refugee sanctuary in Macedonia that would be backed by the international community and protected by NATO. Ireland and Germany are among the countries offering to take in refugees. (The New York Times) |
| Apr 4, 1999 |
Thousands march in Rome protesting the Kosovo conflict, then lay on the ground in mock death near the Colosseum as sirens wailed; some 4,000 Cypriots and Serbs rally in Nicosia, the Cypriot capital, demanding that NATO end its air strikes; scores of Pakistanis in Karachi demand the arrest and trial of President Milosevic for "genocide and ethnic cleansing."(The New York Times) |
| Apr 8, 1999 |
Kosovo's main city, Pristina, is subjected to a NATO air raid. Missiles hit apartment houses. Causalities are reported. (Soviet Press Digest) |
| Apr 8, 1999 |
The Democratic League of Kosovo calls for a serious commitment by its members and allies wherever they are in the West for the release of the president of Kosova, Ibrahim Rugova, LDK leader and president of the self-proclaimed Republic of Kosovo. It also calls on its branches in the West and on its organizational structures in Kosova and outside it "to activate all their possible human and material potential, placing everything at the service of war for the salvation and liberation of the homeland" . The LDK also asked their members, "all those who, at their own will, are ready to respond to the call of the homeland, to put themselves at the direct service of the liberation struggle" .The instructions, which are made public by Hafiz Gagica, chairman of the forum of LDK branches in the West, calls for continued protests in all cities of Europe, the United States and Australia under the motto "NATO ground troops in Kosova." (BBC) |
| Apr 8, 1999 |
The Democratic League of Kosova [LDK] reacts negatively to the unilateral proclamation of the government of Kosova, backed by the Kosovo Liberation Army and led by Hashim Thaci. In an LDK public statement signed by Hafiz Gagica, this decision is described as hasty.(BBC) |
| Apr 13, 1999 |
The 19 foreign ministers of NATO vow after an emergency session to intensify the air war against Yugoslav military forces until President Slobodan Milosevic gives in, as an allied airstrike on a strategic Serbian railway bridge left a passenger train in flames with heavy civilian casualties.(Los Angeles Times) |
| Apr 13, 1999 |
The Yugoslav parliament votes overwhelmingly to apply for membership of a confederation with Russia and Belarus. Vuk Draskovic, the Deputy Prime Minister who opposed the move, issues a warning that Nato's continued bombardment is helping to re-create a Cold War world which revives Moscow's historical dream of a port on the Adriatic.(The Times) |
| Apr 21, 1999 |
Britain hands over a first batch of intelligence reports and witness accounts alleging atrocities in Kosovo to the international war crimes tribunal in The Hague. Britain has information about 87 alleged crimes. It includes allegations of the systematic rape of women in camps. Nato has given details of at least one hotel in central Kosovo which has been turned into a brothel for Serb soldiers, in which hundreds of Kosovo Albanian women have been raped.(The Daily Telegraph) |
| Apr 23, 1999 |
Russian President Boris Yeltsin's special envoy on Yugoslavia, Viktor Chernomyrdin, tells ITAR-TASS that the Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic has agreed to an international presence in Kosovo under the auspices of the United Nations.(Agence France Presse) |
| Apr 25, 1999 |
NATO military leaders begin developing a plan for blocking Serb-bound oil.(Newsday) |
| Apr 28, 1999 |
Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott meets with two top Russian diplomats as efforts intensify to find a peaceful solution to a Balkan conflict. (The Washington Post) |
| Apr 29, 1999 |
The opposition leader Vuk Draskovic believes a UN force, possibly including Nato soldiers, would be acceptable to oversee the return of refugees.(Daily Mail) |
| Apr 29, 1999 |
Slobodan Milosevic sacks his controversial deputy premier Vuk Draskovic. (Daily Mail) |
| Apr 29, 1999 |
While Slobodan Milosevic keeps his distance from any Western-backed peace proposals for Kosovo, his wife's political party joins those forces seeking a compromise solution with the West. (The Independent) |
| Apr 29, 1999 |
The House takes a clear slap at President Clinton's handling of the Balkan crisis, voting to limit his ability to send ground troops into Yugoslavia and to reject a Senate resolution supporting NATO's air campaign.(Los Angeles Times) |
| Apr 30, 1999 |
NATO forces strike the headquarters of the Yugoslav army and the federal Interior Ministry. Witnesses say, missiles also hit a residential district, injuring four people and damaging two houses. Other targets near Belgrade are under fire, including an oil refinery. In Pristina, the capital of Kosovo, two loud explosions have been heard shortly after midnight. (Los Angeles Times) |
| Apr 30, 1999 |
Yugoslavia files accusations with the World Court in The Hague that 10 NATO states are violating international law with the airstrikes. Going before the U.N.'s highest judicial body, Yugoslavia demands an immediate end to the bombardment. The White House and State Department dismisses the move as "absurd."(Los Angeles Times) |
| Apr 30, 1999 |
More than 6,500 refugees arrive in Macedonia. According to UN and Macedonian reports, three refugees, including a 12-year-old girl were killed when a mine exploded as they attemptted to cross from Kosovo northwest of Blace, Macedonia.(Los Angeles Times) |
| Apr 30, 1999 |
In Greece, anti-NATO protesters hold up a trainload of British troops and military equipment headed for neighboring Macedonia, then fool another convoy passing through Salonika by switching road signs and diverting the trucks and all-terrain vehicles in the wrong direction.(Los Angeles Times) |
| Apr 30, 1999 |
U.N. officials fear that many or most of about 200 ethnic Albanian men pulled from columns of fleeing ethnic Albanians by Yugoslav forces were later slain. Refugees crossing into Albania later reported seeing more than 100 bodies near the Kosovo villages of Meja and Oriza. "If this is correct, it would be one of the single biggest atrocities" of the conflict, says Ray Wilkinson of the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.(Los Angeles Times) |
| Apr 30, 1999 |
The passage of the Migration Legislation Amendment (Temporary Safe Haven Visas) Bill 1999 through the Senate gives effect to the Government's commitment on 6 April 1999 to provide temporary safe haven for 4,000 persons displaced from their homes in Kosovo. (M2 Presswire) |
| May 3, 1999 |
The KLA sends NATO location details on the Serbs artillery positions. The KLA hopes massive strikes will destroy Serb positions south of the town of Decani, to allow rebels from Albania pushing east to link up with other units based around the town of Glojane who are now pushing west. (?) |
| May 3, 1999 |
International monitors and diplomats say the KLA remains a jumble of small units. The KLA has neither the experience nor weapons to attack. The KLA has been formed by the Patriotic League of Kosovo (PLK), a party made up of exiles based in Switzerland and Germany who since 1981 have agitated for armed resistance.(?) |
| May 5, 1999 |
Ibrahim Rugova, the top moderate ethnic Albanian leader from Kosovo, holds talks with Italian prime minister Massimo D'alema and foreign minister Lamberto Dini. The arrival of Rugova and his family in Italy refutes rumors of his arrest by Yugoslav government.(Xinhua News Agency) |
| May 6, 1999 |
Macedonian officials abruptly shut the border to newly arriving refugees from Yugoslavia, demanding that other nations do more to pay for the Balkan crisis.(Los Angeles Times) |
| May 8, 1999 |
NATO missle accidentally hits the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade. (Japan Economic Newswire) |
| May 14, 1999 |
The head of Kosovo's rebel-backed government, Hashim Thaci, says Kosovo only has one government and that is the provisional government of Kosovo, which he heads. He says his government enjoys international support and respect, unlike the " government" of Premier in exile Bujar Bukoshi, which he describes as a "mafia-communist clique".(BBC) |
| May 15, 1999 |
Serbian opposition leader Zoran Djindjic says that Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic must accept the peace plan for Kosovo. He adds there would be no viable future for Serbia with Milosevic in power.(BBC) |
| May 15, 1999 |
Bulgarian President Petur Stoyanov says Yugoslavia should be surrounded in the future by a "security belt" of countries with democratic systems and parallel economic development. Speaking at a conference on the future of the Balkans, he also proposes that the external debts of Yugoslavia's neighbours be waived in proportion to the losses they suffered in the Kosovo conflict. (BBC) |
| May 18, 1999 |
About a dozen Serbian cities are hit by NATO air strikes that result in widespread damage on a number of targets. There are no immediate reports of casualties. (Deutsche Presse Agentur) |
| May 19, 1999 |
China demands an immediate end to the NATO bombing in Yugoslavia, and accuses the foreign media of demonishing Yugoslavia to cloak expansionism by Western powers. (The Irish Times) |
| May 23, 1999 |
NATO’s spokesman Jamie Shea says, NATO has destroyed a third of Yugoslavia's heavy artillery and more than 100 Yugoslav air force jets after 60 days of bombing. (Agence France Presse) |
| May 25, 1999 |
Thousands of anti-war protesters, many of them soldiers who have deserted their posts in Kosovo, take to the streets in southern and central Serbia demanding the return of conscript troops from the war-torn province. Despite the efforts of two senior Yugoslav army generals to defuse the growing tension, about 2,000 people assemble in front of the municipal hall in Krusevac to protest against attempts to enforce a regional call-up. Other demonstrations are reported in Aleksandrovac and Raska. The protests have become a persistent source of internal dissent against the government and the army.(The Guardian) |
| May 28, 1999 |
Slobodan Milosevic is officially indicted as a war criminal. (Daily Mail) |
| Jun 4, 1999 |
The Serbian parliament, which is firmly under the control of Mr. Milosevic, votes to accept the peace principles put forth by Russia and the seven leading industrial nations. The plan calls for a "complete verifiable withdrawal of all Yugoslav military, police, and paramilitary forces" from Kosovo. It also calls for the introduction of "an international security presence with the essential involvement of NATO."(The Christian Science Monitor) |
| Jun 8, 1999 |
Chinese President Jiang Zemin and Russian counterpart Boris Yeltsin agree by telephone that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) should immediately stop air strikes against Yugoslavia. (Japan Economic Newswire) |
| Jun 9, 1999 |
In Germany, where the Group of Eight representatives drafted the UN resolution, US Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright and the Russian foreign minister, Igor Ivanov, dispute what they have signed. Albright says the resolution stipulates that "NATO will be the military leader" of the force. But Ivanov says Russian troops, which may number 10,000, would not be under NATO command, and insists that all matters for the peacekeeping force are "a subject of negotiations."(The Boston Globe) |
| Jun 9, 1999 |
Ethnic Albanians who fled Kosovo say that Serb officials have taken their identification papers as they left, saying they would never come back. US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright says, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees has provided refugees with new identification papers.(The Boston Globe) |
| Jun 9, 1999 |
Yugoslav and NATO negotiators reach a final agreement on procedures for Serb forces to withdraw from Kosovo and for international peacekeeping troops to enter the troubled province. Yugoslavia will be allowed to return "several hundred" troops to Kosovo to exercise sovereignty over religious sites significant to Serbian Orthodox Christians. Kosovo will win a measure of autonomy under the peace accord, but it remains a part of Serbia. The first NATO troops to enter Kosovo are to be British troops now deployed in Macedonia under Jackson's command. U.S. troops from Albania are also to participate in the advance guard.(Deutsche Presse Agentur) |
| Jun 9, 1999 |
The Pentagon releases evidence showing Serb forces exhuming 143 graves of massacre victims near the Kosovo town of Izbica and transporting the bodies elsewhere to conceal evidence of war crimes.(Deutsche Presse Agentur) |
| Jun 9, 1999 |
The group of G-8 approved in Cologne, Germany, the UN draft resolution on ending the war in Kosovo. The resolution was sent to NATO and the UN. It established the broad outlines of an UN-mandated international security force in Kosovo and gave NATO sole command of the peacekeeping force. The resolution also envisaged that the KFOR, the NATO-led peace-implementation force, march into Kosovo when Serb forces leave the province, and establish a civilian administration. The administration would help to deal with land mines and bring back the 860,000 ethnic Albanian refugees residing at that time in neighboring Macedonia and Albania. NATO and the UN security Council are committed to demilitarize the rebels and preserve Kosovo’s status as a sovereign part of Yugoslavia (Los Angeles Times). |
| Jun 10, 1999 |
NATO suspended its air campaign against Yugoslavia. NATO and Yugoslav commanders announced that they had reached an agreement on ending the war over Kosovo. Serbian troops began pull out. The Kosovo rebels fighting Serb troops declared a cease-fire. UN Security Council voted to authorize an international force to move into Kosovo. The resolution called for the UN to create an interim administration that would give its residents "substantial autonomy" from Belgrade and lay the ground for a future autonomous government. (The Buffalo News). |
| Jun 10, 1999 |
Andre Gerilymatos, director of the Research Institute on South Eastern Europe at Simon Fraser University, argues that the Kosovo peace accord will not offer practical solution to the Kosovar crisis. Gerilymatos outlines the following reasons for that a) NATO rules out Kosovo’s partition; b) KLA is unlikely to give up its fight for independence; c) KLA is unlikely to disarm; d) significant number of KLA guerrillas remain in Albania and Macedonia, determined to continue the war on two fronts (The Ottawa Citizen). |
| Jun 10, 1999 |
The G-8 foreign ministers fail to arrange the issue on the role of the Russian troops in Kosovo when hammering out the UN draft resolution in Cologne. The Russians have offered to contribute up to 10,000 troops. The Kosovo Liberation Army says that ethnic Albanians may be afraid to return to an area controlled by such a large Russian force. Washington hopes to work out an arrangement modeled on the peacekeeping force in Bosnia in which the Russian troops indirectly report to a NATO general. (International Herlad Tribune) |
| Jun 10, 1999 |
U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright is urging ethnic Albanian refugees not to take revenge on Serbs who elect to remain in Kosovo after Yugoslav forces withdraw from the Serbian province.(United Press International) |
| Jun 11, 1999 |
Foreign ministers from the G8, meet in Cologne to forge a 'Stability Pact" for south-east Europe. Sums running into billions of dollars will be worked out at a later conference. The EU and the US are each bracing themselves for a $ 1bn ( pounds 625m) a year bill for Kosovo's reconstruction for the next five years. Estimates of the total cost of rebuilding the Balkans, including aid to Albania and Macedonia, vary widely from $ 20bn ( pounds 12.5bn) to $ 100bn (pounds 62.5bn). The G8 reaffirm its commitment to keeping all civilian affairs in Kosovo under the control of a representative of the UN secretary-general, Kofi Annan.(The Guardian) |
| Jun 14, 1999 |
Two Serbs were killed and a German soldier was wounded in the first incidents of armed violence between the NATO-led peacekeepers and Yugoslav forces since the beginning of the mission of the international community in Kosovo. British troops in Pristina shot to death a man believed to be an off-duty police officer who had opened fire at them. In Prizren, one Serb was killed after German troops came under heavy sniper fire. A German soldier was wounded in the arm. (Los Angeles Times) |
| Jun 14, 1999 |
Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott acknowledges in Moscow that Russian peacekeeping forces should have an area of responsibility in Kosovo. However, he does not conclude an agreement to solve the issues of who will command the 10,000 Russian peacekeeping troops expected to be sent to Kosovo. A White House spokesman says, Clinton and Yeltsin talk by phone agreeing to let Russian and U.S. generals decide on the role of Russian troops in Pristina.(Los Angeles Times) |
| Jun 15, 1999 |
State Duma speaker Gennady Seleznyov tells Interfax that the Russian peacekeeping units in Yugoslavia will receive orders only from the Russian Defense Ministry and coordinate their activities with the NATO command. Seleznyov says, the disarmament of the Kosovo Liberation Army must be implemented. "There will be no peace without this." (Interfax Russian News) |
| Jun 19, 1999 |
Russian negotiators and US established in Helsinki the outlines of an accord on the role of Russian troops in KFOR. Final package is expected to settle the dispute over Pristina airfield, where Russian troops scored a publicity coup by arriving ahead of NATO troops (Financial Times). |
| Jun 21, 1999 |
At a G-8 summit in Cologne, the leaders of the seven industrial countries, including Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the US, as well as President of Russia Boris Yeltzin, agreed at a multi-billion pound package for the Balkans, known as Stability Pact. The details of the plan would be worked out during the following three months at a series of meetings involving the European Commission, the World Bank, IMF, the European Investment Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. The rebuilding of the region was estimated to cost about $60 billion. This sum of money did not include the cost of maintaining a large-peace keeping force on the ground (The Irish Times). |
| Jun 23, 1999 |
It is reported that NATO had 19,000 troops in Kosovo, another 10,000 at a logistic base in Macedonia, and another 8,000 in Albania. Former Serb-dominated civilian administration reportedly collapsed in Kosovo. KLA is trying to replace it in a bid to become the de facto provincial government (The Guardian). |
| Jun 27, 1999 |
Lt.Gen.Michael Jackson, a British commander responsible for enforcing peace in Kosovo said that a guerrilla war was likely to break out in the province within weeks. KFOR struggled to prevent anarchy in Kosovo where fighting continued between the KLA and Serb factions. "The Dayton settlement at least provided Bosnia with a constitution", Jackson said. "The final status of Kosovo has yet to be defined" (Scotland on Sunday). |
| Jun 29, 1999 |
Members of the Kosovo rebel force gathered at NATO-designated assembly points to begin handing in weapons under a demilitarization deal with international peacekeeping forces. Rebels have 30 days to deliver weapons. In an effort to curb lawlessness, German peacekeepers imposed a curfew on Prizren (The Buffalo News). |
| Jul 17, 1999 |
Ethnic Albanian leader Rugova boycotted the inaugural meeting of UN-sponsored government council. The council composed of ethnic Albanians, Serbs and other minority representatives. The council decided to endorse joint inspections of tense areas in Kosovo. In March 1998 ethnic Albanian leaders appointed Hashim Thaqi, the KLA’s top political officer, as the prime minister of a new provisional government (The Washington Post). Thaqi’s Party for Democratic Progress is known to be strong throughout the province, while Rugova’s Democratic League of Kosovo is popular in Pristina (The Daily Telegraph). |
| Aug 8, 1999 |
KFOR peacekeepers raid the KLA’s Ministry of Public Order to confiscate smuggled weapon, cash and unauthorized police identity cards (The Independent). The German troops reopened the jail in their sector and imprisoned 80 suspects for murder, rape and theft (The New York Times). |
| Nov 1, 1999 |
Albania experienced a new political crisis as a result of the fall of reform-minded Prime Minister Pandeli Majko. Majko opposed change of borders at a time when all-Albanian movement insisted on Kosovo independence (The Plain Dealer). |
| Jan 31, 2000 |
Serbian Renewal Movement in Macedonia (SRM) said that the contacts between the Macedonian and the Kosovar Albanians were intensifying and aimed at creating Greater Albania. At their visit to Bulgaria, Thaci and Xhaferi reiterated demands for Kosovo’s full secession from Serbia (The Gazette). |
| Feb 10, 2000 |
Defense Secretary William Cohen criticized Europe for not contributing enough money and civilian police to the Balkan region (The Christian Science Monitor). The situation in Kosovo is gaining renewed attention because of increasing violence in the Kosovar city of Mitrovica and infiltration of Kosovar guerrillas from Kosovo into Serbia (The Guardian). |
| Feb 27, 2000 |
15 Albanian insurgents and five Serbian policemen were killed in recent fighting near Presevo, Medvedja and Bujanovac, home of some 70,000 Albanians in southern Serbia. The insurgents were a radical splinter group within KLA, which was massing near the Kosovar southeastern border and planned offensive against the Yugoslav forces in southern Serbia. NATO sources in Brussels said that KFOR aimed to "seal off" the Kosovar border and admitted that contingency plans were made for fresh conflagrations (Sunday Times). Violence was also reported in neighboring Macedonia (The Daily Telegraph). |
| Mar 17, 2000 |
NATO officials and US put diplomatic pressure on Kosovo leaders warning them not to support the insurgency outside Kosovo. NATO and US also tried to discourage hopes that NATO may intervene on behalf of ethnic Albanians outside Kosovo (The Houston Chronicle). |
| Mar 20, 2000 |
In Kosovo, tension between ethnic Serbs and Albanians living in the racially divided city of Mitrovica remains. Leaders of the local Serb community in Pristina announced that they would not participate in an UN-led interim government until attacks against ethnic Serbs stop (The Ottawa Citizen). |
| Mar 28, 2000 |
The CIA announced evidence of a Serb plot to assassinate Lord Robertson, the Secretary General of NATO. Serbian military activity in the north of Kosovo reportedly increased as the first anniversary of operation Allied Force neared (The Daily Telegraph). |
| Mar 31, 2000 |
Pentagon announced that an additional 125 US soldiers would be sent to Kosovo to help monitor a border area in southern Serbia (The Seattle Times). |
| Jul 27, 2000 |
It is reported that ethnic Albanians cleansed Kosovo from Serbs, Roma, Jews, Muslims, Slavs and other minorities. Those remaining are forced to live in ghettos, and are deprived of security, freedom of movement and the right to work. Their homes are looted and burned and their property is seized (The Independent). |
| Oct 2000 |
Ibrahim Rugova’s Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK) won municipal elections in Kosovo with 58% (Financial Times). Rugova was quoted as saying that a vote for LDK was a vote for independence. The other two parties that took part in the elections, Thaqi’s Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK), and Haradinaj’s Alliance for the Future of Kosovo (AAK), sprang out of the former KLA. They too, are determined to achieve independence. Kosovo’s final status is expected to be discussed in a month at Zagreb regional summit. Kosovar leaders indicated that they might renew armed struggle against Serbia if independence is denied (The Scotsman). |
| Oct 6, 2000 |
Presidential elections held in Yugoslavia. Opposition candidate Vojislav Kostunica won the elections. President Milosevic contested Kostunica’s victory and thereby provoked civil uprising. President Bill Clinton ruled out US military intervention in Yugoslavia’s civil uprising. US administration officials urged Russia to use its influence to persuade President Milosevic to step aside. Russian President Vladimir Putin did not recognized Vojislav Kostunica as the winner of the Yugoslav elections (Three Star Edition). |
| Oct 8, 2000 |
Vojslav Kostunica became the newly elected Yugoslav president. President Milosevic conceded defeat (St.Louis Post-Dispatch). |
| Oct 17, 2000 |
UN police statistics reports 430 murders in Kosovo for the second half of 1999. Another 205 murders were committed in 2000. Many of them were ethnically motivated (Los Angeles Times). |
| Oct 26, 2000 |
Representatives of the European Union and state leaders of all Balkan countries met in Macedonia (The Washington Post). The Yugoslav President Vojslav Kostunica reaffirmed Yugoslavia’s territorial claims to Kosovo and promised cooperation with Yugoslavia’s Balkan neighbors (The Scotsman). |
| Oct 26, 2000 |
Serbian President Milan Milutinovic dissolved Serbian Parliament dominated by loyalists of Slobodan Milosevic. Outgoing Parliament speaker Dragan Tomic set new general elections for 23 December (St.Louis Post-Dispatch). |
| Nov 2, 2000 |
Yugoslavia rejoined the UN after 8 years of suspended membership (Los Angeles Times). |
| Nov 24, 2000 |
Clashes between Yugoslav policemen and ethnic Albanians near the Yugoslav border with Kosovo took the life of four Yugoslav policemen. Two other political killings were reported in Pristina, Kosovo. It was decided that the EU Balkan summit, opening that day in the Croatian capital of Zagreb, would not discuss the Kosovo situation (Financial Times). |
| Dec 17, 2000 |
The new Yugoslav government announced its intention to reestablish diplomatic ties with Albania. Official relationships between the two countries were severed during the Kosovar conflict. To avoid exclusion of ethnic Serbs living in Kosovo, Yugoslavia suggested that the West should not support holding elections for Kosovo-wide assembly in the spring. Yugoslav foreign minister Svilanovic said, his government was trying to calm down tension in the Presevo Valley, an area of Serbia adjacent to Kosovo (The Washington Post). |
| Dec 21, 2000 |
Kosovar guerrillas infiltrated a 5km demilitarized zone on the Serbian side of the Kosovar border. UN condemned violence of Albanian extremists in south Serbia and asked them to disband and leave. Yugoslav President Kostunica said that NATO led peacekeeping force in Kosovo had failed to prevent the guerrillas from crossing the border. Kostunica suggested that the security zone between Kosovo and south Serbia be narrowed. Smuggling of arms from Kosovo into the Presevo valley (Serbia) is continuing (Financial Times). |
| Jan 26, 2001 |
British troops patrolling the Kosovo-Yugoslav border came under fire from suspected Albanian gunmen. The gunmen retreated back into southern Serbia. Albanian guerrillas claimed responsibility for a rocket attack on a police station in Macedonia. KLA headquarters signed the statement. It hinted at more attacks (The Times). |
| Feb 17, 2001 |
Seven Serbs died and more than 40 were injured when a Serb bus escorted by a NATO convoy in Kosovo drove over a powerful explosive device. Senior NATO officials said the attack was carried out by extremist Albanians in protest at closer links between NATO and Belgrade. Within an hour of the attack, Serbs living in heavily guarded enclaves inside Kosovo started attacking any Albanians they came across (The Scotsman). |
| Feb 18, 2001 |
Kosovar extremists killed three Serb policemen in a south Serbian buffer zone. An Albanian commander was killed and two rebels wounded later in the day. Sporadic fighting was reported (The Scotsman). Senior Belgrade official urged the international community to act quickly to curb an ethnic Albanian rebellion in southern Serbia.Yugoslavia presented to NATO and OSCE a peace plan for south Serbia. Despite KFOR monitoring, hundreds of members of the self-proclaimed Liberation Army of Presevo, Bujanovac and Medvedja (UCPMB) infiltrated the buffer zone of the Kosovo-Serbian border. The new military organization of the ethnic Albanians is named after the three villages that launched the rebellion against Belgrade (The Scotsman). |
| Feb 19, 2001 |
Ethnic Albanians clashed with a military patrol in Macedonia. Rebels from the Liberation Army of Presevo, Bujanovac and Medvedja (UCPMB), and those from the Army for National Liberation (of Macedonia?) (NLA), claimed responsibility for the attacks. Due to increasing violence Macedonia put its troops on alert along the border with Kosovo (The Scotsman). |
| Feb 24, 2001 |
A regular Balkan summit held in Skopje, Macedonia. It aimed to promote economic cooperation and closer ties with the EU. Chris Patten, EU commissioner for external affairs said, international aid for Kosovo would be reduced if cross-border attacks against security forces in southern Serbia continue. Javier Solana, EU foreign policy chief said, Kosovo’s chances for winning autonomy from Serbia would be affected if violence continue in the Presevo valley. Vojislav Kostunica urged the international community to abolish the buffer zone on the grounds that it had become a base for terrorist activity (Financial Times). |
| Feb 25, 2001 |
Macedonian sources named the former KLA commander and leader of the Alliance for Kosovo, Ramush Haradinaj, as organizing incursions in Macedonia. Ethnic Albanian representatives instead maintain that alienated former Albanian fighters who do not have clear political goals organize incursions. Intelligence reports from Serbia and Macedonia, confirmed the creation of the National Liberation Army, a new military group of ethnic Albanians. Macedonian and Serbian Ministers discussed joint military interventions to drive out Albanian guerrillas (The Observer). |
| Feb 28, 2001 |
Because of growing evidence that Albanian separatist guerrillas are using the buffer zone around Kosovo to stage incursions into southern Serbia NATO agreed to start dismantling the zone. Hombach, special coordinator of the Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe, asked NATO to increase security along Macedonia’s border (Financial Times). In the meantime, ethnic Albanian militants fought separate battles with Serb and Macedonian forces. In the Presevo valley in Serbia, ethnic Albanian rebels clashed with Serb forces near Bujanovac. Albanian fighters occupying the Macedonian village of Tanusevci exchanged fire with Macedonian army units. (The Daily Telegraph). |
| Mar 2, 2001 |
Macedonian parliament ratified a long-awaited border treaty with Serbia. On the ground that political parties in Kosovo were not consulted the small opposition Albanian Party for Democratic Prosperity voted against ratification. Some observers believed that the initiating of the border accord might have triggered recent violations of the Macedonian border (Financial Times). |
| Mar 6, 2001 |
The Albanian government condemned the violence in Macedonia and appealed to Kosovo’s Albanian political leaders to distance themselves from it (The Daily Telegraph). KFOR and Macedonian military officials met in Skopje, the Macedonian capital, to discuss Macedonia’s military plans aimed at clearing out guerrillas. Simultaneously, NATO was engaged in talks with Belgrade on preventing insurgents entering the buffer zone between Kosovo and southern Serbia (The Guardian). |
| Mar 6, 2001 |
Yugoslavia expressed readiness to negotiate a cease-fire in the Presevo valley. Albanian political leaders called for expansion of the NATO buffer zone and an internationally supervised demilitarization of the valley. This would mean extending Kosovo’s protected status to southern Serbia (The Daily Telegraph). |
| Mar 9, 2001 |
American peacekeepers opened fire on Kosovar Albanian guerrillas near the border with Macedonia. Peacekeepers crossed into Macedonia to take over positions held by the rebels fighting Macedonian forces. While US officials denied those claims they acknowledged that there was confusion about the border (Star Tribune). |
| Mar 10, 2001 |
Ethnic Albanian rebels launched separate attacks on the Macedonian and the Yugoslav forces killing two people and wounding another three (The Washington Post). In the first assault, rebels attacked Macedonian forces in Brest. The attack prompted Macedonia to close its border with Kosovo. Elsewhere, insurgents attacked Yugoslav police in Lucane, in the Presevo Valley of southern Serbia. A Serbian policeman was killed and six people were wounded. The two attacks heightened concern that NATO-led peacekeepers and US could be drawn into a new Balkan conflict (St.Louis Post-Dispatch). Yugoslav leaders and some Western analysts said that a recent wave of guerrilla raids in southern Serbia and northern Macedonia was aimed at derailing the rapidly improving ties between NATO and the new democracies in the Balkans. |
| Mar 11, 2001 |
NATO let Yugoslavia send troops into the NATO-patrolled buffer zone separating Kosovo from Serbia (USA Today). A specially created Yugoslav task force would be sent into the buffer strip at the Serbian-Macedonian border (Sunday Telegraph). NATO’s bid to negotiate a cease-fire between ethnic Albanian rebels and Yugoslav forces in Southern Serbia collapsed. Ethnic Albanian gunmen launched a fresh attack on Serb forces in the town of Lucane (St.Louis Post-Dispatch; The Times). Separate talks on the deployment of Serb troops along the Macedonian border are underway between the commander of the international force in Kosovo, Lt-Gen Carlo Cabagiosu, and the Yugoslav authorities (The Independent). |
| Mar 12, 2001 |
Rebel commander Shefket Musliu said, he signed a 20-day cease-fire in buffer zone. Nebojsa Covic, a deputy Prime Minister of Serbia signed the truce separately. Musliu said however that rebels opposed to Yugoslav army entering the zone, and he could not take responsibility for possible shooting at Serbs (The Toronto Star, 13 March). |
| Mar 17, 2001 |
NATO said, its peacekeepers were setting up patrols along Kosovo's border to block ethnic Albanian guerrillas from crossing into Macedonia (The Washington Post). About 5,000 Albanians gathered in Presevo’s sports stadium to protest at the return of Serb military (The Guardian, March 19). |
| Mar 20, 2001 |
Amid concern that Macedonian government would not be able to defeat Albanian insurgents, NATO asked member states to send more troops to Kosovo (Financial Times). |
| Mar 22, 2001 |
In an attempt to stabilize the former Yugoslav republic of Macedonia, NATO ambassadors agreed to send more troops to Kosovo (Financial Times). During their visit to Pristina the EU envoys, Chris Patten and Javier Solana, held extensive talks with the chief of UN administration in Kosovo, as well as with Ibrahim Rugova, Hacim Thaci and Ramush Haradinaj, leaders of the Kosovar Albanians (mediapool.bg). |
| Mar 23, 2001 |
At a meeting with senior EU envoys, three top ethnic Albanian political leaders initially refused to sign a short statement drafted by the envoys that criticized the guerrillas for resorting to violence in Macedonia. Kosovo Albanian leaders eventually called on "extremist groups" in Macedonia to lay down their arms and return home (The Washington Post; Independent, 24 March). 6,000 Albanian students took to the streets in Pristina to assail the Macedonian government and voice solidarity with the guerrillas across the border. For first time Macedonia admitted attacking guerrilla positions inside Kosovo (The Guardian, 24 March). |
| Mar 25, 2001 |
Powerful Albanian clans in Macedonia and Kosovo are behind the insurgency in Macedonia, The Sunday Telegraph reports. The Albanian ultra-nationalists in the two areas maintain close links and will offer peace in Macedonia as the price for the international recognition of an independent Kosovo, the newspaper argues (The Ottawa Citizen). |
| Mar 27, 2001 |
Hundreds of refugees arrived in southern Kosovo from Macedonia. Astrid van Genderen Stort, spokesman for UNHCR in Kosovo said, the fighting in Macedonia threatens to cause another crisis of displacement in the Balkans" (The Scotsman). |
| Mar 27, 2001 |
Britain’s elite Special Air Service (SAS) troops were deployed to Kosovo to arrest nearly two dozen Albanian men suspected of involvement in a bus bombing in the province. After a surveillance operation Special Air Service team recently arrested 22 Albanians. Following initial questioning four of them were detained. Detainees were members of the Kosovo Protection Force (KPF). KPF is the western-backed civil defense organization that sprang out of KLA. KPF receives funding and training in human rights, first aid, fire-fighting and language skills from Britain, the EU, the US and the UN. Links between the KPC and organized crime and political violence are an open secret in Kosovo. NATO forces in Kosovo meanwhile detained 17 suspected members of the Albanian National Liberation Army. |
| Mar 28, 2001 |
NATO forces seized a large cache of arms in southern Kosovo. British soldiers are making widespread weapons searches and are watching closely a guerrilla training center in the Presevo Valley, run by the UCPMB. Guerrillas have been moving supplies since KFOR allowed Serbian forces to re-enter the buffer zone between Kosovo and Serbia (The Independent). |
| Mar 29, 2001 |
Four hundred British and Scandinavian troops with armored vehicles and artillery moved into a tense sector of Kosovo’s border with Macedonia to support KFOR’s efforts aimed to prevent the flow of arms and men to Albanian rebels in Macedonia (The Daily Telegraph). |
| Mar 30, 2001 |
Fighting between Macedonian forces and Albanian rebels spilled over into Kosovo, wounding sixteen people and killing three, among them a television producer working for The Associated Press. One mortar attack nearly missed international peacekeepers patrolling the Kosovo side of the border. The Macedonian government denied that its forces were responsible for the shelling and said it was sending a commission to investigate the two incidents (The New York Times). |
| Mar 31, 2001 |
UN officials began investigations into the shelling of Krivenik, a Kosovo village near the Macedonian border. Some 1,000 Kosovo Albanians took part in a protest march to Krivenik condemning Macedonia for the deaths (The Irish Times). |
| Apr 1, 2001 |
The United Nations is to dismiss 2,000 members of the Kosovo Protection Force (KPF). KPF is the province’s Albanian-run local police. The move heralds fears that former KPF officers will destabilize the region by joining the National Liberation Army (NLA) which is engaged in clashes with Macedonian government across the border (Sunday Times). |
| Apr 2, 2001 |
Former President of Yugoslavia Slobodan Milosevic was arrested on charges of diverting state customs revenues. The EU and the US insist that Serbia’s new rulers eventually hand Milosevic over the to the international war crimes tribunal in the Hague. Observers believe that Milosevic’ arrest was motivated by Belgrade’s need in support from the West in handling current political challenges. Among them the most pressing are Belgrade’s need in economic aid; the low-intensity guerrilla war waged by ethnic Albanians in southern Serbia; Belgrade’s relations with the United Nations-administered Kosovo; as well as, Montenegro’s steady drift towards independence (Financial Times). |
| Apr 3, 2001 |
Moderate Kosovar leader Ibrahim Rugova recommended Macedonia to talk with representatives of the Army for National Liberation (mediapool.bg). Secretary of State Colin Powell ensured that US aid to Belgrade will continue certifying that Yugoslavia has been cooperating with the UN war crimes tribunal in the Netherlands. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said that the US "would expect" Yugoslavia to deliver Milosevic to the tribunal (St.Louis Post-Dispatch). |
| Apr 6, 2001 |
Serbian Justice Minister Vladan Batic said that Milosevic’ extradition to the Hague should be preceded by presenting his arrest warrant to the Yugoslav federal authorities. Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica said Milosevic would not be shipped to the tribunal because such transfer violates federal laws. Mr. Batic called on the UN body to indict the leader of the Kosovar Albanians (The Ottawa Citizen). |
| Apr 8, 2001 |
President Kostunica announced the creation of a South African-style Truth and Reconciliation committee to address issues of war crimes. It will call witnesses who will be compelled to testify about crimes committed by and against Serbs (Scotland on Sunday). |
| Apr 12, 2001 |
A peacekeeping unit in Kosovo came under attack near the Serb-Kosovar buffer strip. Several peacekeepers were wounded and a Russian soldier was killed. Tensions between Kosovar nationalists and the NATO led peacekeepers heightened as the Western alliance came to cooperate with the Yugoslav army (The Washington Post). NATO-led peacekeepers in Kosovo detained 12 Albanians coming from Albania who were suspected of belonging to a guerrilla group in neighboring Macedonia (Los Angeles Times). |
| Apr 14, 2001 |
As part of a NATO-backed operation to neutralize Albanian guerrillas, Yugoslav troops begin to deploy in another section of the Kosovo-Yugoslav buffer strip. The move was approved by NATO ambassadors as the latest phase of a plan to allow a gradual return of Yugoslav forces to the 3-mile wide buffer zone (The San Diego Union-Tribune). The Yugoslav forces have yet to be let into the most contentious area in the most southerly part of Serbia, where guerrillas are operating (The San Diego Union-Tribune 15 April). The Contact Group ministerial meeting in Paris took a decision to hold elections in Kosovo that year. Elections will be part of a plan to provide a political road map for the province and forestall calls for independence from Serbia (Financial Times). |
| Apr 16, 2001 |
After weeks of NATO mediation between Serb authorities and insurgents Albanian rebels released two Yugoslav soldiers. A day before UCBMP set free another three Serb civilians held since early March (Milwaukee Journal Sentinel). |
| Apr 19, 2001 |
A bomb went off near Yugoslav government offices in Pristina killing one Serb and injuring four others. Yugoslav authorities blamed ethnic Albanian rebels and demanded action by the UN. No arrests were made immediately (Los Angeles Times). |
| Apr 22, 2001 |
A Yugoslav court martial trying three of its own soldiers disclosed that during the war in Kosovo the Yugoslav army deployed a unit for burning bodies and erasing any trace of Albanian murder (The Observer). |
| Apr 23, 2001 |
Milo Djukanovic became the newly elected Montenegrin president. Analysts say, Djukanovic’ marginal majority, as well as the Contact Group’s threat to withhold aid, would limit the new president’s room to maneuver in his promised referendum on independence from Serbia. Montenegro’s independence would end the Yugoslav federation and would give Kosovans incentives to follow the move (Financial Times). |
| Apr 25, 2001 |
Foreign Secretary Robin Cook went on a two-day visit to Kosovo and Montenegro to deliver a message suggesting the improvement of relationships with Serbia and abandoning ideas for independence. Speaking after meeting with Albanian leaders, Cook insisted that UN Resolution 1244, the basis of Kosovo’s administrative status, did not provide for independence (The Independent). The Yugoslav Army investigates 245 officers and soldiers for crimes committed during the war in Kosovo. The crimes include deprivation of basic human rights-, injuries-, and deaths of civilians (The New York Times). |
| Apr 26, 2001 |
Serbia freed 143 ethnic Albanian prisoners after Supreme Court ruled that their original mass trial had followed "faulty procedures". 281 ethnic Albanians are still in prison (The Independent). |
| Apr 29, 2001 |
The US government is negotiating the status of Camp Bondsteel, the US main base in Kosovo. Unconfirmed reports in Kosovo say, the US is seeking a 75 year lease for a 900-acre base (Independent on Sunday). |
| May 8, 2001 |
Hundreds of Macedonian Albanian villagers fled to Kosovo to escape fighting between Macedonian government and Albanian insurgents (The Independent). |
| May 10, 2001 |
During his visit to Washington President of Yugoslavia was warned that US aid to his country depends on Belgrade’s cooperation with the war-crime tribunal at the Hague. Kostunica assured the US that Belgrade would cooperate with the tribunal (USA Today). Kostunica confirmed that he was completing a draft extradition law that would allow Milosevic to be sent to the Hague. However Kostunica stopped short of promising to deliver the 10-year Serbian strongman (The Plain Dealer). Kostunica left for the US to receive a statesman of the year award from the East-West Institute in New York (Los Angeles Times, 10 May). |
| May 15, 2001 |
Hans Haekkerup, UN special representative in Kosovo said, the election for the Kosovo provisional self-government would be held on 17 November. The election will hand power from the UN, to the predominantly ethnic Albanian Kosovar population. The UN will retain presence after the election and promised to ensure compliance with UN Security Council Resolution 1244 (The Independent). The Serbian leadership in Kosovo rejected the constitutional framework proposed by the UN administration and declared, they would boycott the elections. Serb leaders wanted a veto in the parliament. In Belgrade, Serbia’s leaders called the plan a concession to Albanian separatists (The New York Times, 23 May). In the meantime ethnic Albanian rebels attacked Serbian police near the boundary with Kosovo (Los Angeles Times, 14 May). Serbian troops battled ethnic Albanian rebels forcing the guerrillas out of the Oraovica village along the border with Kosovo. The fighting came as NATO agreed, starting May 24, to allow the Yugoslav army into the final 20% of the Kosovo-Serbian buffer zone (Milwaukee Journal Sentinel). About 1,000 refugees crossed to Albanian-dominated Kosovo to escape the fighting (The New York Times, May 16). |
| May 17, 2001 |
Eighty suspected ethnic Albanian guerrillas from south Serbia surrendered to NATO in Kosovo. They took advantage of an amnesty intended to avert bloodshed in the neighboring Presevo valley area of Serbia (Los Angeles Times). |
| May 19, 2001 |
The UN administration in Kosovo cracked down on illegal border crossing. The move aimed at restricting the activities of guerrillas fighting in neighboring Macedonia and southern Serbia. The authorities are also preparing tough anti-terrorist laws that will let them outlaw proscribed groups. The proposed anti-terrorist law would allow the UN authorities to list banned groups and penalize any individual or companies dealing with them (Financial Times). |
| May 20, 2001 |
British troops began NATO’s missions in Kosovo aimed to oversee a return of the Yugoslav army to the border zone around the southern Serbian Presevo valley. International mediators gave Albanian guerrillas four days to leave the valley and return to Kosovo. The mission also aims to disarm and remove ethnic Albanian guerrillas (Sunday Times). |
| May 22, 2001 |
Following NATO’s assurance that the Serbian government would introduce democratic reforms in the region ethnic Albanian guerrillas in southern Yugoslavia signed a pact to disarm and disband no later than May 31, 2001 (The Washington Post). The collapse of the guerrilla movement paves the way for the Yugoslav forces to move into a 20-mile demilitarized zone along the border with Kosovo that the rebel army had been using as a base for their operations (The Guardian). KLA guerrillas are preparing to reinforce ethnic Albanian rebels fighting government forces in Macedonia (The Herald). |
| May 25, 2001 |
Several thousand Yugoslav troops moved on 24 May into the last, most critical part of a buffer zone separating Kosovo from Serbia (Star Tribune). |
| May 26, 2001 |
Yugoslav authorities tied Milosevic to war crimes (The Toronto Star). |
| Jun 3, 2001 |
Thousands of Albanian students took to Pristina’s streets to protest at the Yugoslav President’s planned visit to Kosovo (Independent on Sunday). |
| Jun 4, 2001 |
Serbian police began exhuming bodies recovered from the Danube River and thought to be Kosovo Albanians. That would link ousted leader Slobodan Milosevic to war crimes (Los Angeles Times). |
| Jun 6, 2001 |
Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica asked Montenegrin lawmakers in his coalition to pass a law that would enable Belgrade to extradite former president Slobodan Milosevic to the UN war crimes tribunal. Kostunica warned that Yugoslavia’s future depends on the passage of that law (USA Today). |
| Jun 8, 2001 |
International officials in Kosovo are considering a plan to return Serbian refugees to the province (The New York Times). |
| Jun 11, 2001 |
Albanians from the National Liberation Army seized control of land just a mile outside the Macedonian capital, Skopje. Thousands of ethnic Albanian refugees crossed from Macedonia into Kosovo at the weekend (The Guardian). |
| Jun 12, 2001 |
NATO-led peacekeepers in Kosovo detained 19 suspected members of the ethnic Albanian rebel army fighting government forces in Macedonia (Toronto Star). |
| Jun 15, 2001 |
On 13 June police released details of a mass grave found in the grounds of a police training college in the Belgrade suburb of Batajnica (The Guardian). An international tribunal for war crimes in Kosovo sentenced two Serbs for their role in killing ethnic Albanians (The Washington Post). The Yugoslav government agreed on a draft law on cooperation with the war crimes tribunal thereby moving closer to extraditing former Yugoslav President Milosevic to the Hague (The Guardian). |
| Jun 17, 2001 |
Yugoslav army and the Serbian police blame each other for organizing of a cover-up of war crimes in Kosovo. The relationships between the two institutions became tense following the past month discovery of a freezer truck in the river Danube, filled with the bodies of murdered women and children, victims of Kosovo war crimes (Independent on Sunday). |
| Jun 18, 2001 |
During his visit to Yugoslavia, President of Russia Putin said that Kosovo was the main cause of instability in the Balkans and urged that Albanian terrorists be completely disarmed (The New York Times). Putin also promised Kostunica that Russia would not cut off supplies of natural gas to Yugoslavia, despite Yugoslavia’s massive debts to Moscow (Los Angeles Times). |
| Mar 17 - 17, 2004 |
Thousands of armed Albanians clashed with Serbs following the deaths of two Albanian children who drowned after allegedly being tormented by a group of Serbs. 11 people died in the new violence. (The Daily Telegraph (London), 3/18/2004, "Kosovo in Flames as Albanians Renew War on Serbs") |
| Nov 3 - 3, 2004 |
An anti-discrimination law came into effect in Kosovo, the aim of which is to protect all persons from discrimination in employment, dismissal, pay, and education. (BBC Monitoring Europe- Political, 11/3/2004, "Anti-Discrimination Law Comes into Force in Kosovo") |
| Jan 21 - 21, 2006 |
Kosovar president Ibrahim Rugova passed away from lung cancer. Rugova was the head of the Democratic League of Kosovo, the first political party to challenge Serbia's communist regime. (The Irish Times, 1/28/2006, "A Force for Moderation in the Fight for Free Kosovo") |
| Oct 1 - 1, 2006 |
Serbia's government adopted a new Constitution that included a section detailing Serbia's claim to Kosovo. (The New York Times, 10/2/2006, "Serbia Asserts its Sovereignty Over Kosovo in Legislation") |
| Nov 28 - 28, 2006 |
Thousands protested the UN mission in Kosovo's lack of response to Albanian demands for an independent Kosovo. UN police responded with tear gas. (The Washington Post, 11/29/2006, "Ethnic Albanians Protest in Kosovo") |
