UNPROCLAIMED CURFEW

AIM Pristina, 24 February, 1998

It seems that it is now possible to speak with some precision about the purpose of the first phase of intensive movements of Serbian police and military forces, and heavy military and police vehicles around Kosovo, going on for several weeks already. The main destination was obviously Drenica, and as assumed, all these forces were concentrated around this region, and a part of them in Drenica itself. It is impossible to speak about the strength of the forces, but there has probably never been such accumulation of men in uniform and so much military equipment in any region in Kosovo, as now in the triangle between main roads Pristina-Mitrovica, Pristina-Pec and Pec-Mitrovica. This in fact is the region of Drenica in the broad sense.

Due to the lack of authentic information, it is possible to say only that it seems that a firm encirclement has already been formed around this region. However, according to the intensity of repression against the population in the north-western part of the triangle, which the Albanian sources are informing about every day, it can be assumed that the encirclement has not been reinforced in that part yet or that it is not operating as planned. This refers to the road Mitrovica-Peå, and Klina and certain points along that road, such as the villages Gornja Klina, Runik and Jasanica. As Albanian sources report, Serbian forces, assisted by the local Serb population, are applying in Jasanica and its surroundings all forms of terrorism and violence against the local Albanian population for days. A few nights ago, around a police barricade, that is, around a control point in Jasanica, intensive shooting from firearms could be heard. The reason for this is still unknown, nor who was shooting and at whom.

The Albanian sources also report about use of ruthless violence in some other villages in the encircled region, especially during raids and searches of houses and apartments. Passengers and pedestrians suffer the most. Pupils and students are also threatened, including elementary school pupils on their way to and from school. That is why the number of pupils attending school has been reduced, and there are reports that people are taking children to safer places. There is foundation to believe that control points are places where men from Drenica are hunted down. In such a situation, beating up and arrests are an inevitable accompanying phenomenon. There are also murders and mysterious disappearance of people.

All things considered, it seems that Drenica has started a life in police and military quarantine. Formally, movements of people in and out of the town and turnover of goods has not been banned, but it is becoming more and more difficult to travel. Dut to mistreatment wherever they go, blackmail, and even robberies, some private transportation enterprises are announcing they would interrupt transport of people along these roads. Albanian sources report about delays and difficulties in supplying the population with the necessary foodstuffs. In several points along all critical roads police barricades of sand and other solid material have been built, so that nobody can pass without being checked and double-checked by the police. Parts of the Albanian population of Klina municipality also live in quarantine, and inhabitants of all regions around Drenica seem to be in a somewhat more relaxed form of this mode of life.

It is possible to reconstruct an approximate, but essentially correct mosaic of everyday life of the inhabitants of Drenica. The impression is that majority of the population live in some kind of factual although undeclared state of war. The army and the police in heavy military vehicles are moving around Srbica, municipal centre which the Albanians call Skenderaj, and along main roads. But, for several months already, Serbian police forces are avoiding patrolling and their customary police operations in the country.

At this moment, the army-police encirclement is acting as a quarantine in order to prevent the "Drenica infection" from spreading. However, there are opinions that the encirclement is just one of the phases of an operation and that it has been established primarily in order to destroy armed Albanian guerrilla groups which are active in Drenica for quite some time.

It is difficult to say what would happen to the so-called civilian population in such an operation. We say the "so-called" because, according to the latest impressions, the formation which presents itself as the Liberation Army of Kosovo actually consists of groups of local population organized for self-protection and protection of the local population from major and minor police punitive expeditions. There is no doubt that these groups have full support of the local population and that it too, to a significant extent and in various ways, also participated and participates in self-protective action. It is considered that the local population could, at best, suffer "moderate" demolition of their houses and "reasonable" loss of human lives, as well as that they could experience massive intimidation in order to deny support to armed guerrilla groups and to break their will for resistance to Serbian rule in Kosovo.

However, like in all guerrilla conflicts, in the guerrilla resistance which is just coming in sight in Kosovo, these are just pure speculations. In such conflicts, many people in various uniforms would participate, as well as those without uniforms and it is highly questionable whether such operations could be held under control. Perhaps it is already possible to say that something like that is inconceivable in Kosovo, at least in the current situation. That is why doubts are not unfounded concerning feasibility of the mentioned military and police objectives with the so-called moderate use of force. In this context, the question becomes highly acute of the "justififiability" of losses of the Serbian party, human and material, in action which would have chances to succeed only partially.

If the only objective would be to keep the so-called guerrilla infection within the centre, that is, in the region where it was registered for the first time in its acute form, it is already possible to say that such an operation is inappropriate. Small and large uniformed, half-uniformed or ununiformed armed Albanian groups are active for some time, mostly as night patrols, in other Kosovo municipalities as well. In many Albanian villages there are the so-called self-protective night watches. They would not be needed if nights in Kosovo were not so insecure. But, who knows what they can turn into after long operation in the current conditions in Kosovo. Those who are more powerful feel safer at night, but since ordinary people have not or cannot have such feelings, life in Kosovo is slowly but surely transferring to the mode of an unproclaimed curfew.

AIM Pristina

Fehim REXHEPI

¸