(28 Jul 1999) English/Nat
K-FOR peacekeepers have detained four men for questioning in the killings of 14 Serb farm workers who were being mourned at a village funeral under heavy NATO security on Wednesday.
The detentions were the first major development disclosed in the investigation of the slayings last Friday.
The killings severely shook Serb confidence in NATO's peacekeeping mission and its pledge to protect all ethnic groups in Kosovo.
Desim Aliu was taken from his house in the village of Kojsk in a dawn raid undertaken by British military police.
Aliu and two other men from his village were taken away along with a fourth man from the village of Gracko.
Desim Aliu's wife expressed fear and concern for her husband's safety.
SOUNDBITE: (Albanian)
"There were more than 10 soldiers who arrived around 5 (o'clock) in the morning. They took him and I do not know for what. Now it is more than 10 hours and I don't know anything about him."
SUPER CAPTION: Sevvi, Desim Aliu's wife
The four men detained early Wednesday were being held for questioning at Lipljan police station, but had not been charged, according to a K-FOR spokesperson.
The British military police, who are part of the K-FOR peace keeping mission in the province, have not disclosed the ethnicity of the men or provided any other details.
Villagers who knew the slain men claimed their assailants were Kosovo Liberation Army members, but the soldiers deny they were involved.
The slayings of the Serb farmers last Friday has underscored enormous difficulties still confronting NATO and the United Nations more than a month after peacekeepers moved into Kosovo and ethnic Albanian refugees began flooding home.
Violence in Kosovo over the past six weeks has included almost 200 killings, hundreds of house burnings and other unrest, mostly in revenge attacks by ethnic Albanians on the Serb minority.
Serb and Yugoslav forces killed an estimated 10-thousand people, and more than 860-thousand ethnic Albanians fled or were expelled from Kosovo before and during the NATO air campaign, which began March 24.
Since Yugoslav and Serbian forces pulled out and NATO moved in, more than 100-thousand Serbs are believed to have fled the province out of fear for their safety.
As Serbs have left Kosovo, more than 720-thousand ethnic Albanian refugees have returned to homes they fled during the yearlong crackdown by Serb security forces in the province.
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