Arrested KLA members given 30-days detention
Serbian justice has ordered a 30-days detention for nine former members of the Albanian separatist Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), arrested last week for alleged murder, rape and torture of Serb civilians
(KosovoCompromise Staff) Monday, December 29, 2008
The nine were transferred to Belgrade after being arrested in Presevo, in southern Serbia. A tenth suspect also arrested remained in Presevo.
They are suspected of kidnapping 153 Serbs and other non-Albanians between June and September 1999, releasing 94 of them after physical torture and killing 59 others.
According to reports, crimes committed by the so-called "Gnjilane Group" of the KLA were committed in an extremely cruel way.
Many victims were killed in a school dormitory in Gnjilane. Their clothes were removed, they were tied up, beaten, stabbed with knives, their body parts were cut off and they were killed in the end.
"Several victims were killed in an attempt of the Gnjilane Group members to test the number of bodies through which a single bullet can pass. They cut all bodies in pieces and took them to different localities to prevent them from being found," Serbian television B92 reported.
Serbian War Crimes Prosecutor's Office spokesman Bruno Vekaric said that the crimes had been committed very cruelly, at three locations in Gnjilane.
"First of all, the location is interesting, this school dormitory in Gnjilane, where people were taken and tortured in the worst possible way. I cannot describe the brutalities that happened there, because I don't think this would be in accordance with the ethical principles of any media," Vekaric said.
"Several women were raped and Serbs and other non-Albanians were tortured in the worst possible ways," Vekaric said.
