INSTEAD OF PROTECTING KOSOVO CROATS, KFOR ASSISTED IN ETHNIC CLEANSING?
by Vesna Fabris Perunicic
Vjesnik, Zagreb, Croatia, November 2 1999
ZAGREB - About 300 Croats from the Kosovo villages of Letnica and Vrnavokla have moved to Croatia. Newspapers report that the resettlement, monitored by the Croatian government and authorized ministries, was done with the utmost of secrecy in order not to endanger the lives of exhausted and mistreated people. The reasons which forced them to leave the area where they had resided for almost seven centuries and resettle to areas in which many of them have never been are well known.One amongst them, Josip Markovic, described the situation in the Kosovska Vitina municipality in the following way: "Since the arrival of KFOR we have been left totally unprotected. At first, armed ethnic Albanians from the neighboring villages visited us dressed in KLA uniforms. They mistreated us even though we never gave them a reason for that: during the war we sided with neither side. Now they come to our village as armed civilians and they recently killed and mutilated, with an axe, Petar Tunic from the village of Sosare. We hoped that KFOR would protect us, but that turned out not to be the case. Likewise, multiethnic Kosovo is also a mirage."
Prior to sending three consecutive letters by way of which they requested protection from Zagreb, they witnessed various humiliations: one was the rape of Justina Peric from Letnica; daily theft of cattle from their stables; burning of homes, and cutting down of woods... The usurpation of the primary school in Letnica (and the local church) was particularly painful for their language, culture and tradition, because parents were told that in the future classes would be held exclusively in Albanian. Apart from the mistreatment by Albanian extremists, Kosovo Croats in recent times have had to undergo poverty - on the verge of hunger - because they have not received pensions, salaries or any other form of assistance. However, fear for their own lives and intolerable daily events are the most important reasons for the fact that only 45 Croats have remained in the village of Letnica and 15 in Vrnavkola, mainly elderly people. Janjevo is the last oasis of centuries long presence by Croats in Kosovo, with about 400 inhabitants.
Despite discrete organization, the latest exodus was no secret to the people whose task it was to prevent it - KFOR. Namely, on the road from Letnica to Skopje, eight KFOR armored troop carriers provided protection for the Croatian refugees, enabling them a safe passage to the Macedonian border, and then following a detailed search, all the way to Skopje Airport from where they flew to Zagreb. Instead of securing a peaceful and safe life, KFOR helped them to - emigrate. Rules of conduct for foreign workers in Kosovo indicate that the situation under KFOR and UNMiK protectorate is becoming increasingly uncertain and difficult. Immediately after their arrival to Kosovo, international workers and officials were able to at least freely move about the towns. However, now, for example in Pristina, they have organized and protected traveling arrangements to their work places, while they can only dream of going out for strolls.
Translated by the Croatian Information Center in November 1999
