Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.house.gov/csce

U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

WASHINGTON : 1999

58-814cc

ATROCITIES AND THE

HUMANITARIAN CRISIS

IN KOSOVO

HEARING

BEFORE THE

COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND

COOPERATION IN EUROPE

ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

Printed for the use of the

Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe

APRIL 6, 1999

[CSCE 106-1-4]

 
(ii)

COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE

LEGISLATIVE BRANCH COMMISSIONERS

HOUSE

CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey

Chairman

FRANK R. WOLF, Virginia

MATT SALMON, Arizona

JAMES C. GREENWOOD, Pennsylvania

MICHAEL P. FORBES, New York

STENY H. HOYER, Maryland

EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts

BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland

LOUISE McINTOSH SLAUGHTER, New York

SENATE

BEN NIGHTHORSE CAMPBELL, Colorado

Co-Chairman

KAY BAILEY HUTCHISON, Texas

SPENCER ABRAHAM, Michigan

SAM BROWNBACK, Kansas

(VACANT)

FRANK R. LAUTENBERG, New Jersey

BOB GRAHAM, Florida

RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin

CHRISTOPHER J. DODD, Connecticut

EXECUTIVE BRANCH COMMISSIONERS

HAROLD HONGJU KOH, Department of State

(VACANT), Department of Defense

(VACANT), Department of Commerce

COMMISSION STAFF

DOROTHY DOUGLAS TAFT, Chief of Staff

MICHAEL R. HATHAWAY, Deputy Chief of Staff

WILLIAM COURTNEY, Senior Advisor

ELIZABETH M. CAMPBELL, Staff Assistant\Systems Administrator

MARIA V. COLL, Office Administrator

OREST DEYCHAKIWSKY, Staff Advisor

JOHN F. FINERTY, Staff Advisor

CHADWICK R. GORE, Communications Director, Digest Editor

ROBERT HAND, Staff Advisor

JANICE HELWIG, Staff Advisor

MARLENE KAUFMANN, Counsel for International Trade

MICHAEL KOBY, Special Counsel

KAREN S. LORD, Counsel for Freedom of Religion

RONALD J. MCNAMARA, Staff Advisor

MICHAEL J. OCHS, Staff Advisor

ERIKA B. SCHLAGER, Counsel for International Law

MAUREEN T. WALSH, Counsel
(iii)

ATROCITIES AND THE HUMANITARIAN

CRISIS IN KOSOVO

TUESDAY, APRIL 6, 1999

OPENING STATEMENTS

PAGE

Rep. Christopher H. Smith, Chairman .......................................................... 1

Rep. Steny H. Hoyer, Ranking Member ......................................................... 3

WITNESSES

PAGE

Ambassador William G. Walker, Head, OSCE Kosovo Verification

Mission ........................................................................................................ 5

Nancy Lindborg, Vice President, Mercy Corps International..................... 16

Dr. Jennifer Leaning, Member of the Board of Directors, Physicians for

Human Rights ........................................................................................... 20

Mark S. Ellis, Executive Director, Central and East European Law Initiative (CEELI) and President of the Board, Coalition for International

Justice (CIJ) .............................................................................................. 25

APPENDICES

Prepared Statement of Nancy Lindborg ...................................................... 38

Prepared Statement of Jennifer Leaning .................................................... 41

If Not Now, When? Only Ground Troops Can Stop the Genocide

in Kosovo by Holly Burkhalter, Reprinted from the Legal Times,

April 5, 1999; submitted by Jennifer Leaning ........................................ 49
 ATROCITIES AND THE HUMANITARIAN

CRISIS IN KOSOVO

TUESDAY, APRIL 6, 1999

COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE,

WASHINGTON, DC

The Commission met at 10:30 a.m. in room 2172 Rayburn House

Office Building, the Honorable Christopher H. Smith, Chairman, presiding. Commission Members present: Hon. Christopher H. Smith, Chairman; Hon. Steny H. Hoyer, Ranking Member.

Witnesses present: Ambassador William G. Walker, the Kosovo Verification Mission, OSCE; Nancy Lindborg, Vice President, Mercy Corps

International; Dr. Jennifer Leaning, Physicians for Human Rights;

Mark S. Ellis, the Central and East European Law Initiative

(CEELI) and the Coalition for International Justice (CIJ).

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH,

CHAIRMAN

Mr. SMITH. The Commission hearing will come to order.

Good morning. According to the March 26, 1999, State Department

Facts Sheet, U.S. and NATO Objectives and Interest in Kosovo,

NATOs military action has three objectives: one, to demonstrate

NATOs seriousness of purpose; two, to make clear to Milosevic the

imperative of reversing course to deter Belgrade from launching an

all-out offensive against helpless civilians; and three, seriously to

damage Belgrades military capability of taking repressive action

against Kosovars. To be brutally honest, to date none of those objectives has been

achieved. As a matter of fact, the situation has gotten exponentially

worse for the ethnic Albanians streaming into Albania and Macedonia

and for the unlucky remnants still in Kosovo.

The whispers we heard before and in the early days of the bombingthat some of Americas top military brass had serious reservations and doubts about the efficacy of air strikes, and the potential

impact of ethnic Albanians in Kosovo at this stage in the processis

now featured fare on page one in the Washington Post. Yesterday,

Post writer Bradley Graham and Joint Chiefs at Air Strategy wrote,

The Pentagons 4-Star Officers, meeting in closed door sessions in

the Pentagons Secure Tank Room, argued that the Administration

should use more economic sanctions and other non-military levers to

compel Belgrade to make peace. Ultimately, the Chiefs agreed unanimously last month to go along with the air strikes . . . . The article

(1)
2

goes on to say that 12 days into the bombing campaign the military

leaders remained doubtful that air strikes alone can satisfy the larger

political objectives, put forward by Clinton and other NATO leaders,

of stopping the violence in Kosovo and driving Yugoslav President

Milosevic back to the bargaining table. In matters of war, I believe no

one should brush aside the doubts of these top generals and leaders. Last night, I picked up my copy of Newsweek and read the incisive

piece How to Fumble Into War, about how the Clintonites thought

Milosevic would cave at the threat of cordite. This is the inside story,

by Michael Hirsch and John Barry, on why they got it wrong. The

article reveals a series of what they call missed opportunities for peace

that, if true, raises serious questions as to how this crisis, now a war,

was handled. Since there are no signs of the conflicts abatement any

time soon, knowing the details and the thinking behind the process

that got us here may suggest what path should be chosen to help

mitigate this human tragedy.

Mr. Hirsch and Mr. Barry write, October, in fact, may have been

the first missed opportunity for a more enduring peace. European

intelligence in Belgrade had strong suggestions then that Milosevic

was not entirely adverse to NATO troops monitoring a cease-fire, an

idea proposed by the French, British and Germans. The real problem, diplomats say, was back in Washington. The U.S. Administration was terrified of how the GOP-run Congress might react to the

prospect of U.S. troops in Kosovo. The midterm elections were near,

Clinton feared losing seats in the face of threatened impeachment.

The Pentagon, too, was fretting overthe alternative was a shortterm Holbrooke compromise, 2,000 unarmed peace verifiers. Clinton

refused to even risk U.S. troops in an extraction force that the Europeans hold in Macedonia in case those verifiers needed rescuing.

Let me state clearly for the record that I sincerely hope there is no

truth whatsoever to Newsweeks charge that Mr. Clinton missed an

opportunity for a more enduring peace because the midterm elections

were near, and he feared losing seats in the face of a threatened impeachment.

Now that bombs are dropping and the Kosovars are being murdered or are fleeing by the hundreds of thousands, I invite our witnesses today to give us the benefit of their views as to what NATO

should do and how it should go about trying to mitigate this crisis.

Is there any chance anytime soon of a negotiated settlement? Are we doing enoughproviding enough food, clothing, medicine and shelterfor the refugees who have been displaced? How do we reach those

who have been left behind, those who, perhaps, were in hospitals as

the crisis worsened? What is your view of Pope John Paul II and the

eight American Cardinals and Patriarch Pavli and other Christian

leaders who have called for a cease-fire and a negotiated settlement?

How can we embrace the Popes humanitarian corridor suggestion?

I believe our witnesses today are part of the solution in the Balkans

and have risked much to promote peace, human rights, and refuge

for the suffering. Ambassador William Walker, head of the Kosovo

Verification Mission of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, will describe the situation as he saw it on the ground

prior to the air strikes, as well as the information which his mission,

withdrawn to Macedonia, is still able to gather.
3

We hope the Ambassador can provide some thoughts on what the

OSCE can or should do regarding Kosovo and comment on the larger

issue of dealing with Milosevic, based on possible outcomes of the

current NATO action. The OSCE is, in many ways, the collective conscience of Europe; and its growing operational responsibilities are

proving critical to many troubled areas within the OSCE region.

Ambassador Walker has a distinguished diplomatic career. Most

recently, he demonstrated his integrity in the Kosovo village of Racak

and reported on what he saw: a massacre.

Following Ambassador Walker, a panel of experts will focus on the

refugee situation, which is becoming increasingly untenable. Their

testimony will also record some of the atrocities which have been occurring in Kosovo and suggest what the international community

should do to hold accountable those responsible for this situation.

First we have Nancy Lindborg, Vice President of Mercy Corps International. Mercy Corps has been a leader in the humanitarian response in Kosovo, well before Kosovo was high on the U.S. foreign

policy agenda. Ms. Lindborg gave insightful testimony at a hearing

the Helsinki Commission held in Kosovo one year ago, and she recently visited Mercy Corps field staff in the Balkans.

Good to have her here today. We look forward to her testimony.

Next, we will hear from Jennifer Leaning, Senior Research Fellow

at the Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies, and

a member of the Board of Physicians for Human Rights. In that capacity, Dr. Leaning has visited Kosovo on two occasions, days before

the air strikes, documenting systematic and pervasive abuses of ethnic Albanians through the health care system. Such abuses are outrageous, and I applaud her efforts to document them so that the world

knows what is happening and corrective action can be taken.

And finally, we have Mark Ellis, who is the Executive Director of

the American Bar Associations Central and East European Law Initiative, and President of the Board of the Coalition for International

Justice. The Coalition has been a vital resource to those advocating

the prosecution of war criminals, crimes against humanity, and genocide throughout the former Yugoslavia and around the world.

Mr. Ellis is not only a legal expert; he knows the region well, and I, too, look forward to his thoughts on what can be done to bring justice

to the region.

Id like to thank our witnesses again for being here and yield to my friend and college, Mr. Hoyer, the Ranking Democrat on the Commission.

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. STENY H. HOYER,

RANKING MEMBER

Mr. HOYER. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank

you for holding this timely hearing, and I want to welcome Ambassador Walker and the distinguished panel to whom you referred earlier.

Ambassador Walker, I want to thank you personally for your brav- ery, your fortitude, and your leadership of the OSCEs Civilian Verification Mission in Kosovo. Youve traveled a long and sometimes

treacherous road since we first met in Oslo last December, and Im

pleased to be able to welcome you here to Washington.
4

Mr. Chairman, as you know, many times I have reasoned on the

Floor of the House of Representatives and talked about war crimes in

Bosnia. Ive talked about Slobodan Milosevic, branded by the State

Department as a war criminal. Ive talked about the necessity of confronting Slobodan Milosevicnot the Serbian people, but the government headed by Slobodan Milosevic in reality, if not technically. But the leader of the Serbian people is a war criminal whom the

civilized community is now confrontingconfronting in a way such

that he clearly understands the West is serious, and the West will not

tolerate genocide in Europe.

So, we are now doing that. The delay, in my opinion, has been very

costly. You and I, Mr. Chairman, asked for more decisive action much

earlier than it occurred. Sadly, in Bosnia, as all of us know, 250,000

people were killed, and over 2 million refugees were created by ethnic cleansing, the greatest tragedy in Europe since the 2nd World

War.

Now, the tragedy continues in Kosovo. Thousands of people, including women and children, have been killed; and hundreds of thousands of refugees are streaming across Kosovos borders, many testifying to the terror and atrocities that they have suffered at the hands

of Serbian forces.

Mr. Chairman, as you will recall, during the conflict in Bosnia President Bush issued what has come to be known as the Christmas Warning to Slobodan during 1992. The President made it clear that if a

conflict erupted in Kosovo caused by Serbian action and aggression,

the United States was prepared to employ military force against the

Serbians in Kosovo and in Serbia proper.

President Clinton reiterated that warning several months later.

That is why I supported taking action as soon as the conflict in Kosovo began in early 1998. In retrospect, it is a mistake that we did not

act then; but in fairness, there was no consensus in the Westin this

country, in this Congressto act at that time.

There were those who say that the air strikes have caused an exac- erbation of the crisis and the mass expulsions. While this may have

accelerated the process, no one who watched Bosnia should doubt

that the 40,000 troops massed by Slobodan Milosevic had as its absolute proximate intent what we see today.

I agree with Secretary Cohens assessment that past is prologue.

Milosevic had massed those 40,000 troops and accompanying armor

in or near Kosovo. His historysince early 1998 in Kosovo and over

the past decade since becoming President in 1989, in Croatia, and in

Bosniais that he uses his forces against civilians.

Having made the commitment to stop this madness, the United

States and our allies must see this action through. There is no alternative to success. If we fail to see this through to the end, it will give

not only to Milosevic but to every tyrant in the world the thought that

he or she can proceed accordingly. It is the right thing to do, and we

must, Mr. Chairman, bring to justice all of those responsible for the

crimes committed in Kosovo.

You and I, Mr. Chairman, have strongly supported the War Crimes

Tribunal in The Hague. The reason for that is that we must stop the

cycle of violence and retribution. Those who talked about the Ottoman Turks and those who talked about centuries of history of injus-
5

tice which was not redressed and, therefore, who repeat it, will be

prologue themselves if we do not bring to justice those who have

murdered and committed war crimes against humanity. It is through the work of people like those appearing before us today, Mr. Chairman, and the organizations they represent, that we

bear witness to the ongoing atrocities in Kosovo. We must bear witness, we must learn, and we must work to prevent such brutality in

the future. That is why there is no alternative to success.

Mr. Chairman, I regret that the President early on said that ground troops would not be used. I think that was a significant tactical and

strategic mistake, because it gave a sense to Milosevic that we would

engage only in the air. The majority of the American public believe

that will not work. I share that view. I have supported from the very

beginningand long prior to this timethe use of troops if troops

were necessary.

The poet Maya Angelou, speaking at President Clintons inauguration, reminded us that, History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot

be unlived, and if faced with courage need not be lived again. After

the 2nd World War we said never again, but it was not the premise

that there would never again be tyrants like Hitler, who would savage their own people.

In Helsinki, Mr. Chairman, we adopted a critical premise, and the

premise was that a nation not only must treat the citizens of other

nations consistent with international law, but they must treat their

own citizens consistent with international law. That was a radical

change. It was a change born of the inaction preceding the 2nd World

War, the inaction which led, perhaps, to millions of deaths.

It is my fervent hope, Mr. Chairman, that we will have the courage

to ensure that the recent past endured by the people of Croatia, Bosnia, and Kosovo will not be prologue for further violence in Southeastern Europe.

Mr. Chairman, I look forward to hearing our witnesses, and I thank

you again for scheduling this hearing.

Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. Hoyer.

Ambassador Walker, thank you again for being here. Your full statement will be made a part of the record, but please proceed however

you wish.

TESTIMONY OF AMBASSADOR WILLIAM G. WALKER,

 THE KOSOVO VERIFICATION MISSION, OSCE

Amb. WALKER. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Hoyer.

Let me begin by expressing my appreciation for the invitation to appear here today. Im back in the country for some consultations and

to do my income tax, so it gave me a good excuse for coming back.

I do want to preface my remarks by stating that I am a career foreign service officer with the Department of State of 38 years tenure;

but as you mentioned, sir, I am presently on secundement to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, and Im appearing before you today as the head of the Kosovo Verification Mission in

Exile, I guess.
6

I thought Id give you a few words about the background of the

mission, just to remind everybody what we went in to do. A few words

about what we were doing as we progressed over the last six months,

and then a couple words about what we are trying to do as we are in

exile in Macedonia and doing some work next door in Albania.

As you mentioned, sir, the OSCE mission was put together back in October of 1998 after a number of agreements were reached. First,

Ambassador Holbrooke and President Milosevic struck an oral agreement, and then the OSCE signed a formal agreement with the FRY;

and, of course, Generals Clark and Nowman also went in and signed

an agreement with the Minister of Defense in Belgrade.

There were a number of principles that the government adopted for the mission as we went in with the very high hopes that we were

going to be able to bring some peace and stability to Kosovo. The first

principle was that we were going in to verify a cease-fire, plus we

were going to try and do some things in terms of putting together an

election process, as well as helping to reform local policea whole

panoply of other tasks, but the principle task was one of verification.

Another principle we went in with was that we were going in as

2,000, as you stated, unarmed verifiers; and the government in Belgrade assumed and kept claiming that they were totally responsible

for the security of all members of my mission. Cooperation was promised by both sides, both by the government in Belgradein the person of Mr. Milosevic himself on several occasions directly to me but

also in terms of the other side of the conflictamd the KLA; both of

them promised that they would fully cooperate with my mission as

we tried to go about our business of verifying that cease-fire. Another principle that we went in with was equality of treatment,

that we were not to take sides, that we were supposed to be impartial

as to what was going on and tell the world in a non-partisan fashion

as to what was happening in Kosovo.

And the overall objective of our mission was essentially to buy time

for the negotiation process that was underway, headed by Ambassador Hill and others.

We went in, as I say, in mid-October, and through November,

through December, we were essentially involved in the buildup of our

mission. This was by far the biggest effort that the OSCE had ever

undertaken. I think we were bigger by a factor of ten than the nearest-sized OSCE mission, the one in Croatia; and we were also four

times bigger than all other OSCE missions around Europe combined.

So this was a very, very big operation for the OSCE.

I would have to say in honestyand I think that people in Vienna

would agree with thisthat the OSCE was somewhat unprepared to

mount an operation of this size, and we were essentially designing

the operation as we went ahead.

By mid-December, I would say, the mission had essentially been

established. We started to adopt different tasks from those that were

on our initial platter. There was a confrontation up in the Podujevo

area to the north of Pristina in which we saw the two militaries facing each other off and threatening to go at each other. We started

putting our people in between the two and actually in the command

centers of both the VJ, the Yugoslav Army, as well as the MUP, the

Yugoslav Special Police, as well as up in the headquarters of the KLA
7

up in the hills, trying to talk these people into not firing at each other,

not provoking each other, trying to maintain the cease-fire that we

were there to verify.

Also in mid-December, we got involved in another task that no one

had foreseen when we went in, which was trying to negotiate the

release by both sides of people they had taken hostage, prisoners,

this sort of thing; and we were somewhat successful in arranging for

the KLA to release a number of Army soldiers that they had captured, and a reciprocal action by the government to release a number

of KLA people that they had captured.

When I was last in Washington last January, our mission was up to

about 1,200 internationals, and we felt that we were making a difference. We felt that we were finally up and running. I was quite optimistic when I came through Washington last January that we were

making a difference and were heading in the right direction. In the January/February time frameI think this was when we

saw our mission in its most robust posture, and at that point I think

we were making a significant difference. You might rememberand

its already been mentioned by you, Mr. Chairmanthat on January

15 there was the massacre in Racak. As you all have already mentioned, I was able to go up the following day and see the bodies strewn

in that ravine, talked to some of the survivors down in the village,

and it was as plain as the nose on my facewhich is a pretty goodsize noseexactly what we had seen. We had seen the end result of a

very, very nasty massacre, one that in later days has been made to

look relatively insignificant by the numbers that are coming out of

Kosovo over the last few weeks. But up to that point, it was a very

significant event. I was really quite proud that the OSCE mission

was able not only to denounce that as a massacre and point the finger

of responsibility at the security services which had committed it, but

also to call for the ICTY to come in and try to do a thorough investigation and bring those responsible for that massacre to justice.

But the Racak massacre and the aftereffects of statements that we

made in Kosovoin pointing the finger at whom we thought were

responsiblehad a number of significant repercussions, one of which

was that the government of President Milosevic quickly saw that the

KVM was a threat to him, that we were, in fact, willing to speak out

and direct our fingers at those responsible for acts. The cooperation,

which had always been minimal to start with from the government in

Belgrade, dropped away toit disappeared completely. So, from the

middle of January on, we saw very, very little in the way of either

cooperation or less than anger and hatred directed at my mission. Nevertheless, the buildup of the mission continued, and we were

able to establish field offices. We were able to go out and establish

five regional centers, a couple of dozen smaller offices in provincial

cities and towns, and another dozen or so in even smaller villages,

because we quickly discovered that where our people were, where

our little orange vehicles were, bad things tended not to happen; and

where they were not, bad things continued to happen, most often

emanating from the government side.

Another thing that happened in January was that the international

media moved into a very, very positive posture vis-á-vis my mission.

At the beginning of the mission, there was a lot of criticism, claiming

that we were out there just to look through binoculars and observe

what was going on but were unable to take action if we saw bad things
8

happening. With Racak and some other things, I think the international press started printing positive news about the missionwhich

was all to our liking, obviously.

They also saw that we were doing other things besides the more

dramatic. We were going into villages and being able to get electricity

back and hooked up, waterthat sort of thing. We were able to do a

lot of mundane things that normally do not make headlines, but that

the press saw was happening. They saw we were making a difference, and we were getting very favorable press. The Albanian population, that is so much the victim of the last six

months or so, increasingly saw the OSCE KVM vehicles as a bit of a

security blanket. As I say, when our orange vehicles would drive

through population centers composed of Albanians, we always found

very positive receptions: kids out waving at us, giving us good luck

signs, this sort of thing. And in every village we went into containing

Albanians, we would hear about how much they appreciated our presence.

The KLA itselfthe fighting arm of the Albanian populationwas also increasingly trusting of our presence; although they did some

things that were detrimental to our mission, including wounding one

of our international staff, unlike the government they were willing to

take responsibility when they had done something like that. They

would tell us if they had detained people, they would tell us if they

had prisoners, they would tell us if they were doing things that were

detrimental to the missionunlike the government which never took

responsibility for anything.

As I say, starting with the Racak aftermath, President Milosevic

saw our mission as a risk, a danger, to him and ceased almost all

communication with us, far less any cooperation with us. So by the

end of February, the OSCE KVM had acquired an extremely favorable image among certain people: among the Albanian community,

which saw us as a protective force; and among the NGOs, which saw

the KVM as a cooperative partner in some of the things they were

trying to do. I think Ive mentioned the press corps, which saw the

KVM as more activist than they probably thought we were going to

be at the beginning, and even among some Serbs there: those who

wanted an end to the violence, who wanted missing relatives to be

found, for their fates to be determined.

But in mid-March, I would say, the environment in which we were

acting turned overtly and increasingly hostile. The Belgrade media,

which was never friendly at the beginning, turned vitriolic in its hatred of the KVM vis-á-vis certain personalities within the KVM, myself included.

The local cease-fire breakdowns, which we had seen in places like

Podujevo and some of the other parts of the country, turned into a

province-wide collapse of the cease-fire. There were massive troop

movements, equipment movementsyou mentioned the 40,000 that

were poised north of the Kosovo borderand those buildups in the

north as well as in the south came with no explanation to the KVM,

no notification, as had been agreed to in the October agreements. In

other words, they did it in total defiance of what they had agreed to

do vis-á-vis moving troops, moving equipment, this sort of thing.
9

In mid-December, we counted up to five to six times more combat

units out and about than the agreements called for. You might remember that in the agreements they were allowed to keep three companies of combat troops out and about in Kosovo at any given time.

We found they were up to 15, 16, and even more, out and about without telling us. In mid-December, we saw them prepare for demolition tunnels and

bridges that would have been exit routes for our getting out or entry

routes for anyone coming in, such as NATO. We saw by mid-December increasing evidence of civilian home

guards being armed by the security forces, weapons being handed

out. We saw increasing evidence of the paramilitary forces; the famous Arkan and his people started making their appearances in midDecember.

We also saw a very disturbing trend, which was an increase in arrogance by the troops, by the Army, by the MUP. They would shell

villages, they would loot, they would torch villages. They would routinely beat people in the villages and do so in front of our verifiers, in

front of the media, apparently with no shame as to what they were

doing.

Another disturbing trend in mid-December was that the violence

moved into the population centers, moved into places such as Pristina,

where we started seeing acts of terrorism, never attributable to anyone, but very, very disturbing that it was coming into the city. So by mid-December we were finding it increasingly difficult to

perform our basic mandated tasks. We were denied access to trouble

spots. We would hear there was shooting going on, or a village was

under attack. We would try to get our people out there, and most

often the MUP or the VJ would stop us from going in. Since they were

armed and we were not, it was very difficult to push forward. Occasionally, the KLA also denied us access.

There was also an increase in physical threats, abusive behavior

becoming normal against our people. And the risk of serious injury to

unarmed verifiers, in fact, became a statistical likelihood.

In March, the Chairman in the office of the OSCE in Norway, the

Foreign Minister of Norway, Knute Volleback, decided that we had to

pull out the mission. Now why did he decide this? It was because the

mission was reduced to witnessing FRY authorities achieving their

aims forcibly and incrementally, with little corresponding evidence

that we were any longer influencing or containing brutal behavior.

So we were unable to form the verification tasks or any of the other

tasks; and we were an increasing security threat to the peopleover

1,400 people from 38 countries of the OSCE.

I must say the most emotional experience Ive had in my past 38

years of service was a few hours after the Chairman in office called

me and told me we were going to have to evacuate. I called together

the local employees, Serbs and Albanianswe had over 1,500 of them.

I called together those that were in Pristina at headquarters to inform them that we were pulling out; and I must say it was a very,

very sad occasion to tell these people who had worked so well, so

diligently for peace in their community, for us to tell them that we

were leaving them behind, which we had to do.
10

It was a very emotional meeting. One of the more important things

and most prophetic things I said was, I hate to tell you this, but

things are going to get a lot worse before they get better. There were

a lot of tears in the room. There was almost a stunned silence among

most members of the staff. They were very emotional, but afterwards

I dont know how many of them came up to me and said, We hate the

OSCE go; we know why you are going, however. We understand it;

we accept it.

The situation since we leftyouve all read the headlines and you

know whats in the papers, but let me tell you what we did. We got

1,400 people, internationals, in 400 vehicles out of Kosovo in less than

seven hours. There was a great deal of concern in the European capitalsas well as, I assume, in the North American capitalsthat we

would be interfered with, that we would encounter opposition from

either the government not letting us get out, wanting to hold us hostage, or local populations trying to impede our exit, knowing what

might come next.

Much to our surprise, and, obviously, much to our feelings for our own safety, we got out very, very quickly; and I have to think in retrospect that the government wanted us out of there as quickly as we

could so they could do what they subsequently did. In fact, what they

subsequently did started almost to the hour when we started leaving

Kosovo. As we were pulling out, some of our verifiers coming out in

their orange vehicles spotted tanks, armored personnel carriers,

troops, moving on into the cities where they had not been in evidence

before. So within minutes of our departure, the VJ and the MUP were

moving into the void. I think it was from that very momentif not well before thatthat

the ethnic re-engineering, as it is now being called, ethnic cleansing

program, began. I certainly agree with Mr. Hoyer that this was not

something that awaited the beginning of aerial bombardment. It had

started well before; it had been planned well before. It might have

accelerated as a result of the aerial bombardment, but it was not something that was precipitated or caused by the bombardment.

Another thing that has happened since we left was, we have seen

tremendous evidence of the rage that was within the government,

and the VJ, and the MUP, against the KVM. They have trashed our

facility; they have harassed and beaten some of our people. They have

killed some of our people. There have even been attacks against those

places where we used to hang out. There were very few restaurants

in Pristina that we could go to; the few that we went to had been

burned to the ground in the aftermath of our departure. There is, obviously, as I said, this full-scale brutal ethnic cleansing,

of killing, expulsion of people, what is going on over the last three

weeks and what goes on today. Our mission is now, essentially, in

Macedonia, but we are still functioning as a mission.

A week ago, just before I departed for economic reasonsas well as

trying to keep 1,300 people busy when there was much less to dowe

had reduced the mission to about 250, but with recent events we are

starting to bring back people. We are now up to about 300. We are

preparing ourselves, we are planning, we are hoping to go back in as

soon as we possibly can; and the structure of our mission has been

preserved. We are also loaning out our people: these 50 that have

come back, plus a good number of the 250, we are putting under the
11

auspices of UNHCR and others. We are trying to do some border

monitoring, and we are certainly trying to work with the refugees.

We are trying to keep the avenues of information flowing, open. We

are doing a lot in terms of telephoning back in with due regard to the

safety and security of the people we are calling but, nevertheless,

trying to keep those avenues of communication open so we can get

some idea of whats going on back in Kosovo.

I think we are still making a difference, albeit a different difference

from what we were able to do when we were in Kosovo.

Ive learned a number of personal lessons from this. Ill just go down

one or two of them. I would like to take your questions. The lessons

Ive learned is, unarmed verification with no enforcement mechanism

at your side just doesnt work. We were dealing withI think we

were the only people in Kosovo that were unarmed; and although I

have to admire the bravery and the guts of some of my people, putting themselves between two sides heavily armed and shooting each

other, or prepared to shoot each other, I think to go back in you can go

in only with an armed body at your side. In spite of what some people think, I believe that the lessons learned

from previous missionsIve got a lot of people on my staff from Bosnia, from Rwanda, from other peace-keeping missions around the

world; youve got to be very, very careful about applying the lessons

learned in those places to the present situation. It really is a very

different, unique situation, and you have to look at it as such.

Another lesson I have learned is that attempting to be balanced in

such a mission, where one side is consistently far worse in its behavior than the other side, also doesnt work. You really do have to call

them as you see them, even if that gives the impression of not being

as non-partisan as you originally thought you could be.

With all those things, let me close by saying that my mission is still in Macedonia, albeit reduced. Everybody who leftto a person from

30 some countries, when they leftassured me they hated to come

out; they want to go back in, they are terribly concerned and disturbed by what is going on since we left. They are very fearful for the

well-being of those people we left behind, especially those who were

working with us to bring peace and security to Kosovo.

We are ready to go back in. We want to go back in, and I truly

believe we will go back in.

With that, let me say Id appreciate any questions you might have for me, sir.

Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Ambassador Walker.

Let me say that many of us applauded you openly. I think it was very consistently a bipartisan effort for you to call them the way you

saw them. That was one of the things that I think singled you out:

you didnt play that game of saying theres one on this side and one on

that side, a bogus game of trying to show a sense of equality. I think

that has been part of our problem in the Balkans right from the very

beginning, when the fighting first began versus the Croatians. There

were people trying to say, Well, they are bad, and they are bad. There

is an aggressor, and we know who the aggressor is. The chief aggressor of all happens to be in Belgrade with the name of Milosevic.

Its interesting you point out that being unarmed doesnt work. I

would be interested in knowing . . . . I think we learned that with

UNPROFOR as well. They were armed, but they certainly had a man-
12

date that was weak and did not give them the capability to in any

way protect people, especially in the safe havenswhich turned out

to be a very cruel joke, almost a staging area for further atrocities.

Weve had hearings in the Commission, as well as in my Subcommittee on International Operations and Human Rights, where weve

heard from people who were there, who saw loved ones taken away

on busses while armed UNPROFOR personnel stood by and actually

aided their passage to the next world. So, I really think your comments are very well taken. In terms of going back, though, what would the mission look like if

it were unarmed? Would you be in the accompaniment of NATO enforcers? Is that the way you would envision redeployment?

Amb. WALKER. Yes. I think we are planning based on the Rambouillet agreement, which calls for the OSCE to go in and be, essentially, in charge of sort of the civilian part of the agreementelections, reform of the police, reconstruction, institution building, all those

thingsbut obviously, as that agreement states, it would be very,

very necessary to have an implementing force at our side, and that in

the context of Rambouillet would be a NATO force.

Mr. SMITH. What has happened to the Kosovars, both Serbian and

ethnic Albanian, who worked for the missions who were left behind?

Were they given an opportunity to leave? Did they choose to stay?

You mentioned that some have met some cruel fates. Do you have

information on how many have been hurt?

Amb. WALKER. I dont have any real good numbers; I just know

that several of my people that were on my security detail were killed.

Almost all the ones we have talked to have either been called in for

questioninga good number of them have been physically abused.

When we left, it was a very, very painful decision to have to make

as to whether or not we could take out local staff. It always is in an

evacuation of this sort; but given that they are Yugoslav citizens, given

the fact that there were 1,500 of them with families, et cetera, most of

them would have chosenalthough we didnt do a poll of any sort

would have chosen to stay behind. And, as I say, we are now finding

many of them are coming out in the exodus, trying to get out after

having had bad experiences remaining behind. But the government undoubtedly targeted people from KVM, as

well as from the Diplomatic Observation Missions of some of the countries, the US KDOM; some of their people met the same sort of treatment at the hands of the government.

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Ambassador, the estimated number of displaced

persons in Kosovo before the air strike was 450,000, and that number

has swelled now to 830,000. No one has absolute hard numbers; these

are all estimates.

Some of the group, or some of the people that I think we are most

concerned aboutas I am sure you are as wellare the weak, the

frail, the elderly, those in hospitals who could not take to the roads.

In an ironic sort of way, those who are actually making it to the border are probably the strongest and those with the most stamina, although many of them have died along the way as well. But how many

are left behind, and what is their fate? Do we have any current information on them? Well be hearing from the Physicians for Human

Rights shortly about the atrocities in hospitals. Perhaps you could

speak to that.
13

Amb. WALKER. Well, in terms of how many are left behind, I dont

think anyone has a good figure on that because there hasnt been a

census conducted in Kosovo for a very long time; and theres been a

lot of population shifts over the last ten years or so.

One of the things we were hoping to do when we go back in, in

preparation for an electoral process, was to conduct a census to see

how many people are actually in Kosovo.

President Milosevic, the first time I met him in my present capacity, tried to convince me that all these statisticsabout 90 percent

Albanians and ten percent Serbswere ludicrous. He tried to convince me, in fact, that the Albanian population was less than 50 percent, and that a majority of the population were Serbs, Hungarians,

Gypsies, Egyptiansall sorts of other ethnic denominations.

But figures as to how many are there, how many have stayed behind, are extremely rough at best. The population prior to this recent

exodus was supposedly about 2 million; and if your figures are correct, then you are talking about 1.2, 1.3 million still in Kosovo, of

whom, again, the vast majority, Im sure, are Albanians.

Mr. SMITH. Let me ask you this. In my opening I pointed outand

I know youve heard it as wellthat a number of religious leaders

have called for cease-fires and for an attempt to jump start the negotiating process. In your very rich experience of having worked not

just in Kosovo but elsewhere in your long diplomatic life, do you think

there is an opportunity here, or is there any window that you see, any

avenue that might lead to a negotiated settlement?

Amb. WALKER. Well, Im usually an optimist, and I usually see negotiations the best way to end conflicts. As you mentioned, my experience in El Salvador at the end of a ten-year civil war when a lot of

people thought negotiation was impossiblegiven the sides were so

far apart and the war had been so bitternevertheless, there was a

point at which both sides recognized that further violence was not

the way to solve the problems.

To answer your question, sir, I do not see, at the present moment, an opportunity for getting Mr. Milosevic to seriously negotiate anything vis-á- vis Kosovo. I think he is showing by his actions exactly

what he thinks of that province and what he thinks of the people

there.

Mr. SMITH. Just one question with regards to the make-up of the

observers, the members of your mission. There were press reports

that some of the Russian members who were deployed were members

of the Intelligence Service. Obviously, you have to take those whom

you are given; and in terms of the people that will serve, Im not sure

you have any say as to which country they will come from. What was

your view on that? Were they doing reconnaissance? Was there any

evidence that they were aiding and abetting the Serbs? Or were they

people who were genuinely committed to the mission?

Amb. WALKER. I found them genuinely committed to the mission.

We had over about 100 Russians. I was disappointed when they pulled

out sort of unilaterally; just before I left Macedonia, they pulled their

people out with the commencement of the bombing.

But both in my previous experience in Croatia and Eastern Slovania, as well as in my mission in Kosovo, I had a good number of Russians

by my side. One of my deputies in Kosovo was a Russian Foreign

Service Officer, and I found them to be very committed to what we
14

were trying to do. Now, whether or not there were other motives involved, or other activities involved, I had no evidence of that whatsoever.

Mr. SMITH. Id like to turn over the questioning to Mr. Hoyer.

Mr. HOYER. I was pleased to hear your response to Mr. Smiths last

question. The troops on the ground in Bosnia, who are working with

Russian troops side by side, give the same response; and, as a matter

of fact, one of the most positive things about the peace-keeping mission in Bosnia is the relationship between U.S. and Russian troops

worked closely together, and Im glad to hear that was also the case

with respect to the civilian Russian complement of the KVM.

Mr. Ambassador, youve met with Milosevic; Ive had the opportu- nity of meeting with Milosevic myself, in Belgrade some years ago. I

went to Pristina and met with the gentleman who was in charge of

Milosevics mission in Pristina and asked him if there was anybody,

anybody in Kosovo with whom he felt he could sit down at the table

and bring a negotiation resolution to the issues. He would not name

one name in all of Kosovo ofif there was 2 million, and we are talking about 90 percent, 1.8 million Yugoslavs of Albanian extraction

that he would mention as a possible interlocutor. That was, I think,

in 92 or 93.

In that context, if Milosevic remainsyou said in response to Mr.

Smiths question you didnt see much possibility of negotiated settlementif Milosevic remains, do you believe there is any possibility of

stability in that region, absent the total ethnic cleansing of Albanians

from Kosovo?

Amb. WALKER. Not much.

Mr. HOYER. Mr. Chairman, I have a number of other questions for

Ambassador Walker, but because my time is brief and Id like to hear

the other witnesses, Im going to hold my other questions. Mr. Smith asked a number of them, Mr. Ambassador. Its going to

be importantI know you are back to your personal reasons, but,

obviously, somebody who has been on site can testify to the fact that

atrocities were already underway prior to any armed action being

undertaken by NATO. I think thats a critically important fact for the

American public to know, that while weve been at this a short time,

and the press two, three days into the bombing were saying it doesnt

appear to be working; this may be a longer effort than we would like,

but I would reiterate that I hope that your message and, frankly, the

Administrations message, was strong in terms of staying the course.

Id like them stronger in using all means at NATOs disposal to accomplish those objectives. I think thats critical for Milosevic to know

that there will be no safe haven. There will be no holding back of

resources available to NATO to accomplish the objective, and I would

hope that message, while you are here and, of course, overseas, is one

within the context of your responsibilities and appropriate to give as

one thats given.

Mr. Chairman, let me withhold my other questions so that we can hear the other witnesses. Im going to stay until at least quarter of.

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Hoyer.

I do want to ask one additional brief question, because I think its

very important to get this on the record and to elicit your response.
15

We have been a major provider of information that has led to both

indictments and convictions in the War Crimes Tribunals. Last week,

I wrote a letter to the President asking that the Administration collect informationdo all that is humanly possible, direct every agency

of our governmentto focus on Milosevic himself.

Mr. Hoyer and I and a number of others passed a resolution last year. Our resolution called onand Alfonse DAmato on the Senate

side made the same request which passed almost unanimously, if not

unanimouslythe Administration to stop dealing with everyone else

but Milosevic.

Again, just last week in the New York Times there was a statement

from a Clinton Administration official saying that we, the United

States Government, have been the largest source of information for

the tribunal; but we have never compiled a dossier with the aim of

indicting Milosevic. It seems to me that when this man is being targetedI dont disagree with the targetingas a Hitler, as a Lenin, as

someone who has done irreparable damage to human beings in crimes

against humanity, to make him immune is, to me . . . . And this isnt

the first time Ive raised the issue; Ive raised it at dozens of hearings.

Ive called hearings, briefings and the like, but I always get back that

same blank stare, that were not collecting information on Mr.

Milosevic. Why? What would be your view on that? It seems we go

after every other underling, but if we dont go after the chief promoter of this abuse, we are missing the boat.

Amb. WALKER. In a word, I totally agree with you. Let me say that

starting with the aftermath of the Racak massacre my mission did

everything it possibly could to cooperate with ICTY. I spoke to Judge

Arbour and invited her to come down. We tried to get her through the

border; they wouldnt let her in because she didnt have a visa. I subsequently went and visited her in The Hague; about a month ago I

met her in The Hague, and we talked about this very issue, without

prejudging what they were doing in The Hague. I am a very big fan of

that process.

As we speak, I have got a good number of my people in Macedonia

talking to the refugees, talking to the people who are coming out with

these horror stories, to collect testimony, to get as much as we possibly can; and there is no question in my mind as to where the chain of

the command leads.

I happen to believe that we should go after all those in that chain of

command, but certainly the person at the top. I think it is terribly

important, as you said, Mr. Hoyer, to demonstrate to the world that

what he has done and what the people working for him have done

over the past monthsbut most recently in the last few weeksis

just totally unacceptable to the civilized world. And we have to show

that by indictments, and trials, et cetera, emanating from The Hague.

So, Im glad you asked that question. Thank you very much.

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Ambassador.

I would like to thank you again. I have a number of questions for

the record that Ill submit to you, but thank you, and were

Amb. WALKER. Okay. Once I get my income tax done Ill be able

to

Mr. SMITH. We are very grateful for your great work.

Amb. WALKER. Thank you, sir.

Mr. HOYER. Wed want you to do that first.
16

Amb. WALKER. Being from Maryland, I understand why, sir.

Mr. SMITH. Id like to question our second panel. Ive already introduced them, but again I want to welcome Ms. Nancy Lindborg, Vice

President of Mercy Corps International; Dr. Jennifer Leaning, Senior Research Fellow at the Harvard Center for Population Development Studies, and a member of the Board of Physicians for Human

Rights; and Mr. Mark Ellis, Executive Director of the Central and

Eastern European Law Initiative, as well as President of the Board

of the Coalition for International Justice.

Ms. Lindborg.

TESTIMONY OF NANCY LINDBORG, VICE PRESIDENT,

MERCY CORPS INTERNATIONAL

Ms. LINDBORG. Thank you, Chairman Smith, for convening this

hearing today. Mr. Hoyer. I appreciate very much the opportunity to

address the Helsinki Commission as I did a year ago, as we all grapple

with the overwhelming crisis thats now engulfing the Balkans.

I would like to firmly underscore both of your opening remarks, in

that this current nightmare certainly didnt begin with the NATO air

strikes; and I think weve all missed opportunitieswe being the collective international communitysince 1989 to address what was by

any perspective a long simmering conflict. And I dont think any of us

needed sophisticated early warning systems to see what was coming

down the pike.

Mercy Corps International has worked in Kosovo since 1993. In what began as a small assistance program to about 15,000 of the most

vulnerable, ballooned into a beneficiary list of over 200,000 individuals by late 1997, partly due to a 70 percent unemployment rate among

Kosovar Albanians, as they were excluded from all state jobs and

institutions and systematically had their civil and human rights

stripped away from them. Then, as we all know, February 1998 was the beginning of violent

conflict that erupted after nine years of a very peaceful and determined resistance by the Kosovar Albanians; and for more than a year

the Kosovars have withstood the burning of their homes and fields,

forcible evictions of entire villages, and the killing and massacres of

innocent civilians.

We also had teams in the open fields of Racak just after the massacres there, saw 40,000 civilians camped in open fields and huddled in

the mosque there. I will say that as Serbian truckers brought supplies for usunder contract they were bringing us flour and emergency blanketssome of them registered horror at what they were

seeing. This is further testimony to the fact that many Serb civilians

have no idea what is going on in the nearby province in Kosovo.

As all of us now watch the news footage of refugees

Mr. HOYER. Can I interrupt, Ms. Lindborg. I apologize for interrupting, but youve made a very important point that both the Chairman and I made at the beginning; but its important that theand I

think the American public understands itthe Serbian people are

not the problem here. That is not to say that they havent been hyped

and Kosovo is very important to them, and their nationalistic spirit,

et cetera, et cetera, has been whipped up by Milosevic; what is the

problem here is an administration, Milosevic, and those who are allied with him in the government, who have as a policy the perpetra-
17

tion of criminal behavior to sustain themselves in power. And thats

the point you make, that the Serbian peoplewhen they know about

these atrocities . . . they dont know about them; they are getting bad

information; I dont mean to a person, but clearly like every human

being who is revulsed by atrocitiesreact. And I think your statement of the Serbian truck drivers havingbeing revulsed by this activityI think when the Serbian people know what Milosevic has

done, they are going to say that the West was right.

But I appreciate your making that point.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Ms. LINDBORG. There has been a systematic suppression of freedom in the press in Serbia that I think has been a very important

factor in all of this.

And as we watch the news footage of refugees pouring across all

the nearby borders, I think its very important for us all to remember

this isnt the first time many of them have left home with nothing.

Last summer, as we discussed, there were over half a million internally displaced people within Kosovo; and even in the weeks before

the air strikes there were estimates anywhere from 250,000 to 400,000

still unable to return home.

What is notable, however, is that prior to the air strikes the very small numbers who took the steps of crossing international borders.

People went to great lengths to stay within the region, close to their

homes, staying with host families, camping in the hills and ravines,

and waiting for the first chance to return home and to begin rebuilding.

Obviously, thats no longer possible. I think we are all witnessing the capstone of Milosevics ongoing campaign against the Kosovars

as we witness the brutal and forced eviction of the Kosovar Albanians, not only from their homes but from the entire region. Mercy Corps evacuated its staff a few days prior to the air strikes.

We did offer evacuation to all 45 of our local staff. Thirty-two chose to

remain in the region with their families. We did remain in phone

contact, as much as we safely could; however, we lost contact with

our offices in Mitrovica and Peja as early as the first Saturday of the

air strikes. In fact, the last phone call that we had from our office in

Peja was when they informed us that there were more than 100 people

in this particular persons officein this particular persons family

compoundthat the Serbs had cordoned off the center of Peja, which

was where the highest concentration of Albanians live, that Serbs

were lobbing shells into the city center and brutally and physically

beating people back as they tried to escape. We havent heard anything since that phone call.

We still have 14 of our staff unaccounted for, although many of

them have surfaced in the current exodus and have rejoined our staff

and helped us to continue work in serving the refugees.

In Pristina, in the first days of the air strikes, residents there reported posters throughout the city warning them to leave before they

were killed. Weve heard stories from hundreds of refugees being forced

from their homes at gunpoint and under shelling, stripped of all their

documents and possessions.

The warehouses in which we and many other organizations stored

relief supplies have been burned. Our offices have been leveled in

Pristina and other cities, and were now seeing the refugees flooding
18

across the borders on tractors, on foot, in buses and trains, in a tidal

wave that threatens to destabilize the front-line countries of Macedonia, Albania and the province of Montenegro. And now, the refugees face a new horror. In Macedonia, almost

50,000 refugees remain trapped in the no-mans land between the

Kosovo and Macedonia borders. Many of them have been without food,

water or medical supplies for five days; and they are encamped in the

most miserable of muddy conditions. There are no sanitary facilities.

There are no latrines. There are fears of disease outbreaks among

this population.

We also have reports of a line of vehicles some 25 kilometers long,

snaking back into Kosovo territory, leaving these people vulnerable

to further Serb reprisals.

Only a handful of relief agencies have been able to negotiate entrance into this no-mans land. Those of us who are able to operate

there have been working around the clock for the last three days,

providing medical attention, food, drinking water, plastic sheeting

and blankets, but are able to serve only a small percentage of the

population.

UNHCR has set up a main transit center to house 10,000 of the

refugees waiting registration. Sanitary facilities are being prepared.

We have additional relief supplies procured, staged and waiting to be

distributed; and NATO is in the process of setting up five collective

centers throughout Macedonia. More can be constructed as the need

arises.

But this absolute tidal wave of refugees has overwhelmed Macedonia, taxing its ability, and, more importantly, its willingness to respond. I think its important to consider the impact of 130,000 refugeeswhich is the current countin a country of 2.1 million people;

and this is in Macedonia, which already had a very delicate balance

between the Albanian minority and the Macedonian majority. Theyve

just had an influx equaling more than five percent of its entire population; and I think, to put it in context, thats equal to about 15.5

million swamping the U.S. in four days, which is roughly approximate to the entire population of Norway, Sweden, and half of Finland

coming to the United States.

And, this is occurring in a country that already had 40 percent unemployment. As a result, tensions are rising on all sides. Macedonian

officials are dragging their feet; they are refusing to register the refugees. They are threatening not to let any more into their country.

Relief workers are frustrated with our inability to help the people

who are trapped literally and figuratively in no-mans land. Similarly, Montenegro is facing an even more ominous set of fissures, as it copes with 50,000 new refugees; and its caught in a very

precarious balance between its friendliness with the West and the

pressure from Belgrade. We are, as are many of our sister agencies,

continuing to distribute food to refugeesprimarily in Ulcinj and

Rozaje today, but tomorrow we may be facilitating escape routes if

the threats continue against the current government there.

Albania has been similarly swamped. In contrast, it has mobilized

its government resources to assist with the more than 100,000 refugees; and NATO has already moved in with logistical support for U.N.

and international relief groups to bring food, water and shelter to the

refugees camped along the borders. Many refugees are still caught
19

along the border waiting for any kind of food, water or medical supplies. Our teams have watched as whole villages with whom weve

worked in the past have come across at various crossing points. However, Albania was barely feeding its own people before this

crisis, and despite its willingness to cooperate it will also need massive assistance to ensure its ability to forestall collapse.

The international community has three overwhelming responsibilities right now. The first is to provide the best care possible for these

refugees. The second is to ensure that these front-line countries dont

collapse under the weight of these refugees; and the third is to press

forward with all means possible to ensure that these refugees are

able to return home as quickly as possible in a secure environment. The international relief communityincluding private organizations, the U.N., and now the militaryhas already mobilized resources

to assist the refugees with emergency immediate needs. Many organizations like Mercy Corps evacuated out of Kosovo and are now operational in the front-line regions. We, with private resources and

early quick funding from U.S. AID and other donors, have been able

to procure emergency food and supplies for tens of thousands of refugees and immediately begin distributing aid.

It is our challenge to work in close cooperation with our colleague

agencies, with the U.N. system, and with the military to ensure that

all of our efforts are collectively focused on bringing aid as quickly as

possible to the refugees. More is needed. I think all of us have seen an

initial outpouring of support from the American public as they help

us support those efforts; and we have seen assistance from the U.S.

government and hope more is forthcoming.

We must also, as an international community, provide Macedonia,

Montenegro and Albania with the political and financial commitments

that they need to maintain stability and continue accepting refugees.

A plan is now underway to transport refugees to third countries of

asylum. This, unfortunately, further tears apart family members and

lessens their desire to return home and remain as close as possible to

their home.

Unfortunately, this step may be needed to provide immediate assurances to the front-line countries that they are not alone in grappling with this crisis; but we urge that we first attempt to provide

these countries with the economic packages they need to relieve their

tensions, in hopes that they will continue to provide assistance to and

accept the Kosovar refugees. For example, on a small scale Mercy

Corps is looking at programs that develop economic assistance to the

local populations of Albania and Macedonia, while at the same time

assisting the refugees. These are the kinds of programs all of us need

to creatively look at to provide the assurances Macedonia, Montenegro and Albania need. Most importantly, we must collectively reaffirm that our first priority is to return the Kosovars to their homes as soon as possible. We

must press forward with all means possible to ensure they are able to

return home in a secure environment.

One lesson that I think we can apply from Bosnia is that we signed

a peace agreement there that did not provide adequate security for

returning refugees. As a result, many of the Bosnian refugees are
20

still not able to return safely to their villages. Any negotiated settlement and any solution in Kosovo must first and foremost provide the

security that the Kosovars need to return home. Weve seen them return in the past to the skeletal frames of their

homes and live under plastic sheeting in order to plant their spring

crop. The Kosovars are committed to returning; we must help them

to do so.

Finally, just as this crisis did not begin with the air strikes, neither

will it end with the air strikes. We must acknowledge now a longterm commitment to helping the Kosovar Albanians return and rebuild their devastated homes and communities.

Mercy Corps and several of our sister agencies have worked with these people for six years; we are committed to working with them

now in their refugee camps and also to returning with them as soon

as possible in Kosovo to help them put their lives and homes back

together from the current wreckage. This vision requires the strong

financial and political commitment from the entire international community.

Thank you.

Mr. SMITH. Ms. Lindborg, thank you very much for your fine statement and more so for the great work that you do on behalf of those

who are suffering, you and your volunteers.

The fact that you have not heard from so many of those who were

left behind by their own choosing raises the question of everyday risks

that the NGOs take on themselves in order to help their brethren.

I think we should always remember that. If there are true heroes

in the world today, they are people who are providing humanitarian

assistance in difficult circumstancesin this case, a war situation.

So you certainly have garnered the respect of everybody on Capitol

Hill, and we do thank you for it, you and your colleagues.

Dr. Leaning?

TESTIMONY OF DR. JENNIFER LEANING,

PHYSICIANS FOR HUMAN RIGHTS

Dr. LEANING. Thank you.

Good morning, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Hoyer, and thank you for the

opportunity to participate in this panel and to address your committee on the topic of the catastrophe in the Kosovo region.

My name is Jennifer Leaning. Im a physician on the Board of Directors of Physicians for Human Rights, and I also work as a Senior

Research Fellow at the Harvard Center for Population Development

Studies.

Id first like to give a vignette that we have received from our PHR

colleague who is now working as a physician and human rights investigator in the field in the Macedonian border camps in the no-man

zone earlier referred to, then recount the spiral into war that I saw

from several vantage points in my investigative missions in Kosovo

during this last year and at a point in the northern Albania border

area, and then proceed to conclude with a set of most recent recommendations that we are submitting to the international community

on behalf of the people in the region.

The major point that we are now all aware of is that two humani- tarian crises are now unfolding in Kosovo, in the region, both raising

great core challenges and timely response. The first is the ongoing
21

destruction of the Kosovo community in Kosovo, which is a rapid campaign of ethnic cleansing and social obliteration being waged by Serbian forces under the direction of Milosevic; and the second is the

public health catastrophe that is exploding on the border areas of

Albania, Macedonia and, to a lesser extent, Montenegro.

The vignette that we have received by e-mail and cell phonewhich still intermittently worksfrom our colleague within Macedonia, includes the following points. This is from this morning: Walking

through the camp last night,this is on the border of MacedoniaI

saw people who have waited for days to cross the border and they are

starting to give up. One family I talked to said they stood in line for

18 hours; another woman was desperate to cross but couldnt wait in

the crowd with her elderly immobile mother. I cannot say how strongly

enough how great the fear is that if they leave the area they will

never see their families again. People are desperate to find their loved

ones that theyve been separated from for days.

Another vignette:  . . . a tent with 25 immobile and retarded persons who were barely attended to because few of their family members had arrived to care for them. They had no bed pans, no caretakers; food and water was scarce. The tank stank to high heaven. The

third vignette: I talked to a man who said my wife collapsed at 8:30

this morning and wants to get first aid. We took her there, but the

Macedonian police would not let me in. I want to know if shes alive.

No one is taking names. The doctor says our colleagueif she goes to

find this patient, will she be able to climb down the vast sea of Peces

on the way to the medical tent and then find the man again in the sea

of people and tell him what had happened. And, by this same token, if

she thinks of her own dilemma of finding the man, how will his wife,

who is ill, ever find him if she returns from the medical tent?

There are many issues of medical care that we detail in the written statement submitted to the record. Wed just like to stress the fact, as

recorded by your colleague and by many other people who are now

there, is that the medical staff at these relief tents are terribly overworked and under-staffed. Over the weekend, a vehicle belonging to

a medical organization was turned back at the police checkpoint on

the way to the border and was unable to relieve the staff who had

been there overnight. Finally, when people did get in, they worked

with only two nurses seeing hundreds of people who were collapsing

from exhaustion, fever, hyperthermia, and dehydration.

The concern is, as the day progresses without aid reaching these

pockets of people who are trapped in these no-mans areas, that there

will be a mounting death toll and the outbreak of further death, not

just from dehydration and diarrhea, but from a range of infectious

diseases that always afflicts a community in this kind of duress.

Our colleague reports that she has heard reliably from several in- formants among the refugees who are now in Macedonia that the

Pristina Hospital, which is the large state hospital, was emptied of its

Albanian patients beginning this last weekend, about five days ago.

A thirty-three year old nurse working in the infectious disease service of that hospital said that Albanian doctors and patients were

told to leave the hospital lastshe said the hospital was closed to all

but most heavily wounded patients; and when she returned to work

last Monday a week ago, the only people she saw at the facility were

police, who told her to go home.
22

As weve heard and as we know, access to the refugees in the

Macedonian border area is severely restricted, and under normal circumstances there might be a way in which people can wait for the

lifting of the border closures. However, because people have waited

for days on the Kosovo side of the border and have been without food,

shelter or water, the restrictions that are now imposed on the

Macedonian border are especially severe and potentially life-threatening to large numbers.

Now, I would like to now turn to the events that led up to this

refugee crisis or this crisis of evicted populations and note that during the last year Physicians for Human Rights has observed at close

range the unfolding calamity in Kosovo and has issued six separate

assessments with calls for vigorous and far-reaching Western action.

We did so in March of 98 after the massacres in Northern Kosovo; in

late June of 98 as we interviewed refugees in Northern Albania; in

late December after a four-month investigation of the tax on physicians and medical care throughout Kosovo inflicted by the Serbian

military and police; in late January after the massacres at Racak;

and in late March of this year as the Serbian campaign of ethnic cleansing reached unprecedented proportions; and again just yesterday,

when we said that the afflictions of hundreds of thousands of Kosovo

refugees prompted the need for vast martialing of international civilian and military aid to provide infrastructure supporting relief.

Based upon our experience over the past year, we have the following observations and recommendations wed like to submit to the panel

and to the committee. First of all, this crisis took a year to unfold, but

its features were evident very early on. There were many points along

the road when the West could have intervened politically, diplomatically, and militarily with far less cost and risk than now confront us.

Second, the October Holbrooke-Milosevic agreement yielded one unexpected outcome: the successful use of unarmed monitors in large

numbers in the field to inject a measure of restraint, visibility, and

accountability, to hold conflict to a low simmer for a short period of

time, but one expected outcome: the blatant and almost immediate

violation by Milosevic of the military terms of the Accord, a violation

which by early January and into February had managed to shift the

military balance of power in the region to the point where armed

intervention to oppose him became almost inevitable.

Third, in the late fall and winter we found a systematic campaign on the part of the Serbian authorities and the military to break the

spirit of Kosovos civil society, to terrorize and kill in moderate numbers in order to force much larger numbers into flight, and thus to

accomplish the de-population of large areas of Kosovo. This was in

the fall and early winter of 1998.

In March of 1999, we saw how rapidly the Serbian forces had managed to build up their strength, bringing in approximately 40,000 to

45,000 regular soldiers, as well as thousands of special police force

units, at least 400 tanks, maybe APCs, extensive artillery batteries,

and much augmented military air capacity.

The presence of this military forceand I and my colleague there

witnessed thiswas brandished with menacing insouciance: tanks

moving 60 kilometers per hour on the main roads; APCs rumbling in

towns and villages, parked at numerous check points and all main

roads; large groupings of heavily-armed soldiers and police at most
23

corners. Little attempt was made to camouflage the artillery batteries; a sense of jeopardy prevailed in all activities; local people did not

go out after 6:00 p.m.; it was dangerous for young men to be out in

public at all during this period; and the humanitarian community

imposed informal curfews of 9:00 to 10:00 p.m. for all their staff.

Our hopes rested on a positive report from Paris after March 15th,

but almost every one in Kosovo at that point feared that Milosevic

would not relent; and by the morning of March 16th, it was evident

that we were all witnessing a rapid slide into outright war. The tanks

prowled the roads in great numbers, swinging off precipitously into

the fields and hills, leaving tracks in the mud and snow, heading off

to do damage to more remote hamlets. Mortar shelling could be heard

during the day, even in Pristina. An increasing number of killings of

Kosovar civilians were reported from all sites. North, Central and

Southwest Kosovo became entirely unstable. As of March 19th, estimates of newly-displaced populations on the

run within Kosovo reached 66,000 for that short week alone.

Mr. HOYER. That was prior to the bombing.

Dr. LEANING. Prior to the bombingthis is the week of March 15th

to 19th66,000 new internally displaced fleeing the violence.

My colleague and I were scheduled to leave on a flight out of Skopje on Saturday afternoon, March 20th. We could sense that because of

the impending escalation of violence that the requirement to extract

OSCE was imminent. We decided to leave a day early on the 19th, to

avoid what turned out to be the traffic jam that Ambassador Walker

described. We left; and on that southern road from Pristina through

Kosovo to the Macedonian border, we passed a menacing and perilous encampment of heavily-armed Serbian military vehicles and

tanks. There were only a few OSCE vehicles on the roadno other

private carsand we could palpate a high alert status in the southern town of Kuchanic, the border area with Macedonia that had seen

much killing and destruction throughout early and mid-March.

And when OSCE began to leave the next morning, packing the road with the vehicles, they left with a sense of dread and sorrow that was

shared by all of us who had traveled throughout Kosovo during these

past weeks. A bloody conflict was inevitable, rendered more brutal

now that the control rods, the OSCE verifiers, were being pulled out.

And, as anticipated, all restraint imposed by official witnesses was

immediately thrown away, and the Serbian forces began to move rapidly and with evident abandon against all civilian targets throughout

Kosovo: people, villages, homes, livestock, farms, cultural and religious sites. They had been doing all of this before, and it was clear

that their intent had been to do it all whether there were witnesses or

not; but without observation, the speed accelerated greatly and the

efficiency of gross ethnic cleansing was catapulted to new heights. We repeat, this occurred before the NATO bombing. And, in fact,

the delay in NATO bombing from March 20th until March 24th gave

the Serbian military a grave head start on the campaign of atrocity

they had already embarked upon. Already by late October it was

known by official estimates, UNHCR, that a third of all villages in

Kosovo had been destroyed, a third seriously damaged, and a third

left intact.
24

By mid-March, it was impossible to travel the main roads without

seeing a seriously damaged village or hamlet from the main roads.

Time is now absolutely critical. Kosovo is a tiny place; you can drive

across it in an hour and a half, and you go ten kilometers west of

Pristina and you can see the mountains of Albania and the mountains of Montenegro. Ethnic cleansing is an intimate activity. You

shell with grenades, you go house to house, you drive people out, you

kill a few, and then you burn and rampage.

Protection of people is a robust and rich word as conceived in international law and human rights; and it involves shoring up the physical security of people but also attending to their past and future. What

is being destroyed now in Kosovo is all record of wealth, all sense of

past and future, all capacity to return without disagreement.

We are extraordinarily concerned about the campaign of social obliteration going on now within Kosovo, which we think raises the concern of early genocide; and we were equally concerned about the humanitarian catastrophe that is now unfolding on the border regions.

We call upon all supports to the Macedonian government to ensure them of international sustenance and infrastructure flow in order to

allow them to give access and rapid processing to the refugees at their

borders. We endorse the use of NATO and other military to support

the international community in its effort to provide emergency supplies and relief to all refugees. We ask that NATO, in addition, secure

and defend a safe region within Kosovo, where displaced people may

be protected and aided in the short term; and as quickly as possible,

NATO and the U.S. should deploy a ground protection force to secure

the withdrawal of Serb forces from Kosovo so that all refugees and

internally displaced people can return to their communities.

And finally, in keeping with U.S. treaty obligations, to punish those

responsible for genocide, we call upon the Clinton Administration to

immediately provide the ISTY with all available intelligence information that reveals evidence of atrocities in Kosovo.

We also would urge that the OSCE provide in its most public forum possible whatever information it is gathering at the border that relates to evidence of atrocities and possible genocide now underway in

Kosovo.

Thank you very much.

Mr. HOYER. Mr. Chairman, unfortunately I have to leave, but let

me apologize. Mr. Ellis, I will read your statementassuming we have

a copy of it. If not, I will read the record of your statement.

I want to echo the Chairmans remark, Ms. Lindborg, to you, and,

Dr. Leaning, to you, and you, Mr. Ellis, in terms of NGO organizations that voluntarily come to the fore to protect people when others

will not or cannot. I also want to thank you for your compelling statements, which certainly underpin the moral necessitynot justificationmoral necessity for those that can act to act.

I tell the story that all of you know about the woman who was raped

and killed in Brooklyn in a complexan apartment complex. There

were at least 14 people who came forward and said, I heard her cries

for help, but I did not respond. That woman, of course, died, as her

attackers were unfettered.

The international community, in my opinion, has been somewhat

in that same position. We talk about exit strategy. Id like to have an

exit strategy, but what I would like to have more is a commitment
25

that this outrage will end; and your testimony will be an important

factor in letting the American public know, the European public know,

what outrages their governments are trying to stop and to reverse. So, I thank you very much for your compelling and tragic testimonyin many waysbut important and necessary testimony.

Thank you.

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Hoyer.

Mr. Ellis.

TESTIMONY OF MARK S. ELLIS, CENTRAL AND EAST EUROPEAN LAW INITIATIVE (CEELI) AND THE COALITION FOR

INTERNATIONAL JUSTICE (CIJ)

Mr. ELLIS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I will follow up with

what Ms. Lindborg and Dr. Leaning have said and try to incorporate

their points into the issue of accountability. I would also like to address the issue of the International War Crimes Tribunal and its jurisdiction over the atrocities occurring now in Kosovo, and particularly whether or not there is a prima facie case to bring indictments

against the command structure in Serbia, including Mr. Milosevic,

for crimes against humanity and genocide.

The primary focus of the Tribunal should continue to be to aggressively investigate the violations of international humanitarian law in

Kosovo. The Office of the Prosecutor has that authority. It can initiate investigations on its own or rely on the basis of information obtained from any source, including directly taking on ground statements from witnesses and from victims. The OTP, the Office of the

Prosecutor, must show only a prima facie case to bring an indictment,

and that should be its focus. Let me speak a few minutes on crimes

against humanity, and then Ill end my remarks on talking about the

crime of genocide.

Under Article V of the Tribunal, we know that the statute recognizes crimes against humanity. The ICTY has the authority to prosecute persons responsible for these crimes, including murder, extermination, enslavement, rape, torture, and also deportation. And as

Dr. Leaning had talked about, de-population, in my opinion, is within

the context of deportation directly under Article V of the statute.

The acts, as we know, must be within a policy of discrimination;

they must be carried out in a systematic and widespread manner and

thus involve a large number of victims and perpetrators. And I think

Ms. Lindborg and Dr. Leaning have certainly established that case. The key aspect of crimes against humanity is a systematic process

of victimization against the protected group. Let me give you a for

instance. We frequently look at murder or mass killings, but it does

not have to be in the context of mass killings to bring you into the

victimization of a protected group. We knowand it has been stated

here todaythat we have evidence of Kosovar Albanians who have

been interviewed and stated that while crossing the borders into Albania their identity papers were taken from them by the Serbs.

It is not necessary that all of the refugees had their papers stripped in order for that to fall within the crimes against humanity; its not

even necessary that we consider this act alone as a crime against

humanity, although in my opinion it is; but if its within the overall

context of this large-scale, calculated plan of victimization, then that

makes the act systematical, and that would bring it within the con-
26

text of crimes against humanity. So this one particular act that we

are now witnessing, in my opinion, is sufficient to fall within crimes

against humanity. Obviously, the most significant manifestation of this policy, the

policy of large-scale crimes against a civilian population, is the forced

displacement or de-populationas Dr. Leaning has statedin Kosovo. It is clear from the statements we are hearing and from the

statements and witnesses that the two groups with us today have

brought forth, that there is an unambiguous campaign to ethnically

cleanse Kosovo. So, this whole issue of deportation, de-population, in

my opinion, is consistent with Article V of the Tribunals statute; and

thus I believe that a prima facie can easily be brought forth to indict

the command structure within Serbia on charges of crimes against

humanity, based solely on this systematic and widespread act of deportation.

Now, there are numerous other crimes that we are witnessing, but

I wanted to make clear to people that the crimes that are set forth in

this article go beyond that of mass killing and involve other types of

acts that would be consistent with crimes against humanity.

Let me now turn to genocide, which is a much more difficult crime

because of its legal complexity; but let me see if I can clarify it and

also make some judgment on whether or not, in fact, there is sufficient evidence to bring an indictment on this particular crime.

Article IV of the Tribunal essentially incorporates the 1948 Geno- cide Convention, but whats important with the crime of genocide is

this element of intent. There has to be an intent to destroy a designated group in whole or in part. This is what turns crimes of mass

murders or crimes against humanity into crimes of genocide, so its

always important that we focus on this issue of intent. Its this element of intent that distinguishes genocide from all the other crimes

that fall within the jurisdiction of the Tribunal.

And, we have to admit, the element of intent can be difficult to

prove, absent a documentary record for this intent, as there was at

the end of World War II. It makes it more difficult but not impossible

because the Tribunal, and wisdom in creating the rules, created Rule

93 which provides for evidence of a consistent pattern of conduct to

be admissible in the interest of justice. And so, the pattern of conduct, which would also include the conduct that occurred in Bosnia,

would be part of building this case of intent, and this, to me, is extremely important.

We know that the crime of genocide includesas we frequently

discussthe vast numbers of people killed, actually murdered; but

we also need to remember that it includes serious bodily and mental

harm to members of a particular group. It includes deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its

physical destruction.

So each of these acts can constitute a crime of genocide in and of

itself, as well as a combination of the acts; and again I submit that

even the evidence weve heard just in this last 20 minutes would give

credence to some of these acts, short of mass murder, which I dont

suggest is not occurring as well.

Now, the punishable acts is also important in genocide. Its not just

the act of genocide, but the punishable acts include the conspiracy to

commit genocide, the public incitement to commit genocide, the attempt to commit genocide, and the complicity in genocide itself.
27

So what we are talking about is that the political masterminds, the

propaganda people, are no less responsible than the individuals who

actually perform this carnage; and that brings us to this concept of

command structurePublic officials, civil and military personnel, all

public office holders, including legislative, administrative, judicial

office officials, including Mr. Milosevic can be held responsible. There

is no shield of immunity.

And this is important because genocide, the very basis of genocide,

tends to be based on a policy that is developed by the authorities of

the state, because only the state can martial the powers and resources

to inflict this type of carnage; and it is unlikely that the policy of

genocide would have its genesis in any other entity other than the

state, other than the top commanders of the military and of the political structure.

It is also important to remember that genocide is aimed at destroy- ing the central foundations of a protected group. It includes the disintegration of the political and social institutions, the culture, the language. Evidence suggesting that Serbian forces are destroying the

archives of the Kosovars, their properties, their deeds, their marriage

licenses, their birth certificates, their financial and all other records,

that they are being systematically destroyed to deprive these individuals of their culture, and of the sense of community for which it

depends. I believe this act, in and of itself, is an act of genocide.

The most significant manifestation of genocide is the same as with

the crimes against humanityethnic cleansing.

Ethnic cleansing is a policy of using any type of force or intimidation to remove these targeted persons from a given area, and then to

prevent them, inhibit them, from returning, as we are witnessing now

in Kosovo, is what we define as ethnic cleansing. It is not necessarily,

as is often stated, that we have to have mass killings. That is not the

definition. It is certainly a part of ethnic cleansing, but you do not

have to reach that level in order to incorporate ethnic cleansing into

the crime of genocide or the crimes against humanity.

It is also important to note that ethnic cleansing can involveas I

said earlierthe intent to destroy a group in whole or in part; so

evidence that the Serbian forces are killing the Kosovar intelligentsia the Albanian population that consists of public officials or lawyers or doctors, the well-educatedis consistent with the definition

of genocide. It is not necessary that we have to destroy all. It is targeting in on a particular sub-group with the intent to destroy that

particular group, and we certainly have seen documentation supporting these acts. Also, the act of targeting a certain segment of the group,

Kosovar menwhich weve seen sufficient evidence to suggest that

this is occurringis incorporated into the article and could, in and of

itself, be an act of genocide. And finally, let me say on genocide that a targeted group can also

be defined within a geographical area. You can focus just on Pristina,

and if theres the intent to eliminate that part of the group in that

particular village, or in that particular city, then, again, you have

brought the act within the definition of genocide.

Let me conclude by discussing the issue of jurisdiction. We know

that within the Tribunals own statute that personal jurisdiction includes those individuals of command responsibility; and within command responsibility you essentially have two meanings. You have
28

direct command responsibility; so if theres evidence to suggest that

Mr. Milosevic planned, or instigated, ordered, committed, or otherwise aided or abetted in the planning of the criminal acts, then the

jurisdiction holds. Theres also within the Tribunals statute, imputed

command responsibility; and that is a situation where the superior,

Mr. Milosevic, or a general, knew or should have known that a subordinate was about to commit a crime under the jurisdiction of the Tribunal, but that superior failed to take the necessary steps to prevent

the subordinate from committing that crime or stopping the subordinate from doing so or punishing the subordinate who already committed the crime.

And so I find no barriers to move these types of indictments quite far up the command structure. I think its time that Mr. Milosevic is

indicted for crimes against humanity and for the crime of genocide

for acts in Bosnia and Kosovo. The prima facie case exists, in my

opinion; and Im hopeful that the Office of the Prosecutor for the War

Crimes Tribunal will concur with this opinion.

Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. Ellis, for your excellent state- ment and for your analysis. I agree with the latter statementand

the rest of it as wellbut that latter statement cant be emphasized

enough. When you let the chief culprit of this misery and destruction

off the hook and make him your partner for peace, theres something

wrong with the picture.

My first question regards the cost and whether or not we have allo- cated sufficient monies in the international community. As you know,

the UNHCR, or the U.N., has said it would take about $81 million for

three months to care for the refugees. I remember when we were

faced with the unprecedented flight of Cardias out of Iraq. The international community, including the NGOs who do so much with so

little very often, were unprepared for the massiveness of what became known as Operation Provide Comfort. It actually took a lot of

military capabilityairlift and the liketo get the money there.

I went over a couple of days after that flight began and was amazed at how ill-prepared we all were for that exodus. It seems that when

you see a doubling of the number of internally displacedespecially

refugeessince the bombing beganIm not so sure the numbers are

scrubbed sufficiently to meet and to accommodate that need.

I called for this; and the President certainly responded very appropriately, I think, to all the callsboth within his Administration and

withoutwith $57 million for at least a down payment. Has anyone

done a sufficient estimate of what it would cost to care for the people,

not just for three months, but, say, for the next six months to a year?

I mean, it would be a crime if we didnt respond adequately to this

crisis.

Ms. LINDBORG. I dont think that calculus has completely been done yet. I think that the $57 million, coupled with whats coming from

other countries and whats coming from private citizens, will certainly

get us through the first trenche. There will undoubtedly be more

needed; and as I noted in my testimony, I think critical to the entire

equation is the adequate support for the countries that are bearing

the greatest burden of caring for the refugees. That cant be lost sight

of either.
29

I think its very difficult to be prepared for tidal waves that grow so

much larger than anticipated, and I think that the numbers that the

U.N. is currently working with are still, perhaps, not high enough for

what we may finally end up with as refugees.

Mr. SMITH. Ms. Lindborg, you mentioned three of your points. One

was related to the front-line states to make sure they dont collapse.

Are you very concerned that they are, perhaps, approaching a situation where they may collapse?

Ms. LINDBORG. Im concerned for two key reasons in Macedonia. One, I recently returned from Skopje and was there for the demonstrations against the United States Embassy, which were clearly orchestrated by Belgrade; I saw the busloads of protestors unloading to

go participate. But I think that there are on-going tensions between

the Macedonian and the Albanian populations there. There was high

unemployment, and what is resulting is this reluctance to more quickly

process the refugees, keeping them, instead, in no-mans land and

not allowing proper access.

I think by providing the Macedonian government with the economic and political assurances that it needs, we hopefully can facilitate their

acceptance of these refugees and at the same time forestall the collapse that I think Milosevic would certainly like to see in that government, in Albania, and then the additionally complicated situation in

the Republic of Montenegro, or the autonomous republic.

Mr. SMITH. In terms of the humanitarian corridor that the Pope

is attempting to get establishedI know your organization certainly

would welcome that in an instant because there are so many internally displaced people who cannot be reached; we dont even have

information about them, as far as I can tellwhat further should be

done to promote that idea? It seems as if its almost a no-brainer. If

something like this could be negotiatedand with great difficulty with

a guy like Megetsu in Ethiopia, who for a long time did not agree to it

but then eventually didwhat would be your recommendations to

Congress, to the Administration, to put that higher up on the priority

list?

For your information, I have read Dr. Leanings previous statements

about those in the hospitals. We dont see medical transport taking

people across the border. We presume that the situation went from

bad to worse for those who were in the hospital or in some other health

care facility and for those who should have been because of some ailment. We never know the day or the time we are going to get sick;

certainly the elderly or others could find themselves in need of health

care but they do not get it. So when there is an acute crisis that grows

worse by the day, a humanitarian corridor certainly would help to

relieve some of the pressure.

Ms. LINDBORG. I think we certainly have an obligation to do what- ever we can to help people get out of Kosovo. I think weve seen that

those who are able to get out come with horrible stories about whats

going on. There is a shortage of food, an inability to get medical supplies. We would welcome whatever means are possible to enable people

to leave.
30

One concern I think many of us have with the cease-fire is that its

very difficult to enforcewhich, I believe, is part of the Popes recommendation, and it, in fact, could give more time for Serbian militarian

police to further harass and brutalize the remaining civilians within

Kosovo. So it would have to be negotiated . . . .

Mr. SMITH. On that point, as Ambassador Walker said earlier, within

minutes of their departure the atrocities began escalating. They could

almost see the tanks in formation as their jeeps were making their

way out of town.

There is something to be said about presence and the curtailing

effect that presence may have on actions of atrocity. I wonder if its a

humanitarian corridor. Its not just an exodus that would be contemplated, but it would also be a way to get people in.

Dr. LEANING. Could I comment at this point? I completely concur

with what Ms. Lindborg has said about the need to protect people in

Kosovo, which may actually involve creating a protected barrier for

them; butand this is something all of us who have been there and

have seen the Armed Forces at work recognizeI think at this point

of militarization and entrenched aggression that is at work within

Kosovo it is not wise to create either a humanitarian corridor or any

kind of other protected area without the initial prior introduction of

an armed force to secure that area.

And if one is going to, the enormous political, diplomatic, and military effort to insert a force in what is still, essentially, a non-permissive environment, one might as well crack open an area in southern

Kosovo that would be a big temporary protective enclave, where people

could flee and find support; but it would have to be rimmed by, patrolled by, overhead surveillance by NATO forces. This is not a time

when one can rely on any assurance from Milosevic, because you cant

see if you are not there. And so the short and long-term way we think of protecting civilians

in Kosovo is not to un-link that protection from the front and center

necessity to face the brutal armed forces at work there.

Mr. SMITH. I appreciate that.

I was just handed a note that CNN has just announced that Milosevic

declared a unilateral cease-fire to mark Orthodox Easter. NATO rejected the declaration immediately, saying that it would not participate unless, one, Serbs stopped the crackdown against Kosovars, and

two, ethnic Albanians are permitted to return.

I wonder if the panel could tell us information thats just off the

CNN television news-breaking storyunder what circumstances

would you suggest that a cease-fire would be appropriate? Let me say

before you answer that the problem I have been havingover the

last few days especially, and particularly from hearing some of the

calls made by clerics and othersis that we are losing. Im not doing

the dying. Some of your people, regrettably, are at great risk, but

there are tens of thousands who are at risk. Sometimes our preconceived notions, including my own, about what would be the best case

scenario must fall to what is the most likely to achieve the least amount

of suffering while we try to regroup and find some way of resolving

this problem.
31

I know that in the past when Milosevic has declared cease-firesI

met with him right after he declared a cease-fire during the siege of

Vukovar; but before I was on the plane to leave Belgrade, he had

already broken it. But, perhaps, things might have changed since then.

We dont know.

The question is, under what circumstances do you think a cease- fire would be appropriate? All three of you may respond, if you like.

Mr. ELLIS. Well, my concern about accepting this type of cease-fire

is that we will find ourselves right back in a situation where Mr.

Milosevic is calling the shots. Enough is enough. Mr. Milosevic needs

to be indicted, and he needs to be in The Hague; and then he can say

whatever he wants from up there.

I think we have witnessed enough. Negotiations must be based on

what the international community is demanding and what its demanding of Mr. Milosevic, and he should not be placed in a position

now or at any time in the future, in my opinion, to act as the peacemaker in this situation.

Dr. LEANING. In our view, the cease-fire would need to be linked

contemporaneously with a fully articulated agreement, under which

a robust NATO protection force, able to defend itself and to defend

civilians in a proactive and far-reaching way, is permitted to be introduced on the ground throughout Kosovo.

Ms. LINDBORG. Speaking from the humanitarian perspective, I

would simply say that any cease-fire or any negotiation must first

and foremost be accompanied by absolute guarantees of protection

and security for those remaining inside Kosovo and those who would

be in a position to return, by whatever means we are able to secure

that guarantee.

Mr. SMITH. Thank you.

Dr. Leaning, has your organization Physicians for Human Rights found any reluctance on the part of the Serbian medical community,

any backlash, as to how the authorities have treated the ethnic Albanian doctors? Have they spoken up? Has there been a sense of comradeship, a feeling that We are medical doctors and nurses. We speak

up for our own because a patient is a patient is a patient. Has there

been any of that?

Dr. LEANING. Thank you for asking that question. We were in Kosovo for two and a half weeks in March in an attempt, still in the light

of the Rambouillet, not the shadow, of looking to the future of possible peace and reintegration of these societies, Serbian and Albanian; and we were doing so on the basis of what we presumed to be a

capacity for professionals on both sides to reach into their hearts and

minds and training and come to terms with their joint shared values

of medical ethics human rights, and their understanding of medical

neutrality under international law. We were able to reach that level of commitment, understanding,

and real thoughtful exploration of what a multi-ethnic peaceful society might be with large numbers of ethnic Albanian physicians, who

once they were led into the principles of the Universal Declaration of

Human Rights immediately grasped that human rights matters not

when you apply it to your own people but when you apply it to the

other people. And particularly the minority people, which they anticipate would be the situation of the Serbian population post-conflict

and in some form of negotiated settlement.
32

We made many approaches to the Serbian physicians, and we have

indirect evidence that there is still alive, if not robustly well, a strong

commitment to professional ethics; and we had some limited first

person evidence that it is still there and able to be rekindled.

The fundamental problem with reaching the Serbian physicians is

that they were directed from above, from some form of either highpowered civil/medical servant, public servant, running the Serbian

health authorities, or directly from Belgrade; we couldnt trace it. But

in any case, any time we attempted to make an outreach there would

be an initial interest on the part of the local person and then there

would be a phone call later saying that it was regrettably impossible

for us to meet with them.

We did meet with three very senior Serbian physicians in the city

of Pea, as the Albanians call it. These were the directors of the overall

medical situation, and under him, reporting to him, the director of

the big state hospital there, and the director of the big ambulatory

clinic which does out-patient surgery as well, and all three of them, in

a two-hour discussion of these issues, said that they wished to work

with the ethnic Albanian physicians in reaching out to the people

who were injured in the countryside. They would like to have joint

convoys supported by OSCE to get past the check points. They were

glad that despite the many criticisms of the care given the ethnic

Albanian patients in the hospital that in general their Albanian physician colleagues said that the technical carenot the overall humanity and courtesy which was extricable but the technical carethat

the Serbian doctors gave the Albanian patients was still good.

And we found that throughout Kosovo, that the Serbian physicians, in general, when they were faced with the need to do an appendectomy, faced with the need to deliver a difficult labor, they would do

the work that was necessary.

So we think that both by indirect discussion with people who would

talk off the record, by the fact that Albanian physicians themselves

said that there were still connections of professional integrity they

had with their Serbian colleagues, and by the fact that some senior

physicians implored us, pleaded with us, to realize that they also believed in medical neutrality. I would say that although the Serbian side of the health system in

Kosovo was deeply degraded by the political regime, it could be reconstructed to work with the ethnic Albanian medical community.

Mr. SMITH. Just for the record, can you tell us how many doctors,

nurses, and health care facilities are we talking about?

Dr. LEANING. We are talkingits very hard to get these numbers because of the parallel system that Ms. Lindborg referred to; the

records are hard, but we think there are about somewhere in the

order of 3,300 ethnic Albanian physicians and somewhere on the order of 500 to 1,000 Serbian physicians; more of them are in specialty

areas because they were allowed to get the training; the ethnic Albanians were not.

And then, there are major state hospitals at the three major cities

and then smaller hospitals and clinics in many of the smaller ones.

Now, a number ofand then in addition, there are hundreds of

private clinics, some of them very well staffed and equipped, that the

ethnic Albanian physicians have built up over the last nine years,

using their own funds and their own money; the majority of those, if
33

not all of them by now, have been completely destroyed in this year of

war. So theres a great loss of medical capacity. There are still some

buildings standing, and there are large numbers of educated professionals who are now refugees on the various borders who would be

very willing and eager to go back.

Mr. SMITH. Thank you.

Mr. Ellis, let me ask you a question regarding the International

Tribunal. One of the criticisms with regards to Bosnia was that nontrained investigators were eliciting evidence from those who were

fleeing, and at some point their testimony changed or didnt hold up.

The right questions werent asked, so the International Tribunal has

been reluctant to get or gather that kind of information.

Is the International Tribunal deploying its own people to investigate, to take depositions, to get information, that could lead to prosecutions?

Mr. ELLIS. Mr. Chairman, they do. The Tribunal would probably

if they were heresay they do not have sufficient resources to undertake a response to the massive problems were now facing in Kosovo.

I would tend to disagree. Its interesting what you mentioned. I wrote

the word guide while you were talking, and I thought as we now

relocate some of these ethnic Albanians from Kosovo elsewhere, including to the United States, we should have a basic guide focusing

on these crimes under the statute so that an individual could identifynot to investigate but could simply identifyindividuals who

could bring to the table information that would be helpful to the Tribunal; and then we could create some mechanism where that information is forwarded to the Tribunal. Because my fear now is that

when we displace some of these individuals from Macedonia, from

Albania, we may lose this type of information. And I think this information would, in fact, help the Tribunal and help the investigators,

because I think thats what they are missing right now.

Dr. LEANING. Could we offer

Mr. SMITH. Yes, please.

Dr. LEANING. a strong concurrence to this suggestion. We have

written a letter to Ms. Abruro about our possible participation in the

collection of evidence, and her response was positive. What is not yet

in place is a guide, as Mr. Ellis said, a protocol that could be distributed to a wide range of groups that are currently engaged in the gathering of evidence, or even at a higher level the identification of people

who might have a story so that over the next couple of months there

could be a really robust documentation of these issues that are really

on a very large population scale.

Mr. SMITH. That is an excellent suggestion and something I think

we will promote from our side of the equation as well, because information and memories do lapse over time. The more trained people

who are out theredeputized if you willto collect that information

and feed it into a source, the more I think a guide would be very, very

helpful.

Mr. ELLIS. Yes, I think this could work.

Mr. SMITH. I do, too.

Let me ask two final questions and then yield to Mr. Hand, our resident expert on the Helsinki Commission, for any questions he

might have.
34

Ms. Lindborg, you talked about returning the refugees. We know

that that is always something that if it can be achievedreturning

people to their own homes is certainly a viable option; and we see it

happening everywhere where people do escape, at least for the short

term. And yet, I believe there also needs to be a provisionand we

have not done it, whether in Rwanda or Bosnia; we didnt do it sufficiently in Bosniafor those people who would seek to emigrate to

another country because their well-founded fear of persecution is so

profound that its not likely they could return any time soon without

carrying harrowing scars and, perhaps, even a return of the reason

they left in the first place.

Do you know if theres any evidence of the international communitys providing any opportunity for interviews to determine whether or

not some of those peopleI mean the 20,000 that we have offered to

take temporarilyjust cant return for whatever reason? It seems to

me that generosity would dictate that a more open-armed policy be

established by the international community to take those people in.

Ms. LINDBORG. I know that there are a number of negotiations

going on among various countries to address exactly that, and I dont

have for you the outcome of that.

However, one thing I would underscore is that unlike Rwanda and unlike Bosnia, this is not a return of refugees to the same kind of

multi-ethnic community. For the most part, you are looking at 90

percent Albanian, ten percent Serbian and other. So, presumably, if

one is able to return any, one could return almost all under the kind

of security guarantee that would be necessary to even start the conversation.

Mr. SMITH. But weve been getting reports from some of the Roma

that they are concerned because they are a minority within those

who are fleeing, that they might not find a safe haven anywhere else

abroad. They may not be among the welcomed going back. They are

concerned about humanitarian disbursement of the humanitarian

goods, concerned that they may not get their fair share. Has there

been any provision made for them, or do you think there should be?

Ms. LINDBORG. I think there needs to be, and I think its also important for us all to recall that there was a significant population of

Kryena Serbs who have now been doubly displaced. They were resettled, against their will for the most part, in the Kosovo area, and

now, of course, have fled again; and I think that if there is a return

the Serb minority will need the same kind of international protection

that all of us are calling for now for the Kosovar Albanians, and that

is a strong commitment that all of us do and must make.

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, your point is well taken on that as well.

Mr. Hand?

Mr. HAND. Thank you. Dr. Leaning, I was wondering if you could comment on how the

results of your findingswhen you had first gone to Kosovo and reported what you saw in the hospitals and with the health care facilities, how the international community made use of that information.

For example, did the OSCE missiondid they then start to visit hospitals, health care facilities, and monitor the situation there more

closely?
35

I ask this in part because the OSCE is having a seminar on field

missions and human rights towards the end of this month in Warsaw, and it raises the question of whether one of the recommendations should be for field missions everywhere the OSCE haswhether

its in Bosnia, Kosovo, whereverthat they go and visit places like

hospitals and monitor whats going on. So if you could comment as to how the OSCE and other organizations reacted to your findings and what they said they would do to try

to correct the situation.

Dr. LEANING. Well, thank you.

We first of all should note that the widespread systematic attacks

on physicians and ethnic Albanian medical facilities is somewhat unprecedented, in our view, of even ethnic and communal conflict over

the last 10 or 15 years. It was highly unusual and orchestrated, and if

one is building a bill of particulars to put in the category of war crimes,

as well as crimes against humanity, this activityit was highly organized, we think, from the topshould be explored in depth, because

what the result turned out to be had two prongs. One is, as we mentioned, the harassment, intimidation and with some hundreds, we

think, the forced exile of a very highly professional class of ethnic

Albanians; but secondly, the deprivation of health care to large numbers of people in dire need in the setting of a war, in a context where

health care was already pretty meagerly disbursed within the countryside. So it created great suffering and was, in our view, a constitution of international law in the setting of civil conflict.

We also noted that in the hospitals ethnic Albanians, particularly

those who came from the contested areasand when I say came

from, Im talking about people who were so sick they couldnt be

cared for in these country areas and had to sneak through the night

to get into the cities where the hospitals were and then first went to

the private clinics run by ethnic Albanians, because they thought

theyd be treated more mercifully; those clinics would not be equipped

to handle their serious either surgical or medical conditions; therefore, virtually against their will they were most reluctantly brought

to these hospitals. So, these people in these hospitals were treated

essentially as terrorists, as combatants, but not just as combatants;

using the word terrorist, the Serbians were trying to push this population of people outside the reach of the Geneva Conventions.

And this meant that women, children, old men, were chained to

beds, were not allowed to see their families; great amounts of money

were extorted from them. There are instances of Serbian armed police rushing into the intensive care units and breaking all rules of

medical neutrality and disrupting sterile procedure. Isolated but consistent reports across several hospitals in many cities of Serbian police rubbing out cigarettes on the backs of patients coming out of the

operating room when they were still recovering from anesthesia. These

are ethnic Albanian patients.

So this detailing of systematic abuse of physicians, intimidation of medical personnel, and harassment of Albanian patientswhen we

brought it to the attention of the international communitycreated

a laudable amount of outrage and consternation, because as I said at

the outset, this is unusual. And people were at first somewhat incredulous, except for a few in the humanitarian community who had

already seen it and for a few in the very experienced professional
36

humanitarian communityand here Im referring to the ICRC, who,

Im sure, had seen it but would not comment because of their mandate.

We spoke with Julia Taft about it. We spoke with the heads of some

of the humanitarian organizations about this. We mentioned it to the

head of Mercy Corps, and it created a galvanization and a discussion

of this which we think was very positive.

OSCEits Human Rights Divisionbegan to monitor the hospitals and medical facilities; some of the humanitarian organizations

began to be much more careful about where they brought supplies.

They began to bring ethnic Albanians into their organizations, not

just as interpreters but also as doctors. They began to pay much attention to the treatment of Albanian patients in Serbian-run facilities.

So, I think when we were thereI know when we were there in

Marchnot specifically in follow up to this but because we were traveling around we could follow upwe found a much higher level of

awareness, observation, and vigilance on the part of the humanitarian community and OSCE to be engaged in surveillance and intervention on these issues.

Mr. HAND. Thank you. Mr. Ellis, I think you did a very good job in sort of defining genocide, crimes against humanity, and rejecting a lot of arguments that

are made in public which try to narrowly define them in order to deny

that they are occurring. You also made the case about indicting

Milosevic.

The one thing that comes up, beside defining the crimes, is the issue of what evidence you actually need; and whereas there is a lot

of evidence regarding the crimes that are being committed, Milosevic

has been a master of deniability. You go in and meet with him, and he

says he knows nothing about this and claims hes trying to do this. He

was a master of that during the Bosnia conflict.

In order to actually indict him, you actually need to have a smoking gun, evidence that he ordered some action, the type of things that we

are looking for from our intelligence community; or do you believe an

indictment could actually come from all the evidence thats publicly

available now?

Mr. ELLIS. I dont believe that you need a smoking gun, but you

probably need something more than what I discussed regarding a

pattern of conduct. But the pattern of conduct is something that I

would, as a prosecutor, focus on primarily right now, because within

the rules that type of evidence can play a very important role in setting at least a prima facie case. So I believe that on the prima facie

case the pattern of conduct can play an important role.

Now, you get the indictment. Can you get the conviction? I think you need more than a pattern of conduct, so I would look at this as

two steps. The first step would be the indictment, which is what we

are focusing on right now; I would place a good deal of emphasis on

this pattern of conduct, and under the Tribunals rules there is a list

of the conditions or some of the elements that can help show a pattern of conduct.

From that point on in a trial you would have to show more, but I

would focus now on the indictment; and I think there is a sufficient

evidence to prove a prima facie case for an indictment.
37

Mr. SMITH. Thank you.

I want to thank our very distinguished witnesses again not only for

your testimony but more importantly for the work youve done on

behalf of those who are suffering and the work you will continue to

do. And, it is to be hoped, we can all work togetherour Helsinki

Commission, the Congressin a bipartisan way can be part of the

solution in the coming days, weeks and month.

Thank you very much. I look forward to seeing you again in the

near future.

(Whereupon, the hearing was adjourned at 12:44 p.m.)
38

APPENDICES

WRITTEN TESTIMONY OF NANCY LINDBORG,

VICE PRESIDENT, MERCY CORPS INTERNATIONAL

 APRIL 6, 1999

 Thank you Congressman Smith for convening this hearing today.

Thank you Mr. Hoyer. I appreciate the opportunity to address the

Helsinki Commission today as we all grapple with the overwhelming

crisis unfolding in the Balkans.

I would like to begin by underscoring that this current nightmare

didnt begin with the airstrikes. Mercy Corps International has worked

in Kosovo since 1993, providing humanitarian relief to Kosovars. What

began as a small assistance program in 1993, helping 15,000 of the

most vulnerable, ballooned into a beneficiary list of 200,000 by late

1997 as unemployment among Kosovar Albanians ran as high as 70%

due to their exclusion from all state jobs and institutions. In February 1998, violent conflict erupted after nine years of determined peaceful resistance by the Kosovars. For the last year, Kosovars have withstood the burning of their homes and fields, forcible evictions of entire

villages and killing of innocent civilians.

 As we watch the news footage of refugees pouring across borders,

we need to remember that for many of them, this is not the first time

they have left home with nothing. Last summer, there were nearly

500,000 internally displaced people within Kosova, and even in the

weeks before the airstrikes, there were still 240,000 in Kosovo unable

to return home. What is notable, however, is the relatively small numbers who previously took the step of crossing international borders.

They preferred instead to stay in the region, close to their homes,

staying with host families or camped in the hills and ravines and

waiting the first chance to return home and begin rebuilding.

 Obviously that is no longer possible, as we witness the capstone of

Milosevics ongoing and unambiguous campaign against the Kosovars,

and as we witness the brutally forced evictions of Kosovar Albanians

not only from their homes but from the entire region. I was in Macedonia for the first six days of the bombing, and I

heard from our local staff remaining inside Kosovo the growing horror they faced as the Serb military and police began systematically to

erase them from the region. The last contact we had with our office

manager in Pec was a phone call the morning of Saturday, March 27,

during which he reported with terror that over 100 people were in his

familys compound in the center of the city, where most of the Albanian population lived. The Serb military was lobbing shells in the city

center now in flames, and physically beating back anyone who tried

to leave. And then the phone went dead.

 In Pristina, in the first days of the airstrikes, residents reported

posters throughout the city warnings them to leave before they were

killed. We have heard stories from hundreds of refugees who were

forced from their homes at gunpoint and under shelling, stripped of

all documents and possessions. We are now seeing the refugees flood-
39

ing across borders on tractors, on foot, in buses and trains in a tidal

wave that threatens to destabilize the frontline countries of Macedonia, Albania and Montenegro. Now, the refugees face a new horror. In Macedonia, almost 50,000

refugees remain trapped in no-mans land between Kosovo and Macedonia. Many have been without food or water for five days in miserable and muddy. Sanitary conditions are abysmal, with no latrines or

washing facilities. We also have reports of a line of vehicles some 20

kilometers long snaking back into Serb territory, where the fleeing

Kosovars still face further reprisals. Mercy Corps is one of a handful

of relief agencies able to negotiate entry into the border area, and our

teams have been working around the clock for the last several days,

providing medical attention, food, drinking water, plastic sheeting

and blankets.

UNHCR has set up a main transit center was set up to house 10,000

refugees awaiting registration. Sanitary facilities are being prepared,

and additional relief supplies are staged and waiting distribution.

NATO is in the process up setting up five collective centers throughout Macedonia and more will be constructed as the need arises.

However, this tidal wave of refugees has overwhelmed Macedonia,

taxing its ability and willingness to respond. Consider the impact of

130,000 refugees in a country of 2.1 million people, with an already

delicate balance between the Albanian minority and the Macedonian

majority They have just had an influx equaling more than five percent of its entire population, equal to about 15 million people swamping the US in four daysor the entire population of Norway, Sweden

and half of Finland coming ashore. In addition, this is occurring in a

country that had 40% unemployment at the onset of this emergency.

Tensions are rising as a result on all sides. Macedonian officials are

dragging their feet, refusing to efficiently register any refugees or let

any more into their country Relief workers are frustrated with the

inability to help people trapped, literally and figuratively, in no-mans

land.

Montenegro is facing an even more ominous set of fissures as it

copes with 50,000 new refugees while balancing western friendliness

against pressure from Belgrade. Mercy Corps is distributing food to

refugees in Ulcinj and Rozaje today, but tomorrow we may be facilitating escape routes if threats continue against the current government

In contrast, Albania has mobilized its government resources to assist with the more than 100,000 refugees, and NATO has moved in

with logistical support to the UN and international relief groups to

bring food, water and shelter to the refugees camped along the borders. Refugees are quickly being moved to host families and collective centers throughout the country. However, Albania was barely

feeding its own people before this crisis and will require massive assistance to ensure its ability to forestall collapse.

The international community has three overwhelming responsibili- ties right now. The first is to provide the best care possible for the

refugees; the second is to ensure these frontline countries dont collapse under the weight of these refugees, and the third is to press

forward with all means possible to ensure these refugees are able to

return home in a secure environment.
40

1. The international relief community, with assistance from the

military, has already mobilized resources to assist the refugees

with immediate emergency needs. Many relief organizations like

Mercy Corps have evacuated Kosovo and are now operational in

the region. For example, we have transferred our operations to

Macedonia and Albania and continued our Montenegro operations. With private resources and early funding from USAID,

we were able to purchase emergency food and supplies for tens

of thousands of refugees and immediately begin distributing aid.

We are working together with our colleague agencies, the U.N.

system and now the military to ensure supplies are brought in

as fast as possible. More is needed and more must be done as

quickly as possible to ensure the refugees receive the necessities.

2. We must provide Macedonia, Montenegro and Albanian with the political and financial commitments they require to maintain

stability and continue accepting refugees. A plan is now underway to transport refugees into third country asylum, which further tears apart family members. Although this step provides

important assurances to these frontline countries that they are

not alone in this crisis, it should only he used as a last resort. We

should first attempt to provide these countries, and Macedonia

in particular, with the economic and political support it requires

to overcome the tensions causing their reluctance to accept refugees. On a small scale, Mercy Corps is developing programs that

provide economic assistance to the local populations of Albania

and Macedonia while also assisting the refugees, to help ease

further tensions from developing, These kinds of programs are

critical.

3. Most importantly, we must collectively reaffirm that our first

priority is to return the Kosovars to their homes as soon as possible. We must press forward with all means possible to ensure

these refugees are able to return home in a secure environment.

One lesson from Bosnia is that we signed a peace agreement

that did not provide adequate security for returning refugees 

many of whom are still not able to return to their villages. We

have seen the Kosovars return in the past to the skeletal frames

of their homes and live under plastic sheeting in order to plant

their spring crop. They are committed to returning; we must

help them do so.

Finally, just as this crisis did not begin with the airstrikes, neither

will it end with the airstrikes. We must acknowledge now a long-term

commitment to helping these refugees return and rebuild their devastated homes and communities. Mercy Corps has worked with these

people for six years, and we are committed to working with them now

in the refugee camps and back in Kosovo to put their lives and homes

back together from the current wreckage. This vision requires a strong

financial and political commitment from the entire international community.

Thank you Mr Chairman.
41

STATEMENT OF JENNIFER LEANING, M.D.

PHYSICIANS FOR HUMAN RIGHTS

Good morning. Mr. Chairman. Thank you for the opportunity to

participate in this panel and to address your committee on the topic

of the catastrophe in the Kosovo region. My name is Jennifer Leaning, M.D., S.M.H., and I am a member of the Board of Directors of

Physicians for Human Rights and Senior Research Fellow, Harvard

Center for Population and Development Studies.

Two humanitarian crises are now unfolding in Kosovo and the region, both raising great core challenges of timely response. The first

is the ongoing destruction of the Kosovar community in Kosovo, a

rapid campaign of ethnic cleansing and social obliteration being waged

by Serbian forces under the direction of President Milosevic; and the

second is the public health catastrophe exploding on the border areas of Albania and Macedonia.

 At the outset, I would like to share with you the most recent information from the Geld situation where PHRs physician investigator

is working, on the border of Macedonia. The camp is a huge, stinking

pile of garbage and dirt. Our doctor reported the following this morning:

Walking through the camp last night was like being on an

archeological dig. People who have waited for days to cross

the border are starting to give up. One family I talked to said

that they stood in line for eighteen hours; another woman

was desperate to cross but couldnt wait in the crowd with her

elderly, immobile mother. I cannot say strongly enough how

great the fear is that if they leave the area they will never see

their families again. People are desperate to find their loved

ones ... Everyone needs a phone: ATT should provide phones

so that they can reach relatives in Macedonia, Germany, or

the U.S.

 A tent with twenty-five immobile and retarded persons

were barely attended to because few of their family members

had arrived to care for them; they had no bed pans, no caretakers... the tent stank to high heaven.

 I talked to a man who said. My wife; she collapsed at 8:30

this morning and went to get first aid. The (Macedonian police) wouldnt let me come with her; I want to know if shes

alive. No one is taking names. If I find this patient, will I be

able to climb down this vast sea of feces and find this exact

man to tell him again? By the same token, how will his wife

ever find him again? And what if they get on busses and are

taken to different places.

The refugees cannot leave the border area or receive assistance

there. An OSCE representative told PHR that the Macedonian government was resisting taking in the refugees until other countries

agreed to provide refuge to them. On Saturday night, PHRs representative reported that the mass of Albanian. refugees stretched for

at least a mile long and a football field deep on a field of mud. Some

stood. Some huddled under makeshift lean-tos. They had no toilets,

little food and the mud caked their shoes and legs. Their loss of

strength and hope showed itself today as many streamed to the medi-
42

cal aid tent. The medical situation, while grave now, will become disastrous if they continue to be denied adequate shelter, food and sanitary conditions. Other refugees are trapped in their cars or, having left their cars

behind in Kosovo, standing between the official border crossings. Until

tonight, they had little aid. One woman interviewed said she had not

received assistance for 4 days. This appears to be due both to the fact

that these refugees have had to wait for days on the Serbian side of

the border. Then, once they crossed to the Macedonian side, international humanitarian agencies were not allowed by police to enter the

no mans land to provide aid for them. Some assistance was being

provided by local Red Cross workers around the clock, but they were

overwhelmed by extent of the need.

As night approached. it grew cold and the rain made people colder

and soaked wood so that fires could not be started. One 26-year old

woman said she was forced to leave her Pristina home on Monday,

spending a night on the street with nothing to eat before being taken

here by rail four days ago. The mother of four, ages 6 months to 4

years said, Its so cold. The children are so cold. Its so bad. Poor

children. Poor people. I dont have words to say for this situation.

She pointed to her feet, which were in too-small lace-up shoes stretched

wide open. I dont have shoes because I didnt have time to take them,

she said.

 There seemed to be no system of passing through the border for the people in the fields. People in the fields reported that they had no

idea what the process was they had to go through to cross into Macedonia. When asked if there were Macedonian officials there to register them, one woman said, yes, they come and work for 5 minutes

and say, I cant any more because of the crowd.

 The main border crossing was more organized and tightly controlled

by police in riot gear, but operating at a snails pace. Cars were parked

four or five deep and fender to fender along the mile-long crossing in

the evening. Despite this, only 2 passport-checking booths were open

to register families.

Special police ringed both refugee areas and kept control not only

by their appearanceflak jackets, hard helmets with face shields and

gunsbut by yelling at the refugees. In two independent interviews

conducted by PHR, witnesses said they had watched a child being

trampled after police pushed back a crowd. The PHR physician witnessed one boy of approximately 13 being treated in the medical tent

after being crushed.

 At one point, part of the crowd suddenly broke into a run as a tractor rumbled its way through the crowd, its riders, from the local

Albanian humanitarian organization Al Hilal, tossing bread and milk

to the people.

MEDICAL CONDITIONS

Despite the huge numbers of people in distress and suffering from

serious medical conditions, medical aid was almost non-existent. Getting access to the medical tent is itself technically difficult for the

population. Sick people had to cross out of the valley of mud and grass

and pass police in riot gear in order to reach an emergency tent. Police sometimes refused to let sick persons pass. When they did allow
43

passage, it was frequently only for the ill person, causing the separation of family members. Another medical aid tent was placed amid

the refugees in far reaches of the muddy field. The medical staff at the tents were terribly overworked and understaffed. Saturday morning, a vehicle belonging to a medical organization was turned back at a police checkpoint on the way to the border

and, as a result, the doctors and nurses were unable to relieve the

workers who had been there overnight. When the PHR physicianinvestigator arrived, care was mainly being provided by two or three

tired nurses. The situation improved when a medical vehicle arrived

with more physicians and nurses. Many of them are Kosovar medical

personnel who have just crossed the border themselves as refugees

over the past few days and are themselves exhausted.

 As the day progressed, more and more patients were being brought

into the medical tent with signs of dehydration, exhaustion and extreme stress. When individuals arrived for medical care at a large

green medical tent. they found it already packed with people. They

were brought in and placed side by side on foam pads, some covered

by blankets, which quickly grew muddy and wet. Medical workers

kneeled in the mud to attend to the patients. Early in the day, patients waiting to be seen stood in line outside the tent in the rain. The refugees are now in area of public health crisis. Excrement is

lying on the ground and being stepped on and spread about. PHRs

investigator observed two deaths during the day and found one case

of suspected cholera.

In addition to the medical situation of the refugees, PHR has received information that the Pristina hospital was emptied of its Albanian patients beginning last weekend. A 33 year-old nurse working

in the infectious disease service said that Albanian doctors and patients were told to leave the hospital last Sunday by police. She said

the hospital was closed to all but heavily wounded patients. When

she came to work on Monday, the only people she saw at the facility

were police, who told her to go home.

By Tuesday, April 6, medical conditions appeared to be improving,

as more doctors and nurses entered the area.

ACCESS TO REFUGEES

Access to the refugees is severely restricted. This is partly due to

the Macedonian police, who have set up check points on the way to

the border and prevent journalists and sometimes aid workers from

getting in. PHRs physician-investigator was stopped at the border

two days ago by police and, after providing identification, was told,

there are enough doctors in there. The PHR physician was later

allowed to enter, but only after the invitation from a physician inside.

Representatives of the local Albanian refugee agency also told PHR

that it had also experienced difficulty in obtaining permission to provide assistance to the refugees.

FOOD

Some refugees have not eaten in three or four days. Food is available in some areas but not others. Even where available, distribution

is chaotic. PHRs physician went into the no mans land between

the official borders at approximately 9 p.m. on Saturday night. Only

one small vehicle made the trip with about 15 boxes of supplies, in-
44

cluding lollipops, candy bars, crackers, diapers and French mealsready-to-eat ( ). Repeated trips were planned. However. there were

only about 40-50 MREs in this batch and despite efforts to get the

food to children, individuals were pleading for food and the distribution was haphazard.

After the distribution was done, one tired-looking woman politely pleaded for help for her family. Please, just some milk and crackers,

she said softly. I have four children, and I havent anything to feed

them.

*****

In the last year, Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) has observed

at close range the unfolding calamity in Kosovo and has issued six

assessments with calls for vigorous and far-reaching Western action:

Our calls for Western response have been particularly sharp because

we have witnessed the pattern of Milosevics state action throughout

the last eight years in the Balkans, and could point with strong certainty to the end-state he intended for Kosovo.

In early March of 1998, after the massacres in northern Kosovo, we attempted to assist in forensic investigations and called for international action to stop the brutal assault of Serbian Forces against

Kosovar civilians.

In late June of 1998, as the Serbian war against the civilian population of north and western Kosovo progressed with swift ferocity,

leading to the sudden flight of 12-15,000 refugees over the border

into northern Albania, we sent a mission to that area, interviewed

refugees, and predicted a widening war, an eventual flood of tens of

thousands of refugees into Kukes, and called for the introduction of

ground forces into Kosovo to halt the campaign of ethnic cleansing

that was clearly underway.

In late December, 1998, after a four-month investigation of attacks

on physicians and medical care throughout the Serbian campaign

against the Kosovar population, attacks aimed at crushing the leadership of Kosovo civil society and undertaken in blatant disregard for

international humanitarian law, we again called for the introduction

of ground forces to separate the warring parties (because by this time

the KLA had become a force of its own to reckon with, and to establish the prompt withdrawal of Serbian military and police forces from

Kosovo.

In late January of 1999, after the massacres at Racak and when it

was clear that an unarmed monitoring presence could not prevent or

withstand the deliberate and calculated annihilation tactics initiated

by a heavily ed military, we again called for the introduction of NATO

ground forces.

 In late March of 1999, as the Serbian campaign of ethnic cleansing

reached unprecedented proportions, we issued a strong plea that

NATO, in addition to sustaining and intensifying its air campaign,

proceed to introduce ground troops as well.

And just yesterday, on April 5, 1999, as the affliction of hundreds of thousands of Kosovar refugees and deportees entered its second week

without sufficient introduction of life supports, we called upon the

international community and NATO to embark upon a number of

measures to maintain open borders and provide immediate relief to

those longest stranded without food, water, or shelter.
45

Based upon our experience over this past year, we have the following observations and recommendations:

OBSERVATIONS:

1) This crisis took a year to unfold but its features were evident

very early on. There were many points along the road when the

West could have intervened politically, diplomatically, and militarily with far less cost and risk than now confront us.

2) The October Holbrook-Milosevic agreement yielded one unexpected outcome, the successful use of unarmed monitors in large

numbers in the field to inject a measure of restraint, visibility,

and accountability to hold conflict to a low simmer for a short

period of time; and one expected outcome, the blatant and almost immediate violation by Milosevic of the military terms of

the accord, a violation which by early January and into February has managed to shift the military balance of power to the

point where armed intervention to oppose him has become almost inevitable.

3) In the late fall and winter, PHR investigators found a system- atic campaign on the part of the Serbian authorities and military to break the spirit of civil society, to terrorize and kill in

moderate numbers in order to force much larger numbers into

flight, and thus to accomplish the depopulation of large areas as

of Kosovo.

4) In March of this year we saw how rapidly the Serbian forces had

managed to build up their strength, bringing in approximately

45,000 regular soldiers as well as thousands of special forces

police, at least 400 tanks, many APCs, extensive artillery batteries and much augmented military air capacity. The presence

of this military force was brandished with menacing insouciance:

tanks moving at 60 km per hour on the main roads, APCs rumbling in towns and villages, parked at numerous checkpoints on

all main roads, large groupings of heavily armed soldiers and

police at most corners, most intersections, moving day and night.

Little attempt was made to camouflage the artillery batteries or

main troop areas. A sense of jeopardy prevailed in ail activities;

local people did not go out after 6 p.m.; it was dangerous for

young men to be out in public at any time; the humanitarian

community imposed informal curfews of 9 or 10 p.m. for all staff.

Checkpoints were omnipresent; few if any private vehicles were

on the main roads at any time. In attempting to conduct seminars on human rights and medical ethics, our purpose in being

there during this time, it was necessary to rely on the OSCE for

all logistic and transport support, since only utility vehicles with

official humanitarian or OSCE markings could travel with relatively little interference between the main cities of Pec, Prizren,

and Pristina.

5) All hopes rested on a positive report from Paris after March 15th,

but almost everyone in Kosovo feared that Milosevic would not

relent. By the morning of March 16th, it was evident that we

were all witnessing a rapid slide into outright war. The tanks

prowled the roads in great numbers, swinging off precipitously

into the fields and hills, leaving tracks in the mud and snow,

heading off to do damage to more remote hamlets. Mortar shell-
46

ing could be heard during the day, even in Pristina. An increasing number of killings of Kosovo civilians were reported from all

sites. North, central, and southwest Kosovo became entirely

unstable. As of March 19, estimates of newly displaced populations on the run within Kosovo reached 66,000for that short

week alone.

 6) My colleague and I were scheduled to leave on an afternoon flight

out of Skopje, Macedonia, on March 20. The probability of NATO

bombing, preceded by the requisite withdrawal of most humanitarian agencies and the OSCE (lest they become hostage to the

Serbian military, patterned on earlier experience) led us to leave

a day earlier. On March 19, even in an OSCE vehicle, the road

south from Pristina to the border was perilous. The traffic was

entirely Serbian military vehicles and tanks: only a few other

OSCE vehicles were on the road. Snow had fallen the night before, the road was dangerous and slippery, but still the Serbian

tanks and APCs moved very swiftly. Virtually always in eyesight were Serbian troops and police, along the edge of the road,

in the hills, at intersections. High alert status was palpable in

Kacanik, the southern border town of Kosovo that had seen much

killing and destruction throughout early and mid-March. We

crossed into Macedonia with a sense of war behind us.

7) When OSCE began to leave the next morning, packing this road

south with their 500 orange vehicles, they left with a sense of

dread and sorrow, shared by all of us who had traveled throughout Kosovo during those past few weeks. A bloody conflict was

inevitable, rendered more brutal now that the control rods, the

OSCE verifiers, were being pulled out. As anticipated, all restraint imposed by official witnesses was immediately thrown

away, and the Serbian forces began to move rapidly, destructively, and with evident abandon against all civilian targets in

Kosovo: people, villages, homes, livestock, farms. cultural and

religious sites. They had been doing all of this before and it was

clear that their intent had been to do it all whether there were

witnesses or not. But without observation, the speed accelerated greatly and the efficiency of gross ethnic cleansing was catapulted to new heights.

8) The delay in NATO bombing, from March 20th until March 24th,

gave the Serbian military a grave head start on the campaign of

atrocity they had already embarked upon. Already by late October 1998 official estimates stated that 1/3 of all villages in Kosovo had been destroyed, 1/3 seriously damaged, and 1/3 left

intact. In March, it was impossible to travel on the main roads

of Kosovo and see one single intact village or settlement from

the road. Virtually every town or intersection or settlement of

any size, and many small hamlets also visible from the roads,

had sustained significant or thoroughly destructive damage from

the Serbian onslaught. So it was abundantly clear to all of us in

Kosovo at that time that it would not take long for the Serbian

military to clear out Kosovo completely compel people to flee

from terror, kill those who hesitated, herd off and possibly execute most young males in their way. The NATO bombing did
47

not cause what is now happening. What is now happening is a

speeded-up version of what has been happening for a year, and

what has been planned to happen for longer than that. 9) Time is now absolutely the critical element if, as the West has

stated, the civilians in Kosovo are to be protected. Kosovo is a

tiny place: you can drive across it in an hour and a half; on a

high hill you can see for miles across the deforested plains: the

woods are thin and scant except on the mountainous fringes;

from virtually any site 10 km west of Pristina you can see the

mountain borders, the relative political sanctuary, of Albania

and Montenegro. The Serbian forces are heavily armed and

widely dispersed in strength throughout the countryside. Ethnic cleansing is an intimate activity: shell with grenades the

outskirts of a town, kill a few people on the periphery, force

through this terror everyone else to flee, drive in and rampage

door to door, looting, stealing, pillaging, and then incinerate all

structures. It will not take many more days for the Serbian forces

to have pursued this pattern over every inch of Kosovo. 10) Protection of people is a robust and rich word, as conceived in

international law and human rights discourse. It involves shoring up the physical security of persons, of course, but it also

requires attending to their past and future, their sense of dignity and self-respect, their capacity to sustain family and community. Protection of the Kosovar population has been to date a

lamentable failure. This failure, widely described, has been outlined in mainly physical termsdeath, injury, flight, dislocation.

What has not been adequately limned is the extend to which the

pillage of homes and theft of person has stripped with entire

population of all its worldly earned wealth, the economic product of generations of peasants who have kept their savings in

gold, jewelry, and improvements in home and farm structures

and equipment. There is no paper record of this wealth, except

in deeds to land. Land is extremely scarce in this country, the

most densely populated in Europe. A quarter acre of arable land

goes for 100,000 Devi, or approximately $75,000. What the Serbian forces are now doing, as they burn all public records, after

taking all goods and personal effects from the tens of thousands

they have forced to flee, is to obliterate systematically all capacity to reconstruct this intricate and dense network of social wealth

and settlement. Who, from now on, is to prove that a particular

man without a passport, drivers license, or identity card, without deeds or bills of sale, owned this particular plot of land, with

these boundaries? This query comes on top of the question, who

will ever help to pay this particular man for the goods, livestock,

and money he was forced to abandon at the hands of the Serbs?

And this question must be added to the more general one. How

will this population recover from, rebuild upon, be given restitution for the loss of some of its most beloved cultural and religious sites? The burning of the old city of Djakova, a lovely old

medieval town of wood dwellings, mosques, and other cultural

sites, constitutes a grotesque assault on Kosovar sense of history, beauty, and continuity.
48

Physicians for Human Rights urges the following actions regarding refugees on the Macedonian border:

1. The Macedonian government must be urged in the strongest possible terms to open its borders and allow free flow and rapid

processing of refugees and full access to these refugees by the

humanitarian community. The Macedonian authorities should

open multiple sites for processing entry of refugees and provide

large numbers of staff to facilitate the entry of the largest number of refugees as quickly as possible.

2. The international community must immediately provide emergency supplies, transport, and personnel in order to shore up

crucial life supports for this population of tens of thousands.

3. NATO countries should use troops now in Macedonia to assist

relief groups and the Macedonian government in providing transport. shelter, food, medical care and water to the refugees now

suffering on the Macedonia side of the border, including those in

the no-mans land area at Macedonias border. The OSCE

should offer support and personnel for rapid processing of refugees.

4. The international community should provide Macedonian citi- zens and the government of Macedonia with support until refugees can return to their homes in Kosovo sop that Macedonian

communities so not become themselves vulnerable to health crises and food insecurity.

5. NATO should immediately secure and defend a safe region within

Kosovo where displaced people may be protected and aided in

the short term. As quickly as possible, NATO and the U.S. should

deploy a ground protection force to secure the withdrawal of Serb

forces from Kosovo so that all refugees and internally displaced

people can return to their communities.
49

IF NOT NOW, WHEN?

Only Ground Troops Can Stop the Genocide in Kosovo

by Holly Burkhalter

Reprinted from the Legal Times, April 5, 1999

Submitted by Dr. Jennifer Leaning

Every occasion of mass murder has its own unique history and char- acteristics. But as Serb forces herd men and boys to their deaths,

close in on thousands of terrified families on the run, and complete

the burning and ethnic cleansing of Pristina, one is reminded of the

Bosnian genocide. And as Clinton administration officials bob and

weave around the question of whether genocide is unfolding in Kosovo, I remember the precious weeks and lives that were lost in April

1994 when the United States equivocated and demurred over the

question of whether genocide was taking place in Rwanda.

Genocide is the gravest crime that human beings can commit, and

that term should not be thrown about loosely to convey outrage. Massacres, in and of themselves, do not necessarily constitute genocide.

The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of

Genocide defines the crime as acts committed with intent to destroy,

in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group by

killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm

to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole

or in part.

If we are to invoke the international Genocide Convention and its

requirement that signatory nations prevent and punish genocide, we

must be clear about whether the crime is occurring or about to occur.

The convention distinguishes genocide from mass murder by requiring an intent to destroy an ethnically or racially defined group. We at

Physicians for Human Rights believe that Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevics campaign of terror in Kosovo meets that standard.

Accordingly, we call upon the United States, as a convention signatory, to take action to stop this genocide and to punish the perpetrators.

It is impossible to speculate how many Kosovar Albanian civilians

have died in recent days, weeks, and months because Milosevic-who

learned from his mistake of letting international journalists report

fully on the destruction of Bosnia-has severely limited access to Kosovo for journalists, human rights monitors, and humanitarian aid

workers. But even with those limits, information is abundantly available that Milosevics forces are accelerating a campaign they began a

year ago to destroy the Albanian population. That campaign includes

the murder of thousands of civilians and the methodical bombing and

burning of hundreds of villages and towns.

Milosevics strategy also entails the destruction of the Albanian communitys leadershipthrough the targeted execution of Kosovar

political leaders, doctors, independent journalists, humanitarian workers, and intelligentsiaas well as the destruction of cultural and religious sites.

But perhaps the clearest indication of Milosevics intention to eliminate this community is the Serbs well-organized program to terrorize and forcibly remove the Kosovar Albanians from their homeland.
50

On March 30, NATO spokesman Jamie Shea stated, Pec was a city

of 100,000 people. We now have reports that it has been almost totally destroyed. We also have reports of people, thousands of people

from Prizren, being forced to leave on a forced march towards the

Albanian border. . . . This is something that we havent seen since the

forced evacuation of Phnom Penh in Cambodia by the Khmer Rouge

in the mid 1970s. And sustained Serbian attacks on Pristina, the chief

city of Kosovo, are continuing.

Dr. Vjosa Dobruna, head of the Pristina Center for Women and Children, who fled to Macedonia as a refugee, reported on March 31

that only 30,000 of Pristinas original population of 200,000 remained

in the city. The rest had been forced to flee. At the time of this writing, the official estimate of the number of

refugees, within and outside Kosovo, was 580,000-more than a third

of the provinces population-and there is no end in sight. And in a

clear indication that the Serb authorities do not intend to permit

Kosovar Albanian refugees to return to their homes, Serb police are

confiscating car registrations and identity documents at the border. On March 28, German Defense Minister Rudolf Scharping reported

that information reaching us indicates that genocide has begun.

British Defense Secretary George Robertson agreed, noting, What

we see of what is happening and what we hear from those who have

managed to escape, and from reports by the U.N. High Commissioner

for Refugees and the International Red Cross, are enough, more than

enough, to convince us that we are confronting a regime which is

intent on genocide.

On March 29, State Department spokesman James Rubin appeared

to concur, stating, There are indicators that genocide is unfolding in

Kosovo, but we are looking at a mixture of confirmed and unconfirmed

reports at this time. There is no reason, however, to await confirmation of genocide because we can clearly say crimes against humanity

are being committed by Milosevics forces. The International [Criminal] Tribunal [for the former Yugoslavia] can impose life imprisonment, and that can be imposed for crimes against humanity, just as it

can for genocide.

Rubins suggestion that there is not really a difference between labeling the Kosovo atrocities genocide or crimes against humanity

because the tribunal can impose life sentences misses the point. Does

the Clinton administration really believe that the tribunals potential penalties are deterring a serial ethnic cleanser like Milosevic,

when he has not been indicted for past crimes in Bosnia?

The United States is morally bound to prevent or stop crimes against humanity, and it should not wait for the situation to deteriorate to

the point of genocide to intervene. Indeed, Physicians for Human

Rights has been calling for ground forces in Kosovo to protect civilians for a year. But the United States is not legally bound by its solemn treaty obligation to intervene unless genocide, as defined in the

convention, is actually unfolding in Kosovo. At a briefing for nongovernmental organizations on March 31, Larry

Rossin of the State Departments Europe Bureau shied away from

genocide, using the weaker term ethnic cleansing. He stated that

Ambassador David Scheffer was in the region to collect information

on abuses so as to make a determination on whether genocide is occurring.
51

I hope Ambassador Scheffer concludes, as we do, that genocide is

occurring and that he does so very quickly. Such a finding might help

persuade the administration, which continues to forswear the deployment of a ground force to stop Milosevics war against civilians, to

reconsider. Though the NATO bombing campaign may eventually

weaken Milosevics war-making capacity, it is clearly not deterring

Serb forces from accelerating their yearlong campaign to purge Kosovo of its Albanian majority.

Some observers are troubled that military action against Milosevic

has been taken under NATO, not United Nations, auspices. The Genocide Conventions Article VIII states that convention signatories may

call upon the competent organs of the United Nations to take action

to prevent acts of genocide. But given that a Russian or Chinese veto

on the Security Council would make humanitarian intervention in

Kosovo impossible, the conventions first article-requiring action to

prevent and punish genocide-takes precedence, in my view, over the

U.N. mechanism suggested by Article VIII. In any event, the Security Council has issued numerous resolutions calling on Milosevic to

end the use of force in Kosovo and withdraw the bulk of his troopsresolutions that he has ignored.

The United States must not wait until the unfolding genocide has

been completed to acknowledge it and respond. President Clinton bears

a heavy burden for his administrations refusal to act to stop genocide

in Rwanda and Bosnia. Those precious lost lives cannot be redeemed

with Kosovar civilians saved from dispersal and death. But an immediate intervention by NATO ground forces in Kosovo will save a people

from destruction, and allow this president to be remembered as one

who learned from the mistakes of the past.
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