YUGOSLAVIA: LUM HAXHIU, POLITICAL OFFICER FOR THE KOSOVO LIBERATION ARMY (KLA) SAYS FREEDOM IS NECESSARY PRECONDITION FOR PEACE

Record ID: 230450

  • Title: YUGOSLAVIA: LUM HAXHIU, POLITICAL OFFICER FOR THE KOSOVO LIBERATION ARMY (KLA) SAYS FREEDOM IS NECESSARY PRECONDITION FOR PEACE
  • Date: 6th July 1998
  • Summary: JUNIK, KOSOVO, YUGOSLAVIA (JULY 5, 1998) (RTV) 1. LV STREET SCENE WITH GROUP OF SOLDIERS STANDING AROUND AND PEOPLE WALKING ALONG ROAD 0.06 2. SLV ROOF TILES OF HOUSE DAMAGED BY SHELLFIRE / SLV HOLE IN BRICK WALL / LV HOLE IN BRICK WALL OF BUILDING (3 SHOTS) 0.17 3. HAS CHILDREN STANDING IN STAIRWELL AT INSIDE HOUSE DAMAGED BY SHELLFIRE TILT UP TO DAMAGE TO THE INTERIOR OF HOUSE 0.26 4. LAS MOTHER WITH CHILDREN STANDING OUTSIDE DAMAGED HOUSE 0.33 5. SCU SMALL GIRL TILT UP TO BOY / CU YOUNG BOY (2 SHOTS) 0.47 6. SLV LUM HAXHIU, KOSOVO LIBERATION ARMY (KLA) MILITIA OFFICER IN JUNIK INSPECTING KLA PLATOON (2 SHOTS) 1.04 7. SLV KLA PLATOON, CLOSE UP FIGHTERS (2 SHOTS) 1.14 8. LAS INTERIOR OF ROOM WITH HOLE IN WALL/ MV KLA MEMBERS STANDING IN ROOM / SCU STAINS ON WALL /SCU KLA FIGHTERS IN DOORWAY OF ROOM / SCU KLA FIGHTER IN DAMAGED ROOM /HAXHIU SPEAKING TO VILLAGERS (7 SHOTS) 1.44 9. SCU HAXHIU SAYING "SINCE HOLBROOKE VISITED US LAST WEEK IT WAS QUIET FOR TWO DAYS. AFTER THAT THE SERBS BEGAN TO FIRE GRENADES. SINCE YESTERDAY SERB SNIPERS HAVE BEEN FIRING AT US." (ENGLISH) 2.17 10. SCU MILITARY FLASH ON HAXHIU'S ARM 2.20 11. SCU ASKED IF HOLBROOKE'S TALKS WOULD SOLVE JUNIK'S PROBLEMS, HAXHIU SAYS "PEACE IS ONLY POSSIBLE WHEN THEY HAVE INDEPENDENCE." (ENGLISH) 2.36 12. SLV/SCU KLA FIGHTER MILKING SHEEP (5 SHOTS) 3.03 13. SLV KLA FIGHTERS EATING AT TABLE (3 SHOTS) 3.18 14. SCU AUTOMATIC RIFLE LEANING AGAINST WALL 3.22 15. SCU KLA FIGHTERS EATING (3 SHOTS) 3.40 16. LV/SLV JUNIK SEEN THROUGH WINDOWS OF HOUSE (2 SHOTS) 3.48 Initials Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
  • Embargoed: 21st July 1998 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: JUNIK, 200KM WEST OF PRISTINA, KOSOVO, YUGOSLAVIA
  • City:
  • Country: Yugoslavia
  • Reuters ID: LVAETA067WZGMF9DSA6M5AM0XSVV
  • Story Text: A political officer in the Kosovo village where U.S.

    special envoy Richard Holbrooke first bumped into members of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) nearly two weeks ago has said freedom is the necessary precondition for peace there.

    Signs of the recent fighting were evident in the western Kosovo village of Junik on Sunday (July 5).

    Houses in the village bore the signs of recent shelling and sniping, with broken roofs and riddled with bullet holes.

    "I think that Kosovo needs freedom," Lum Haxhia, 40, political officer for the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) unit in Junik, near the Albanian border, about 200 kilometres west of the regional capital Pristina.

    "After that it (will be) possible, really, for peace in Kosovo." Haxhia was a published poet before the KLA began taking on Serbian security forces earlier this year in an ethnic Albanian insurgency that has given the rebels nominal control of more than a third of the country.

    He was one of the KLA members Holbrooke spoke to in an unscheduled visit to Junik on June 24.

    Asked what had been the village's fate, the KLA political officer spoke of sporadic shelling and sniping and pointed out many houses that had been badly damaged by fighting.

    Serbian police and Yugoslav army units have been attempting to seal Kosovo's border with Albania, over which the KLA smuggles arms to support its fledgling guerrilla campaign.

    Kosovo is a southern province of Serbia but 90 per cent of its two million people are ethnic Albanians.Most want independence.

    The international community favours some form of autonomy within the borders of Yugoslavia, a middle ground that most hardline KLA members like Lum Haxhia dismiss out of hand.


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