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The town centre in Skendaraj/Srbica. Photo: Wikimedia Commons/Përdoruesi:Kaperthuras.

The Humanitarian Law Centre NGO held a lecture event on Wednesday at the Kosovo Documentation Centre to present data about killings in the Skenderaj/Srbica area on March 20, 1999, including the testimonies of eyewitnesses and relatives of victims and findings from the Hague Tribunal.

The lecture explained how eight Kosovo Albanians were taken from their homes that day by Serbian forces and killed at a place known as Te Pishat (To the Pines).

The same day in the Skenderaj/Srbica, 29 other ethnic Albanian civilians were killed or disappeared without trace; 16 of them are still missing.

Dea Dedi, the manager of the Documentation Centre Kosovo, told the story of the murder of one of them, Veli Mustafa from Skenderaj/Srbica.

Dedi said that on March 20, 1999, gunshots were heard from the morning onwards, then men in white uniforms arrived at the Mustafas’ home at about 1pm.

“Six people entered the house and ordered everyone to go out into the yard, women and children. They ordered them to leave for Albania, while Veli Mustafa was held back in the yard,” Dedi said.

“After the others left, they started hearing gunshots. After three weeks, the family members received the news that Veli had been killed and buried by neighbours on March 30, 1999 in the yard of the house,” she added.

Dedi said that the murders and disappearances of civilians in the Skenderaj/Srbica took place in the area of ​​responsibility of the 125th Motorised Brigade of the Yugoslav Army’s Pristina Corps.

“Despite the evidence of the crimes committed in Skenderaj, no single member of the 125th Motorised Brigade has been prosecuted for the crimes; on the contrary, the brigade leader was decorated after the war in Serbia,” she said.

The lecture was part of a series organised by the Humanitarian Law Centre on major incidents during the Kosovo war.

HLC director Bekim Blakaj said that the events were being organised so victims are not forgotten, to create a collective memory of what happened in the past and to provide accurate information about the incidents.

Blakaj said that 20 years after the war, relatives of the victims are “feeling more abandoned all the time”.

He added that an exhibition of children killed and missing during the war will be opened soon, including testimonies and some of the young victims’ belongings.