Insurgency in Kosovo

BERN - Dick Marty, the former Council of Europe rapporteur who investigated crimes committed by the so-called "Kosovo Liberation Army" ("KLA") and human organ trafficking in Kosovo-Metohija, died on Thursday aged 78, Swiss.info reported.

The news of his death was confirmed by Switzerland's Radical-Liberal Party.

The order for the attack was issued by Javier Solana, the Secretary General of NATO at the time, to the then commander of the allied forces, US General Wesley Clark, although there was no UN Security Council approval. It was an obvious precedent.

A Kosovo court has jailed Svetomir Bacevic for five years for taking a Kosovo Albanian woman from her home and mistreating her in the Peja/Pec municipality during the war in 1998.

An official of the American administration has only now confessed that their soldiers also took part in the land invasion of Serbia and that they died in those battles.

Albania's parliament voted on Thursday to set up an investigative committee to collect information on other investigations conducted by local and international bodies into alleged crimes committed by the Kosovo Liberation Army in Albania in the war in Kosovo two decades ago.

The parliament will then present a resolution based on the findings.

Drita Hajdari told BIRN on Thursday that Kosovo's Special Prosecution Office has opened a preliminary investigation into Serbian police special forces' attack on the Jashari family compound in Prekaz from March 5-7, 1998, in which guerrilla commander Adem Jashari and 58 of his relatives were killed.

The Kosovo municipality of Gjakova/Djakovica's Office for the Collection and Documentation of War Crimes submitted 102 new criminal complaints against alleged Serbian war criminals to Kosovo police on Monday.

This was the 13th batch of criminal complaints filed by the municipal office in Gjakova/Djakovica about war crimes by Serbs, bringing the total number to around 1,600.

The last families left for Serbia in end of June 1999. The next day, someone set the houses on fire.

Two decades later, Zhakova/Zakovo remains in ruins. Like many other similar 'ghost villages' in Kosovo, its residents never came back.

Speaking in Belgrade on Monday, Brnabic said that political leaders in Pristina are preventing Serbs in Kosovo and Metohija from achieving their basic human rights.

Kosovo started its three days of commemorations for KLA commander Adem Jashari and the army which fought against Serbian forces in the 1998-99 conflict with a parade of the Kosovo Security Force.