Husband, brother and father-in-law stand guard 12 hours a day

Dnevni Telegraf, Belgrade, FR Yugoslavia, July 6, 1998

"That's when the Shqiptars withdrew from the village and went to the surrounding hills and forests. They either abandoned their homes or left them in the care of the oldest members of the household," she said.

For the Serbs of Kijevo, according to Anka Rakic, hell began in the middle of March. "From then on it was dangerous, very dangerous. There was shooting every day, the Shqiptars dug in in the hills on all four sides of Kijevo and fired on us, mainly with snipers."

The main target of the terrorist attack, according to Anka's testimony, was the police station in the centre of Kijevo, which held some one hundred policemen from Belgrade.

"At the same time, on the road to Pec, the terrorists where building barricades from the rocks they had brought from a nearby quarry; they even built veritable walls to prevent the blockaded policemen and villagers from getting aid from Klina or Pec," she asserted.

The biggest problem for the blockaded Serbs, beside the daily sniper-fire, was that the terrorist quickly disconnected electricity and water supplies.

"First they disconnected our electricity, and later on the water. The policemen exhausted their food supply, and we could not help them as our fridges and freezers melted and the food we had went bad. For a period of time we exclusively ate milk and cheese - foodstuff that we got from cattle which was our only salvation," remembered Anka.

"We had to get water from the center of Kijevo, where there is a water-pump, and people would often get wounded or killed while trying to get water. That is how the school principle Rajko got killed, I don't remember his last name. Because the snipers were very active we could not retrieve his body from the street for a long time," she said.

The surrounded Serbs were forced to obtain their water from wells, with a great fear that the terrorists would poison that supply also.

At "work," which is what Anka calls the sentry posts around Kijevo, her husband, brother and father-in-law spent up to twelve hours a day. When not standing guard duty, the men attempted to obtain food, water and fire wood, and get a few moments of rest.

"Some ten days ago two policemen got ill, one had a problem with his kidneys while the other one suffered a heart attack. A helicopter flew in to evacuate them. That's when us four pregnant women got evacuated along with a three-year-old child. I did not want to go, I wanted to stay to the end in the village with my family, but my husband made me go," remembered Anka, adding that the Albanian terrorists fired on the helicopter with ambulance markings, but that she was "not afraid as I am used to daily weapons-fire."

Two of the pregnant women are in a Kragujevac hospital, one with family in Klina, while Anka is in a hospital in Pec. Anka is expecting to give birth in the next few days.