YUGOSLAVIA: STARVING KOSOVO ALBANIANS COME DOWN FROM HILLS AS NATO TROOPS ENTER PROVINCE.

Record ID: 565813

  • Title: YUGOSLAVIA: STARVING KOSOVO ALBANIANS COME DOWN FROM HILLS AS NATO TROOPS ENTER PROVINCE.
  • Date: 15th June 1999
  • Summary: SRBICA, KOSOVO, YUGOSLAVIA (JUNE 15, 1999) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL) 1. GV: VARIOUS OF REFUGEES RETURNING FROM THE HILLS CARRYING BAGS/ BABIES (3 SHOTS) 0.20 2. MV: SMALL CHILDREN HOLDING HANDS 0.27 3. GV/PAN: YOUNG GIRL CARRYING BABY 0.32 4. GV/CU: REFUGEES WALKING ALONG ROAD TOWARDS VILLAGE (3 SHOTS) 0.47 5. CU: (SOUNDBITE) (English) GIRL REFUGEE UNAWARE THAT NATO TROOPS ARE IN THE AREA SAYING "I hope so...but for me life is over, for my father, my brother". 1.57 6. MV/PAN: GIRL TURNS AND WALKS AWAY 2.01 7. VARIOUS: MORE REFUGEES WALKING WITH BELONGINGS ALONG DUSTY TRACK/ SITTING DOWN EATING BREAD (9 SHOTS) 3.11 Initials Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
  • Embargoed: 30th June 1999 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: SRBICA, KOSOVO, YUGOSLAVIA
  • City:
  • Country: Yugoslavia
  • Reuters ID: LVA4XXLJFJCEBMCIDC3B4ZSZXDKP
  • Story Text: Hundreds of starving Kosovo Albanians have come down
    from the hills unaware that NATO troops had entered the
    province and were trying to meet them just a few kilometres
    (miles) down the road.Some told chilling tales of executions
    and beatings by Serb soldiers and being forced to walk at
    gunpoint through minefields.

    Central Kosovo appeared a wasteland of empty villages,
    with only Yugoslav army units to be seen around the the town
    of Srbica.

    But in the countryside nearby groups of bedraggled
    refugees began to come out of the woods and fields five days
    after a peace deal brought an end to NATO bombing of
    Yugoslavia.

    Bombed-out barracks, radio relay masts and bridges stood
    out on the landscape as stark reminders of the 78-day alliance
    onslaught to force Belgrade to halt its crackdown on ethnic
    Albanians in Kosovo.

    The refugees were fearful at first at the sight of
    journalists in an armoured land rover but broke into cheers of
    joy when they were told that NATO troops were already inside
    Kosovo and deployed in nearly all of its main cities.

    One young woman couldn't believe it - her life she said
    had been destroyed by the war, so too the lives of her father
    and brother.

    Around 1000 refugees from the Drenica region set out on
    foot to return to their villages.For weeks they have had
    neither food nor water.But they are alive.

    Some had horrific tales of executions and beatings by Serb
    soldiers.One man told how each day as prisoners of the Serbs
    the refugees would be forced to walk through minefields at
    gunpoint.
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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