Death of the Bytyqi brothers

Twelve former Yugoslav Army troops who are being retried for allegedly killing more than 118 Kosovo Albanians near the town of Pec/Peja in 1999 have pleaded not guilty.

Serbia’s premier is likely to come under renewed pressure during his US visit this week to resolve the murders of the Bytyqi brothers, three Albanian-Americans killed in Serbia in 1999.

Serbia on Monday said that Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic will visit the US this week to meet, among others, Vice-President Joe Biden and John Kerry, Secretary of State.

Vucic will also meet Christine Lagarde, IMF managing director, and Jim Yong Kim, the President of the World Bank.

War Crimes Prosecutor Vladimir Vukcevic has said there has been progress in the investigation into the murder of the Bytyqi brothers.

He said that many of the suspects in the crime today hold "more notable" positions "in the state or around it."

Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic will visit Washington with new evidence in the case of the murder of the Bytyqi brothers.

Serbian War Crimes Prosecutor Vladimir Vukcevic also told Radio Belgrade that authorities have been intensively working on the case and that the FBI has participated in the investigation since the beginning.

Important progress has been made in the investigation into the murder of the Bytyqi brothers "and now we have some new evidence," said Nebojsa Stefanovic.

The interior minister added that he expects the case to be solved.

The Bytyqi brothers case will be one of the more important topics when U.S. Vice President Joseph Biden and Serbian PM Aleksandar Vucic meet in June.

The case in which members of the Serbian police in 1999 killed three U.S. citizens of Albanian origin is one of the obstacles in relations between Serbia and the U.S.

The unresolved murder of the Bytyqi brothers is an obstacle in relations between Serbia and the U.S.

They were U.S. citizens whose bodies were found in a mass grave in Petrovo Selo.

War crime prosecutors have no will to investigate the Serbian army chief's alleged war crimes in Kosovo, the Belgrade-based Humanitarian Law Centre said.

Brothers Slobodan and Srecko Martinovic and Svetlana Stojanovic were acquitted of mistreating two Kosovo Albanians from the town of Novoberdo during the war in April 1999.