Kosova Daily Report #1686, 99-02-07
Kosova Information Center
KOSOVA DAILY REPORT #1686
Prishtina, 7 February 1999
CONTENTS
[01] Rambouillet Conference on Kosova Launched Saturday
[02] Powerful Bomb Kills Three Albanians, Injures Others in Prishtina
Saturday Evening
[03] 9 out of 25 Albanians Killed Ten Days Ago to Be Buried Today
[01] Rambouillet Conference on Kosova Launched Saturday
President Jacques Chirac of France opens it with a solemn appeal for
Albanians and Serbs to answer the call of history
PRISHTINA, Feb 7 (KIC) - President Jacques Chirac of France opened an
international conference on an interim settlement for Kosova in
Rambouillet, France, late afternoon on Saturday.
Chirac began the proceedings in a 14th-century chateau with a solemn appeal
for all parties to answer the call of history.
"There are times when history is in the hands of a few men," President
Chirac said in an opening statement, the Associated Press reported. "When
you leave Rambouillet, a page in Europe's history will have been turned. I
exhort you to let the forces of life overcome the forces of death."
"The world is watching," the French leader said in a speech broadcast live
by Euronews. "The world is waiting."
The conference in Rambouillet was delayed for more than three hours,
because the Serb regime had obstructed travel arrangements involving the
Kosovar delegation departing from the Prishtina airport.
The Kosova delegation arrived by mid-afternoon on two French planes.
In the end, all parties turned up, for the opening speeches and the brief
administrative session that followed.
The real negotiating started today (Sunday) at 10:00 CET, sources close to
the talks said.
French and British foreign minister, Hubert Vedrine and Foreign Secretary
Robin are acting as co-chairmen of the talks on Kosova, based on a
framework document prepared by the Contact Group.
Mediating the negotiations will be Christopher Hill, the U.S. ambassador to
Macedonia, who is the main author of the draft interim plan for Kosova. He
is joined by Wolfgang Petritsch of Austria, the European Union
representative, and Boris Mayorsky, a Russian diplomat.
The framework document "offers the basis for a democratic self-governing
Kosova with control over its own internal affairs," Robin Cook said.
Crowds of pro-Kosova Albanian demonstrators gathered in the center of
Rambouillet, this small central French town, located about 35 miles south
of Paris.
The demonstrators carried red and black Albanian flags and waved banners,
some of them reading "Independence, and only Independence", and chanted
slogans in support of Kosova, Ibrahim Rugova, the President of the Republic
of Kosova, the U^K (Kosova Liberation Army), and Rexhep Qosja, the leader
of the opposition bloc to Rugova, all participants in the talks.
[02] Powerful Bomb Kills Three Albanians, Injures Others in Prishtina
Saturday Evening
PRISHTINA, Feb 7 (KIC) - Last evening, a powerful bomb ripped through a
small grocery store in the center of Prishtina, capital of Kosova, killing
three Albanians, including a teenage girl.
Several others were injured in the explosion, sources said.
The explosion occurred just before 19:00 CET on Saturday in the "Almir"
grocery store, owned by Enver Shala, situated alongside the main Prishtina
street, near the vegetable produce market in Ulpiana neighborhood.
UnidentifieD persons tossed the powerful explosive device killing Enver
Shala (1947), the store's proprietor, and Vlora Humolli (f, 1981) a passer-
bye from Prishtina. Artan Ajeti (20) from Ferizaj, died on his way to the
Prishtina hospital, one mile away from the scene of the carnage.
The scene of the crime was cordoned off by Serbian police today (Sunday)
morning, too.
The Kosova capital has seen a spade of bombings, hand grenade attacks,
targeting eating and drinking establishments.
Saturday's blast appeared to have been caused by a more powerful device,
those who saw the scene claim.
"A leg with the shoe still on and other pieces of mangled bodies were
scattered on the city's main road, and a trail of blood ran along the
gutter," CNN said in a report from Prishtina.
OSCE verifiers attended the scene Saturday evening. Ambassador Gabriel
Keller, the deputy head of the OSCE KVM, informed William Walker, the U.S.
ambassador who heads the mission and is currently attending talks in
Rambouillet, France, launched Saturday evening at the time the bomb
exploded in Prishtina.
The Democratic League of Kosova (LDK), President Ibrahim Rugova's, party,
condemned in the strongest terms "the terrorist act" which killed three
Albanians and wounded a number of others in Prishtina last night. The
attack coincides with the start of the international conference on Kosova
in Rambouillet, France, the party said, adding that "this is further
evidence the Serbian regime is adamant on obstructing a political
resolution to the Kosova issue".
The LDK presidency reiterated the call for NATO ground troops to be
committed to Kosova, "as a necessary move to establish peace in this part
of Southern Europe region".
Meanwhile, a spokesman for the Serbian occupation authorities in Kosova
added to the already grave and tragic situation by rushing to declare that
the shop owner, Enver Shala, "was known to be loyal to the Serbian
Republic" and to maintain good relations with local Serbs, "which made him
a target for radically-minded terrorists".
This kind of verbal pyrotechnics has been frequently the pattern of Serbian
regime's reaction to killings of Albanians in Kosova: routinely putting the
blame on Albanians by declaring killed Albanians "decent" citizens, loyal
to Serb authorities, which, in the yes of Kosovars, means Serb
collaborators, who would only be killed by 'Albanian terrorists', the
argument goes.
There is no end in sight to Serb criminal regime's outrageous propaganda
ploys in the height of the Kosovar tragedy.
[03] 9 out of 25 Albanians Killed Ten Days Ago to Be Buried Today
PRISHTINA, Feb 7 (KIC) - Nine out twenty-five Albanians killed by Serbian
forces on 29 January will be buried today afternoon in the village of
Rogov& e Hasit, in south-western Kosova, local sources said.
The nine are said to be residents of Rogov&, the place where the 25
Albanians were killed ten days ago.
It is not known yet whether all the victims - taken for post-mortem
examinations by the Serb police forces which had killed them - have been
identified.
The bodies of more than 40 Albanians killed in the Re^ak massacre on 15
January are still unburied, as the Serb regime authorities have refused to
release all their bodies at once for a collective burial by the grieving
Albanian families.
Kosova Information Center
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