YUGOSLAVIA: TWO TOP SECURITY OFFICIALS VISIT PRISON IN NIS WHERE INMATES HAVE STAGED A REVOLT

Record ID: 647374

  • Title: YUGOSLAVIA: TWO TOP SECURITY OFFICIALS VISIT PRISON IN NIS WHERE INMATES HAVE STAGED A REVOLT
  • Date: 10th November 2000
  • Summary: NIS, YUGOSLAVIA (NOVEMBER 9, 2000) (REUTERS) 1. DELEGATION OF YUGOSLAV AND SERBIAN OFFICIALS ARRIVING IN CONVOY AT THE PRISON IN NIS WHERE INMATES HAVE STAGED A REVOLT 0.10 2. SLV POLICE STANDING IN FRONT OF PRISON' RADE MARKOVIC, SERBIAN STATE SECURITY CHIEF GETTING OUT OF HIS CAR (2 SHOTS) 0.28 3. MV FLORA BROVINA, KOSOVO ALBANIAN ACTIVIST APPROACHING THE PRISON MANAGEMENT BUILDING TOGETHER WITH THE YUGOSLAV OFFICIALS (2 SHOTS) 0.50 4. SCU SCU BROVINA STANDING IN FRONT OF THE ENTRANCE TO PRISON YARD, TALKING TO THE REPRESENTATIVES OF THE INMATES; BROVINA ENTERING PRISON YARD, ESCORTED BY THE TWO INMATES (2 SHOTS) 1.08 5. SCU INJURED INMATE LYING ON FLOOR IN PRISON MANAGEMENT BUILDING 1.17 6. SCU DOCTORS EXAMINING INJURED INMATE; DOCTORS PLACING INJURED INMATE ON STRETCHER; DOCTORS BRINGING AN INJURED INMATE INTO THE AMBULANCE; PRISON GUARD HOLDING A GUN (4 SHOTS) 1.46 7. MV PRISON GUARDS EVACUATING ALBANIAN PRISONERS FROM NIS PRISON (2 SHOTS) 2.01 8. (SOUNDBITE) (Serbian) FLORA BROVINA, KOSOVO ALBANIAN ACTIVIST, SPEAKING SAYING: "Albanians just want to be evacuated. They do not have any special requests." 2.08 9. MV FLORA BROVINA, GETTING INTO HER CAR 2.18 10. SOUNDBITE (Serbian) RADE MARKOVIC, SERBIAN STATE SECURITY CHIEF, SPEAKING SAYING: "Representatives of the Federal Government are here, Serbian justice and interior co-ministers are here, I am here... We are all in the same team, trying to resolve this situation as soon as possible." 2.35 11. SLV RADE MARKOVIC, SERBIAN STATE SECURITY CHIEF GETTING INTO HIS CAR 2.41 Initials Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
  • Embargoed: 25th November 2000 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: NIS, YUGOSLAVIA
  • City:
  • Country: Yugoslavia
  • Reuters ID: LVA68JIVJPTN8CKZM62B1AWI8429
  • Story Text: Two of Serbias top security officials have visited a
    prison in Nis where inmates have staged a revolt, accompanied
    by a Kosovo Albanian activist Flora Brovina
    who was herself a prisoner in a Serbian jail until last week
    Flora Brovina, a poet, doctor and humanitarian worker
    who spent more than a year in a Serbian jail, toured the
    prison in the southern city of Nis together with Serbian state
    security chief Rade Markovic and Joint Interior Minister Bozo
    Prelevic on Thursday (November 9).

    Brovina and other campaigners had expressed fears that
    hostility between Serbs and ethnic Albanians, which spilled
    over into war in Kosovo last year, could make Kosovo prisoners
    targets for violence by the rebel inmates.

    But Brovina said the ethnic Albanian prisoners were being
    protected by Serbs at the jail, one of three prisons in Serbia
    where revolts have broken out in the past few days.

    "They have shown solidarity with Serb prisoners, who are
    protecting the Albanian inmates," she told reporters.

    "The Kosovo Albanian inmates are not taking part in the
    rebellion, they want the whole thing to calm down. They should
    be in Kosovo's prisons," Brovina said.

    The prison revolts, which started in the northern town of
    Sremska Mitrovica and then spread to jails in Nis and
    Pozarevac, appeared to calm down on Wednesday, after several
    days of arson, vandalism and rooftop protests.

    The prisoners have been demanding an amnesty for some of
    their number and better living conditions.

    "I've visited all the prisoners, Serb and Albanian. A
    total of 301 Albanians are crammed into cells on two floors in
    bad living conditions. Four of them are sick and require
    medical treatment, " Brovina said in Nis.

    Hundreds of ethnic Albanians, the majority ethnic group in
    Kosovo, are held in Serbian jails after being detained by Serb
    forces during the Kosovo war.

    Campaigners have demanded their release, insisting they
    were detained and sentenced simply to be used as bargaining
    chips by Slobodan Milosevic, who was forced to step down as
    Yugoslav president by a mass pro-democracy uprising last month.

    New President Vojislav Kostunica ordered Brovina to be
    released and she was freed on Wednesday of last week. He has
    also set up a team of legal advisers to draw up an amnesty law
    for political prisoners.

    Markovic, whose future is at the centre of a bitter
    political battle involving Kostunica, the multi-party alliance
    which backed him and Milosevic's Socialists, said he thought
    the revolt would calm down soon.

    "I am trying to be as helpful as I can here, as we are all
    here with the same assignment, to resolve this situation as
    soon as possible," he told reporters.

    Kosovo remains legally part of Yugoslavia but, under the
    terms which ended the Kosovo war, is run as a de facto
    international protectorate with a United Nations administration
    and a NATO-led peacekeeping force.


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