Trond Andresen
>Nato officials said Slobodan Milosevic was waging
> "refugee warfare" after thousands of Kosovars
> poured into Macedonia, bringing new and horrifying
> reports of anarchy and barbarity in their homeland.
>
> After 28,000 Kosovars arrived in the space of three
> days, alliance officials said the Serbian leader was
> using the deluge of people as a weapon to destabilise
> the Macedonian government, which is already
> confronting growing protests from a large and vocal
> pro- Serbian faction.
>
> The latest exiles brought reports that were shocking
> even by the standards of this war. They described
> Kosovo as a land of fear, where squads of Serbian
> paramilitaries, often high on drugs, rape and loot at
> will. The cities have been emptied of most of their
> inhabitants and packs of dogs roam the empty
> streets, scavenging on dead bodies. There is little
> power and there is a shortage of food. The
> authorities have a deliberate policy of withholding
> what little supplies there are from the Kosovo
> Albanians.
>
> Many refugees reported that weeks of mistreatment
> and semi-captivity suddenly ended with them being
> dispatched to the border in organised groups. The
> reports lend support to claims that the Serb
> authorities have orchestrated the expulsions, and that
> the Kosovars are not leaving to escape Nato bombs,
> as Belgrade claims.
>
> One of the last acts of the Serbian soldiers was to
> stop the trains and convoys of buses carrying the
> Kosovars, and fleecing them of any money or
> valuables.
>
> The refugees said the worst atrocities were being
> carried out by the so-called Tigers, a unit of
> paramilitaries led by the Serb warlord Zeljko
> Raznjatovic, whose nom de guerre is Arkan. Arkan's
> units - seasoned from the war in Bosnia from
> 1992-95 - fan out from their base at Kolovic, near
> Pristina, to bring terror to surrounding areas. They
> are described as shaven-headed, wearing red or
> black scarves, and are often drunk or high on drugs.
> The refugees accuse the Tigers of random, pointless
> killings. They say their activities have shocked even
> the Serbian police, who sometimes try to help the
> victims.
>
> At the Stenkovec refugee camp, near Skopje, Ymer
> Gashi, a 20-year-old former student at Pristina
> University, told of a multiple murder committed, he
> said, by Arkan's men 10 days ago. "There was a
> man called Gani Berisha, he was a building engineer.
> He lived at Bledi in Pristina," said Mr Gashi. "Gani
> had two refugees staying with him when the Tigers
> came. He stood up to them, and they shot him and
> the other two dead. Gani was shot so many times in
> the face that his own family would have found it
> impossible to recognise him. We couldn't bury the
> bodies at the time. When we came back we found
> that dogs had got in and they had eaten Gani's left
> hand."
>
> Idriz Duriqi, 42, a driving instructor from Bledi,
> spoke of the killing of a 65-year-old doctor, Isa
> Hyseni. Mr Duriqi said: "He was just getting to the
> gate of his home when they shot him in the back.
> His wife saw what happened and she started
> weeping. She was hysterical. But they would not let
> her get to the body.
>
> "We knew they were Arkan's men, everyone is very
> scared of them. They come and kidnap girls, and
> take them away blindfolded. Some of them come
> back. We don't know what happens to the others."
>
> Amira Hamadi said she was grateful to the local
> police in Pristina. She said: "Some masked Serbs in
> uniform came into our home. My mother and I
> managed to get out but they caught my sister. We
> could hear her screaming. One of the neighbours
> called the police and they came and freed my sister.
> We were lucky that time, and we knew it was time
> to leave."