"KLA" Revenge for Lojane

The weapons stashed in the Lojane mine seemed impressive to the domestic public. However, the leaders of the infamous NDK in Switzerland were not equally impressed. Although DM2 million [about $1 million] were earmarked for the purchase of weapons for the so-called Liberation army of Presevo, Medveda and Bujanovac (UCPMB), the arsenal in Lojane, consisting of rifles, ammunition and anti-personnel mines was worth only DM200,000. The NDK demands the "change" from Taso, who is in a hospital, from Ismail Hyseni, who is at the moment in the prison in the American base "Bondsteel" in Kosovo and from the "KLA", which is sinking into crime...

by D.T.

Start, Skopje, Macedonia, October 6, 2000

Taso Bogdanovski, the chief of police in Kumanovo, who is still recovering from wounds inflicted by five bullets "picked up" in an ambush on September 9, is definitely not the victim of revenge for the banned love affair with a 25-year-old Albanian woman Luleta Ajeti. In the absence of the official explanation for the possible motive and perpetrators of the "assassination attempt" on Taso, Start will yet again point out the likely connection between this crime and "Lojane case", or more specifically the tragicomic "unexpected" Police raid on the abandoned mine and the discovery of a significant amount of weaponry and a local headquarters for the so-called "KLA", in which no staffers were found. The information obtained by Start in the meantime not only confirms that connection but also reveal the motive for the murder attempt on Taso, and the whole list of individuals with whom he "cooperated" thereby directly harming the security of the state that he was supposed to protect as a policeman, as well as the context in which his attackers should be sought. However, Taso, a loyal soldier of the Dalaverci clan, according to our information, is only a bit player in a much bigger story which indicates the crime in which the "KLA" is sinking and monstrous manipulation with the Albanian population, with its "huge dreams", as well as its "voluntary" contributions for the so-called national cause, ranging in millions of German Marks.

Two Million for UCPMB

The story starts in late 1998 and early 1999 in Switzerland. Leaders of the NDK (Popular Movement for Kosovo), the organization which is at the moment the center of the all-Albanian cause, i.e. the project of "Greater Albania" and which has absorbed all extremist Albanian emigrants groups (both political and criminal in nature) in the West, made at the time the "political decision" to extend the "liberation struggle" of the Albanians to the territory of Bujanovac, Presevo, Medveda and a part of the Skopje Crna Gora [black mountain] (Karadak), and provide support to the "newly founded" UCPMB. With that in mind, a big part of the compulsory three percent of monthly income paid by every Albanian emigrant to the NDK fund was earmarked for the purchase of weaponry for UCPMB. Rashet Imeri from Gnjilane, better known as "Flamur" and Sadik Ademi from the village of Muratovac, the Presevo municipality, showed up as "investors" with DM2 million for the purchase of weaponry. The chief organizer of the purchase, transport and storage of the weaponry was Ismail Hyseni from the village of Lojane.

The weapons arrived to Macedonia via Albania. In Debar the shipments were taken over by Flamur Ame, the brother of the missing Petrit Ame, otherwise a member of PDPA-NDP and Mendyh Thaci's bodyguard. He in turn stored the weapons in a bunker near his house. From there, from time to time, brothers Ridvan and Husrin Arifi from the village of Lojane, moved the weapons and stored them in the abandoned mine.

Up to that point everything went as planned. The NDK believed that its money had been spent as planned. The Macedonian police, especially its part commanded by our Taso, pretended to be blind and deaf while convoys with weapons passed in front of it. It appears that money was responsible for their deafness and blindness.

1.8 Million "Change"

However, suddenly one of the political-mafia rings in the chain broke and the police discovered in April 1999 the weapons cache in Lojane which, based on the amount of discovered weaponry, iconography and the time of discovery (bombardment of FRY) was impressively terrifying. Then, Taso Bogdanovski stepped on the stage. Certainly not without knowledge of at least some of his superiors, political appointees from VMRO-DPMNE, he did everything to sweep the whole affair under the rug as soon as possible. The reasons are clear: if the "investors" from Switzerland found out that someone in Macedonia had stolen most of their money, heads could have been lost! Taso obstructed the complete police investigation of the case and released the information that the "arsenal discovered in the abandoned mine in Lojane is worth roughly DM2 million". However, the truth is that all the weaponry found in the mine in Lojane can be bought on the black market for roughly one tenth of that sum. Where is the difference? Hyseni must have spent some of the money for the bribes but that cannot explain the enormous deficit. Our sources claim that more than DM50,000 found in Taso's official safe in Kumanovo police station (together with hundreds of passports of unknown origin and about twenty handguns, also of unknown origin) were a part of his "fee".

Soon after the discovery of weapons in Lojane, the truth about the "change" after all made it to the leaders of the "KLA" in Kosovo and their mentors in Switzerland. Namely, they found out that Hyseni (himself took about DM300,000) together with other participants in the local part of the operation, cheated on them, and stole money earmarked for the UCPMB weapons. Normally, the "KLA" immediately ordered that the culprits be found and executed. Taso was the first victim. On September 9 seventeen bullets were fired on "his" vehicle (nowhere registered, one of the "confiscated" vehicles) from an automatic pistol. Our sources believe that that was a message from Switzerland, via Kosovo ("KLA"). Hyseni is at the moment safe. He was recently arrested by the American soldiers in Kosovo and is now kept in the prison in the base "Bondsteel". The "Swiss" are also mad at many other members, activists and sympathizers of the "KLA" in Kosovo and Macedonia. Corruption and crime, which after the entry of KFOR in Kosovo became the chief activity of the "KLA" are contributing to the organizational break up of this "military" organization. It is not known what Hyseni knows and can say (in any case this should be asked of the Americans in "Bondsteel"), but for a while it has been claimed that there is an open conflict between the headquarters in Switzerland and the "agents" in the field, especially those from the ranks of PDPA-NDP. The reasons are far from glamorous: people are stealing money from Albanian emigrants. Just like they stole peace and dignity from the local Albanians...

Translated on December 1, 2000