Kosova Daily Report #1360, 98-03-03

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From: Kosova Information Center <kic_pr@zana-pr.ztn.apc.org>

Kosova Information Center

KOSOVA DAILY REPORT #1360

Prishtina, 3 March 1998

Third Edition (20:20hrs)

CONTENTS

[01] Twenty Four Albanian Victims of Serb Massacre Buried Today Afternoon

[02] Albanians Were Massacred and Liquidated, CDHRF Says

[01] Twenty Four Albanian Victims of Serb Massacre Buried Today Afternoon

Bekim Beqir Deliu (16), the twenty-fifth victim, was buried yesterday. He was shot dead by sniper in Skenderaj.

The burial of nine victims, scheduled originally for 13:00 hrs, was put off till the other victims, whose bodies were in the Prishtina Hospital morgue, were collected and brought to the village for burial. The were picked up only in the afternoon today, because the Serb police forces at Komoran village (checkpoint on the Gllogovc- Prishtina road) had prevented relatives from coming to Prishtina to fetch the bodies.

Tens of thousands of people from Drenica and other parts of the Republic of Kosova took part in the funeral processions of the Albanians killed by Serb forces over the week-end in Drenica, what has by now been dubbed "the Drenica massacre".

The following Albanians were buried today: four brothers, Beqir Sejdiu, Bekim Sejdiu, Bedri Sejdiu and Nazmi Sejdiu, husband and wife Xhemshir Nebiu and Rukije Nebiu, Muhamet Islam Gjeli (70) and his son Naser Gjeli (37), Rexhep Ajet Rexhepi, natives of Qirez village; the extended Ahmeti family members, Ahmet Ahmeti (1948), Gani Ahmeti (1952), Elmi Ahmeti (1954), Ham&z Ahmeti (1954), Driton Ahmeti (1975), Naim Ahmeti (1976), Lumni Ahmeti (1978), Shemsi Ahmeti (1979), Basri Ahmeti (1979), Elhami Ahmeti (1982), all of them natives of Likoshan village, and Behram Fazliu (1948) and Shaban Muja (1967), natives of Gradica.

KIC could not obtain the names of other victims, also buried today afternoon at Qirez.

[02] Albanians Were Massacred and Liquidated, CDHRF Says

At the outset, the CDHRF said: "The arbitrary and extrajudiciary liquidation of ten members of the (extended) Ahmeti family, native of Likoshan village, among whom the 16-year-old boy, Elhami Ahmeti, and their guests (Behram Fazliu and Shaban Muja); the killing of four brothers (Sejdiu), natives of Qirez village, the killing of the 16-year-old Bekim Deliu from Skenderaj; the killing of the 70- year-old man, Muhamet Gjelaj, from Likoshan village of Gllogovc; the killing of the pregnant woman Rukije Sejdiu, native of Qirez village of Skenderaj - all these invalidate allegations that Serb police and military, on 28 February and 1 March 1998, clashed in the Drenica region with Albanian 'terrorist bands'".

The major Kosova human rights group regrets that it was not only Serb media which accepted these falsehoods without reservations.

Foreign media and leading international figures also swallowed the Serb propaganda terminology, the CDHRF said.

What happened in Drenica over the week-end was "a well-prepared massacre of a regime, which has been terrorizing an entire people", the CDHRF concluded.

Kosova Information Center

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