by Ivana JANKOVIC
When the three Stolics were bludgeoned to death on the night of June 4 and their house set on fire, police were called by an Albanian neighbor who saw the fire. That's how the house was saved. The stolen car was found burned not far from the scene of the crime. The house remained intact with visible signs of fire on the inside: ashes, burned hardwood floors, broken windows, singed shutters.
The Pristina police will mention the fact that it is unusual that none of the neighbors heard anything. The murderers obviously spent a lot of time committing the crime; the weather is nice, the windows are kept open. It is even more unusual that the neighbors are Serbs.
"No one here keeps their window open," the Serbs of Obilic say. "There is one Serb house for every three Albanian ones, so how are we supposed to rest during the night? As soon as dusk falls, we lock everything and pray that we wake up alive. When we go to bed, we cross ourselves and pray: Lord, grant that we wake up alive. And when we wake up we say: Lord, thank you for granting that we wake up alive. In Serbia proper you go out on the town at 10 o'clock at night; here we have to lock ourselves in at 8."
The house next to the Stolics is owned by Serbs but abandoned, as is the one next to it. In the yard of the third house, there is a cow grazing grass. The man tending it doesn't know who the house belongs to but it isn't his. Finally he mutters: "The cow must eat, the grass is free." This house is also abandoned and the yard, truth to tell, is overgrown with grass.
The first inhabited neighboring house is owned by Albanians and is just near enough for its inhabitants to have been able to see the fire. They called the police. The Serb neighbors heard nothing and they are all the more angry because they have already been asked the same question by police and because two Serbs were detained: "They want to imply that Serbs are murdering Serbs; it's the mafia from Belgrade, they say. They took two men down to the station ten times for questioning, and passing through Obilic ten times is no easy matter. We heard nothing, we don't know how... At 4 o'clock our neighbor came and we all got up. There was a fire truck over there and they wouldn't let us in... You don't want to hear the stories of the people who dressed them later [for burial]..."
One hears various rumors about who killed the Stolics and why, even before arriving in Pristina. "They probably sold their house," the Serbs who know everything will say. "Everyone must have known they had money from the sale and so they came to rob them."
In Obilic the embittered response is that any sale was out of the question. On the contrary, the Stolics were bound to the town where their son died ten years ago. "[Mrs. Stolic] didn't want to leave because her son is buried here. [Stolic] was here the night before it happened. We talked; he didn't mention any sale. But people speculate. As far as why they were killed, just look at the house, the location, it's the very best. They didn't want to sell and then this happened..."
Michael Steiner has offered an award of 50,000 euros for information leading to the solving of this murder. It hasn't helped, at least for now.
Before the war about 4,500 Serbs lived in the town of Obilic; approximately 400 remain. The majority left right after the war. Only some 50 households were left at the time; now there are only twenty. Everyone would like to sell their property and leave. Everyone has received offers but the prices, they say, are miserly: $5,000 for 12 ares of land [approximately 1/3 of an acre] and a house. That's not enough to start a new life somewhere else.
"Everyone gets a hand grenade. If you want to sell but don't like the offer, you get a grenade; if you don't want to sell, you get a grenade... Ljubica and Paja Matic didn't want to sell; they were beaten up, their property was set on fire and ultimately, they were forced to leave... Just like the Bojkovics, just like Milan and Draga...," says Olgica Subotic.
There is no phone service because, they say, KFOR broke the low-hanging cables upon entering Obilic and they were never repaired. There are only a few working phones in Obilic and the bills, say locals, are astronomical. Basic service is eight euros; if you make calls, the total can reach as much as 100 euros a month. "We're paying for their calls." Only those lucky enough to get cell phones as gifts from relatives have telephones.
The men don't like to give their names. "You can write that we are the last wretches; that's our name." Most of them worked in the electrical supply and distribution company, recently renovated and now employing only Albanians. They get 45 euros per month from Belgrade. "We went to work and the British, UNMIK and KFOR showed up. They took our identification cards and then nothing... Four years have passed and they haven't called us back or anything. And Serbia has forgotten us, too. And when they cut off the social assistance we're getting now, then it will really be over."
The municipal government consists of Albanians and Serbs. The Serb representative is rumored to have no authority and a brand new car...
"No one came to see us until [the Stolic murders]; we do not know who our representatives are or what they do. We found out from the reporters who came here after this tragedy who they are and what they do. We can't ever find them, though, even if we take the risk of going to the municipality. 'Where is he?' 'He's not here. He's not here. He's not here.' He holds five or six posts and can't be bothered to visit the Serbs. The people here are being seriously manipulated and there is no possibility of life here anymore."
There are 40 pupils in the Serb school in Obilic. They are brought here by bus and they don't leave the building. Neither for recess, nor for physical education.
Verica Mladenovic has three children aged 4, 7 and 10. They go to school with a police escort, although their mother would feel more secure if it was a UNMIK one. The children will finish this school year and then she will think about the next one. "[International representatives] are demanding a multiethnic school but we don't have any children to waste... How long will these killings go on... They say it is safe in Obilic; you see how safe it is. They say there are no murders in Obilic; three people have just been killed..."
KFOR and UNMIK enjoy little confidence, the Kosovo Protection Corps even less. They add that their streets are not patrolled by members of the multiethnic police. They say that the policemen openly tell them they are working for money and to protect themselves.
"My grandson was attacked by seven others; heaven knows how he managed to defend himself," says Planinka Stevic. "Then they locked him up and let them walk away. The people from KFOR said, 'We came here to protect Albanians.' "
Everyone would like to leave if they only had a place to go. They will demand that the Serbian government move all of them to Serbia proper. Come what may, things cannot be worse than they already are. Even though Serbia also does not enjoy the best reputation.
"We blame Serbia the most, then KFOR and UNMIK. Serbia abandoned us; they don't know that we exist. Why don't they come and see what things are like instead of believing false reports about how safe multiethnic Obilic is? Whenever someone asks me what life is like here, I tell them to come live with us for a month and see for themselves because it is just indescribable. I knew this Norwegian policeman. I told him, here, take my house and I'll go live in yours. Take my house and I don't have to go live in yours, just live here a little bit to see what it's like. He said, 'I don't want to. You people here are crazy.' "
"What's the point of restoring the house for the Coordinating Center, what's the point of anything when we aren't safe? We've been patrolling and guarding our houses for four years now and we're at the end of our rope. We're about to lose either our minds or our nerves completely."
The lack of hope, the anger and the lack of anything to do wear on the nerves. "Leave those cigarette butts alone. You don't have to collect them. It will give us something to do when you leave." And the conversation ends, the conversation that was so difficult to convince them to have in the first place. What's the point, they say. Everyone showed up after what happened but they trust no one anymore. "It's not that we don't trust reporters, Serbia or UNMIK; we don't trust our own fathers and mothers anymore."
"By the autumn I'll be gone from here. I don't know where yet, anywhere. But I won't go to Serbia... I'll go anywhere else, stretch out my hand and beg for something to eat... I would even go to Sarajevo to beg; at least everyone there speaks my language. Some say they speak Bosniak, others say Croatian; they argue about that but that's their problem. Here we stick out; we speak differently... No, I won't go to Serbia. If I go to Vojvodina, they'll call me a newcomer; if I go to central Serbia, they'll call me Shiptar [Albanian]!"
The latest news from Obilic is that the house of the Pecelj family, the last Serb family in their street, was set on fire. The Peceljs left Obilic the day before the murder of the Stolics.