http://www.nin.co.yu/
http://www.ex-yupress.org/
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Where Are Missing Serbs?

Families of abducted and missing from Kosovo and
Metohija suffer because of uncertainty. They will not
find peace until they find out the truth, whatever it
may be...

by Marijana MILOSAVLJEVIC

NIN, Belgrade, FR Yugoslavia, December 14, 2000

How are you? This customary question that we daily
politely ask of each other sometimes has to be, for
the sake of sensitivity, set aside. The question loses
all sense especially when you meet any member of the
"Association of Families of Kidnapped or Missing
persons from Kosovo and Metohija". They can be found
in the center of Belgrade, on the first floor of a
multistoried building. In two small glass rooms.
Behind the glass, as in a shop window, from the street
one can see slouching and somehow hemmed in people.
They are exposed to the stares of passers by. They
come almost every day, exchange information, help each
other.

They are looking for their loved ones who were
abducted or went missing. They have counted that since
1998 about 1,300 of them have either been abducted or
went missing in Kosovo and Metohija. The number is not
final since new abductions still happen. The
association was formed last spring because of "obvious
disinterest of the former authorities and the
international community". Not a single case from their
list has been resolved so far. They are hurt that
"their" missing do not have the same significance as
other missing persons [ethnic Albanians] about whom
media write a lot. They are hurt because they think
that no one wants to hear about their misfortune.

Teacher Slavica Zivkovic from Prizren lost her husband
on the road between Pristina and Gracanica. She
accuses: "The international community did not put any
effort in finding the abducted individuals. As
witnesses of many abductions they averted their eyes
and turned their heads away. Our state also did not do
anything. We feel like second class citizens, as if
this were not our country."

Activists of the Association have calculated that out
of all abducted persons, 20 percent of them were
abducted before the NATO aggression on our country,
five percent during the aggression, and 75 percent
after the arrival of the peacekeeping forces to
Kosovo. These data are a clear indication of the
errors made by KFOR. The changes in Serbia also
haven't brought solace to the refugees. The locals
frequently refer to them as "Sloba's voters".

In KLA Embrace

Slobodan Stevanovic is from the village of Dojnice
near Prizren. He is a tiny man with a shriveled gray
face. He has three children. His son Vlastimir, born
in 1970 is missing. He was mobilized and worked as a
waiter for the Yugoslav Army in Prizren. On June 12
last year he went to visit his parents in the village,
while they had gone to Prizren because Dojnice had
been occupied by the KLA. They missed each other. They
haven't seen their son since then.

While looking for Vlastimir, Slobodan was also
captured by the KLA. "In my son's apartment in Prizren
I found an Albanian with short blond hair and black
tights. She screamed: 'Your time is over. My house has
been looted, my husband hasn't had work for ten
years.' As I did not want to leave the apartment, she
called Albanian soldiers who robbed me and forced me
into a car. KFOR soldiers calmly observed the whole
incident."

They drove him to a house and threw him into the
cellar. Inside, there was a young man with his arms
tied up. He was a Serb and complained that he had been
beaten. Then Albanians came in and started to
interrogate him. He told them about his son. They told
him that he had to pay $50,000 if he wanted to see
him.

"I told them that I did not have that money, and that
they should kill me and let my son go." They left.
Later, five strangers jumped in through the window.
"They were armed with batons, knives and machine guns.
They tied my hands with a belt. They tied the young
guy's legs to a chair. They savagely beat us. Our
faces turned black after the beating. Then they left.
A bit later the first group came back and they wanted
to know who had beaten us. 'Your lot.' 'Liar!' They
put a barrel of a machine gun in my mouth and a knife
under the boy's throat."

After eight hours the torture was interrupted by KFOR
soldiers who came by chance. For eighteen months
Slobodan hasn't known anything about the fate of his
son. "I was in their hands for less than a half of a
day, and I know how that was... I have been trying to
find him in all possible ways. I felt the worst when
Adem Demaci came to Belgrade and openly said that the
KLA had no time to take care of captured Serbs, that
all of them have been killed."

Out interlocutor contacted the Red Cross, the Church,
international and local non-governmental
organizations. He even tried to get some information
through the sister of Ekrem Rexha, one of the KLA
commanders. His sister, Nexhmija, lives in Kragujevac
[in Serbia proper]. It did not help. Various stories
are circulating. "Some say that he was killed, some
that he is still alive. At night I pray to God that
someone get interested in this so that all our
abducted are released. Not like this. Only Albanians
are mentioned, and no one even asks about our missing.
It is nice that everyone is concerned about Ivan
Stambolic [Serbian politician, abducted during
Milosevic's regime]. However, it is not right that no
one cares about our lived ones, more than a thousand
of them.

The face of Dragica Majstorovic, aged 44, is washed
out by tears. They roll down her face to the white
collar of her shirt and disappear in the softness of
her black sweater. Her son Ivan Majstorovic
disappeared on August 19. "Ivan is a pupil, third year
of high school. Therefore he was neither a member of
paramilitary formations nor mobilized by the military.
He was simply a high school pupil."

Student's Disappearance

The four-member Majstorovic family lived in Pristina.
They had no intention of leaving the city, but they
were forced out of their apartment after the departure
of our military and police. Dragica, with her husband,
elder son Nikola and younger son Ivan, went to stay
with her parents in Kosovo Polje. There, Ivan at times
worked as a translator for Irish KFOR soldiers. The
beginning of the school year was postponed in Kosovo
Polje, but Ivan did not want to miss classes. He
decided to continue school in Leskovac [in Serbia
proper]. Those days there were problems with
transportation. Ivan left to Leskovac with a family
friend Dragan Stevanovic who drove a "Yugo". They left
at 10am and were seen off by Dragica's parents. Later
they disappeared.

"I do not know why they kept Ivan. He is a student and
hasn't harmed anyone. It seems that our biggest guilt
is that we are Serbs." Dragica has so far received
only unofficial information about the fate of her son.
Allegedly Ivan and Dragan immediately after the
abduction spent two days in an investigative prison in
Batlava. "We were told about that by an Albanian."
Later, they allegedly worked on the repairs of the
road between Pec and Djakovica. Through ham radio
operators the family heard that Ivan had been kept for
a while with a few other Serbs in a cellar in
Pristina. "We were told that had broken his arm there
and that it had been put in a cast. That encouraged me
because that may indicate that they take care of
them."

"I hope that he is alive. Whenever I start losing
hope, he appears in my dreams and tells me that he is
alive. I've been everywhere. I made over a thousand of
his photos. I do not know if there is a single country
to which I haven't sent his photo. His photo, with a
message, is making rounds of the Internet. I contacted
many people and my brother even made it to the U.S.
Senate... Last year, an Albanian told me that he was
alive and would definitely be exchanged. Later he
refused to talk. I've heard all sorts of versions.
Some claim that he was murdered on the spot, some that
he is in a work camp in Albania, some that he is in
Macedonia... We've never stopped looking for him. He
is young, strong. We think he'll somehow survive,"
Dragica says haltingly.

Members of the Association have recently frequently
been protesting on the streets of Belgrade. "People
usually turn their heads away when they realize what
the protest is about. I do not blame them. As if they
do not believe that so many people could disappear."
However, our interlocutor says that slowly their
problem has stopped being a taboo topic. Recently
families were received by the president of Yugoslavia,
Vojislav Kostunica, who promised to help them. A
Federal commission that will try to shed light on the
fates of the missing has been formed.

As far as the others are concerned, they all agree.
"As if people are afraid of us. They do not want to
see us, they avert gaze. It seems that we are the last
unwanted burden for Serbia. Here everyone has to take
care of himself. We keep together, the others do not
understand us. People do not want to hear about
tragedies such as ours."

Jacket for Abducted

Jelica Grkovic from Orahovac is looking for her
abducted husband Svetislav. Their son Zvonko was a
physician, and died with his son. She and her husband
stayed in Kosovo to try to keep the house for their
daughter-in-law and the second grandchild, who had
escaped after the tragedy. The KLA came in front of
their house. They sought weapons. Svetislav gave them
son's rifle, which he had received as a reservist. He
asked them for a document confirming that he had
turned in the weapons.

"They said that they did not have a pencil and ordered
him to get in the car. I saw two more Serbs in the
car, our neighbors Tihomir Miljkovic and Marko
Vitosevic. They told us that they would drive them to
the office and give them documents for weapons. They
never came back," says Jelica.

She says that she did not have any premonitions,
because they had not harmed anyone. Her son, as a
physician took equal care of Albanians and Serbs.
"There were many Albanians at my son's burial, some of
them even came on crutches. Almost the whole Orahovac
came to express condolences." On that June 16, at
night, rain started falling. Her husband had been
taken away in a short-sleeved shirt. Jelica took his
jacket to the KLA headquarters. She knew that her
husband disliked cold and was afraid that he would get
sick. "They pointed a gun at me and told me to go home
and that he would return in half an hour."

KFOR arrived to Orahovac that night. Jelica told them
everything. They told her that they would contact her
as soon as they found anything out. She stayed in
Kosovo waiting until November. They did not help her.
"I am here with my daughter-in-law and my grandchild.
It is hard, very hard... I keep thinking that it would
not have happened if our neighbors Albanians were at
home. However, they also ran away then. There was no
one to protect us. I hope that someone saved my
husband. I beg anyone who knows anything to let me
know... It is not right that no one cares. My husband
suffers from diabetes, he is old and sick," Jelica
ends in whisper.

The people in the Association are burdened by
uncertainty. They will not find peace until they find
out the truth. Whatever it may be. Some of them are
prepared to face the worst, while others are only kept
in life by hope. Such as Olgica Bozanic, maiden name
Kostic. She is aged 36, skinny as a young girl, but
she does not look like one. Her face is totally pale,
bags under her eyes black. Her story is by year older
than other stories.

On July 19, 1998 almost all males from her family
disappeared in the Orahovac villages of Ocerusa and
Ratimlje. Her brothers Todor(33) and Lazar(28) were
captured with another 12 relatives by the KLA after
the attack on their village Ratimlje. They haven't
been seen since then and nothing is known about their
fate. The same happened the same night in the village
of Ocerusa, where Olgica lived since she got married.
Nine of her relatives from her husband's family were
captured by Albanians. They also later disappeared.

"I think that I will die from pain and sorrow. I would
go crazy if I believed that they were dead," Olgica
has no doubt.

Doctor Milivoj Todorovski worked for 35 years as a
physician in Pristina. Albanians abducted his son,
aged thirty, a student of the last year of dentistry.
"In Serbia the authorities are trying to suppress the
information that 1,300 people from Kosovo have gone
missing. On the other hand, the Albanians are given a
lot of publicity in the media. Certain
non-governmental organizations publicize only the
Albanian cases. We've heard that Flora Brovina
complained because she was not receiving Albanian
language press besides Serb language press in prison.
And what do we know about our kidnapped loved ones?
What is up with them? What kind of people are we? I am
convinced that KFOR knows very well what is going on
with our abducted loved ones. I do not know why
Kouchner refuses to say that. Perhaps the new
administrator will be different."

Assistance from Seers

Todorovski says that he thought that he had a lot of
friends among Allbanians. They invited him to
weddings, he went to funerals. He worked day and night
during the bombardments and never differentiated
between his patients. "It hurts me the most that those
to whom I helped never even tried to help me.
Nevertheless, I believe that my son is alive. After
all, one of these people would have told me if he were
dead. It would not cost them anything. It seems to me
that it is inhumane to ignore something like that." In
desperation our interlocutor approached private
investigators for assistance. "I realized that that is
a big swindle. I wonder if after that I have the right
to get angry with my wife for her visits to seers."
The husband of Olivera Budimir was kidnapped on August
2, 1999. "Unfortunately, the time is passing by, and
it is not working for our abducted loved ones. We do
not want to accuse anyone. We simply want the truth
about our loved ones. We have in all our appearances
expressed support for the release of ethnic Albanian
prisoners and at the same time for the release of the
camp inmates on our list. It is wrong that we are
today seen as Milosevic's Serbs. The disappearance of
our loved ones is not a political problem. They were
as civilians abducted on roads or in front of their
homes".



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