10'10
July 2000
1st speaker:
0,05
Bloody conflict between Serbs and Albanians has been raging for centuries. Yet only in the past decade has international attention been drawn to the Balkans. Kosovo, inhabited by an ethnic Albanian majority, lost ist autonomy to the Serbs in 1989. Kosovar Albanians fought back as the Serbs pursued a policy of ethnic cleansing which led to thousands of executions and 90% of the population losing their homes. NATO decided to intervene with air strikes in March 1999.
This village is known as Kosovo Polje to the Serbs. The Albanians call it Fusha e Kosoves.
0,20
This is the village school.
Bajram Zybai is a 50 year old teacher in the Southern Kosovo village of Bukosh. He shows us the bullet holes in the school wall.
0,34
27 of the villagers were executed here by the Serbs as they were caught fleeing to Albania last May.
0,43
Haunting memories. NATO air strikes failed to stop the murder.
0,55
Here in the Zanzibar bar in Pristina, all of that is but a distant, if grim memory. Survivors would rather forget the ordeal.
1,06
Survival in Kosovo today is no easy task. If you have hard currency, and you are not a Serb, a gypsy or a Slavic muslim, then you stand a much better chance.
1,22
There are 25% more cars on Kosovo's roads than there were before the war - most of them have no number plates and many are stolen. There is still no state control of the situation.
1,37
Issuing number plates is not the only thing causing the international authorities a headache.
1,53
These postcards depict a fictional Kosovo republic, although there are still no post offices in working order. To get their passport extended Albanians have to queue up here. The precious document is only issued by their enemy, the Serbs.
2,21
These Serbian women are victims of victims. Serb minorities fear the Albanians' revenge in their enclaves. Last Summer there was still an average death toll of 50 murders per week - now it's around five. That's what KFOR calls progress. KFOR is the security force mandated by the United Nations Securiy Council, with NATO participation. Ist troops moved into Kosovo last June. The peacekeepers are no longer striving for a multi -ethnic Kosovo, but a peaceful co-existence of the two peoples.
2,52
The 300-strong KFOR troop has been active in the South of Kosovo, mostly around Suve Reke, since last September.The Serbs have all fled.
Their priority was to co-operate with international aid organisations in finding winter shelter for 12,000 homeless Albanians.
3,13
voiceover
Vice-lieutenant Franz Tagger
We've brought machinery and tools along so that local carpenters can make doors and windows.
3,27
None of the donor countries has yet fulfilled ist generous promises and UN administration is simply not working. Life is only getting better for those who help themselves, as we see with this rebuilding initiative.
3,50
voiceover
Vice-lieutenant Franz Tagger
We built this wall together. German soldiers laid the roof beams, and we've given advice about materials.
4,07
Teacher Bajram Zyba is the community speaker for the village of Bukosh.
4,22
He is holding a meeting to decide how to spend the DM 500 (US$ 250) that the Austrian soldiers have brought to help out. He consults other villagers to see who needs immediate help in the community. Bajram Zyba decides that the Katolli family need help. DM 500 is a lot of money in Kosovo at the moment. It's around the same as a month's salary for a university professor - it may be a modest sum for us.....
4,51
....but for the Katolli family, it's certainly enough to get them back on their feet.
4,58
The ‘Neighbours in Need' project has raised US$ 41 million so far. This has made 3500 destroyed homes inhabitable again, and has given hope to many a destroyed soul.
5,47
Voiceover
Captain Alexander Pehr
Our suggestion was to deploy German forces to rebuilt the villages.This has proved successful in about 90% of the region we're responsible for. A contact leader has been allocated to each village, and they are in charge of the co-operations and rebuilding programme.
6,10
Sadri Metaj managed to survive with help from the red cross.
6,17
July 1999 - insert
Last year he returned with his brother and their families from the Austrain camp. This is what they found when they reached their village, Kernin, in the Istok region. It had been razed to the ground.
6,35
They have a roof over their head again now.
6,45
Third speaker
The red cross gave us vouchers worth .(US$1350) each.
6,55
We could buy the material for our roof - and we also got four windows and two doors.
7.05
First speaker
Vlora Zaberxha is still homeless. Her family's house was right on Mitrovica's front line.
The UN refugee aid centre has set up camp in the yard of ist former premises. They have a flat in the North of the city but daren't return there, as they were thrown out by the Serbs.
This block of flats next door is being prepared for Serbs who were driven out by Albanians.
7,40
There has been violent rioting in Mitrovica for weeks. Albanians and Serbs
fight one another constantly and both riot against these French KFOR troops.
These two bridges over the river Ibar separate the Serb-controlled North from the Albanian quarter in the South.
8,00
The Serb leader is Oliver Ivanovic, Milosevic's right hand man in Mitrovica.
8,06
Second speaker
Oliver Ivanovic, Serb spokesman in Mitrovica.
The area around the two bridges is designated to be a security zone - which means it will be unpopulated land. We feel this is a great danger for the Serbs, and we won't accept it because the zone will be full of Albanians before we know it.
8,33
First speaker (Speaks in English)
Albanian spokesman Bajram Rexhepi lives without bodyguards but with his guarddog in the Albanian quarter in the South of the city. He doesn't see Mitrovica as a divided city.
There is no Serbian part. That is the Northern part. 9000 Albanians and 2000 Serbs lived there before the war - so over 70% were Albanian. Albanians were driven out during the war and they continue to be so today.
9,13
First speaker
Their international accomplices can't prevent that. But wherever they appear, a different type of ‘aid worker' turns up.
This is a travelling circus of multilingual call girls in Pristina's Miami beach club.
9,21
A bottle of champagne costs 500 marks,the price includes an evening's personal entertainment.
9,33
Sex slaves from Eastern Europe - flown in from Zürich.
9,42
The manager tells us that this is his contribution to the rebuilding of Kosovo and for the UCK, the underground Kosovo Liberation Army.
Officially, the UCK no longer exists, yet ist strategic aim clearly still does. It controls this sealed Albanian settlement in the Balkans, along with that one of the main trading routes from Turkey to central Europe.
This is the toll of the conflict. And this is what it has taken for NATO to grasp the full extent of the situation in Kosovo.