Word: albanians
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...past three years, Lindita Rexhepi, an ethnic Albanian high school student from the mining city of Mitrovica in northern Kosovo, has not been able to go home. She was 14 when Serb troops expelled her and her family from their small cement-block home as part of their offensive against ethnic Albanian rebels and forced them across the border into Montenegro. When the war ended in 1999, they returned to find the narrow road into their hillside neighborhood blocked by Serbs, many of whom had fled here from Albanian-dominated areas elsewhere in Kosovo. The last time Lindita tried...
...Ibar River, a shallow, polluted stream running between high banks through the center of Mitrovica, has become the city's main demarcation line. To the north is Serb territory; to the south, ethnic Albanians dominate. But there are some notable exceptions. In the Albanian zone, for example, 17 Serbs have refused to leave and are now under 24-hour protection in compounds ringed with razor wire. In the north, a few hundred Albanians live in equally fortified "confidence zones" established by the U.N. and kfor...
Though violence has tapered off, the conflict has taken on other forms. Mitrovica's largest Serbian Orthodox cemetery, like the church, is located on the Albanian side of town. Every few months, Serbs who want to tend the graves of their loved ones travel in a KFOR armored convoy to the site. After they leave, Father Nojic says, the recently tended graves are defaced by Albanian vandals. As a result, some parishioners have taken to burying their dead in their backyards. The largest ethnic Albanian cemetery is also on the wrong side of town, and it gets even fewer visitors...
While extremists operate on both sides, they are most visible in the north, where Serbs have violently resisted efforts by the U.N. to return Albanians and impose "multiethnic" rule. At the first sign of an Albanian intruder, or an effort by the U.N. to return refugees, self-appointed vigilantes known as bridge watchers use radios, mobile phones and even car horns to summon hundreds of supporters within minutes. At one clash last year, Agim Ibrahimi, 42, lost his 17-year-old son when someone from the Serb side lobbed a grenade. KFOR estimates there are around 300 bridge watchers, while...
Most longtime residents of Mitrovica insist that what has happened to their home town is the fault of a few extremists and outsiders. "The only thing worse than a Serb at war is a free Albanian," says Beke Abazi, 50, an Albanian magazine editor who is investigating the illegal seizure of property by organized gangs from both sides. "This is not a problem of neighbor-against-neighbor," he insists. "It's criminal gangs who are operating with impunity on both sides. All the good people have gone silent." With Milosevic on trial in the Hague, now may be the time...