The thrilling confession of the survivors of the Recak massacre: A man's heart was lifted, I confessed to him at The Hague

Recak village of the Shtime municipality, which is located about 30km from Pristina two decades ago, made a big turn in Kosovo's history.

The survivor of this massacre relates, the horror they experienced early morning 99. Rame Shaban, 52, reports that about 30 village residents had fled to the basement of Sadik Osman, whose home today still bears the bullet marks that were fired that day.

Well, 21 years ago in the court of Sadik Osman, we were in Sadik's basement here, there was a cow nut, the men were crying, me with Sadik Bask, with women and children we were in the basement. We've gathered half the village in this courtyard, that the mountain has been near to escape, always when there were grants, in the basement we have closer to the mountains of exits. Once we've been promoted, they've promoted the house. Now they've come to us out here, they beat us, what we had IDs, money, what we had. This is where we've been led, and we've been told to walk the mountain... With our hands behind us and we've walked past”, he says.

From there, Rama and over 30 other residents of the village, with their hands set back, headed toward the mountain.

On the way, Serbian criminals had beaten and burned them. While, he still has the cool, horrible sights he had seen that morning.

This is where the Serbs have been waiting for us. They've been blaming us. Two of them have already been killed. I just went downstairs, got some more killed, got back, got killed. The largest group... on this road was Ragip Bajrami, dropped earlier than expected, took his heart”, he adds.

On Mount “Bebush”, other Serb policemen were standing, who did not hesitate to perform macabre works on unarmed civilian population.

The big group here is, over 20 people here, and from there and down there were killed. When I came in the evening, I'm hiding in the sky, I'm coming in the whole evening... in the worst condition I am today of that day, today I can't work too hard, I'm messing with all the broken bones, I've been beaten up, I haven't been able to take medication or anything... I've seen them in the evening, from there and here, and Ragip has been here somewhere, the coma has been going back to the village that after mom and 30 other girls, but they came to O The SB, I thought Serbs came back, slept up there until morning”, he confessed.

He had seen his brother and ten other family members in terrible, barbarous condition were killed and slaughtered.

The same day in the rest of the village, Xhemajl Beqiri was killed by 12-year-old nephew Halimi, brother and four other family members.

We've been around 50 people from this part, and we've been hunting those from Roga ain't got 50 meters, and they've killed her cousin's wife, they've robbed her, and I've been able to help you. Even Halimi was murdered below, brother's son... when I came down that I couldn't get a bullet head, you didn't know where they were shooting. They were knee cones from Bebusha, on all sides”, he declares.

Xhemajli had continued under the village, where dozens of residents had managed to escape the bullets of Serbian police officers.

Three months before Recak's massacre in Kosovo, the OSCE's Investigative Mission was established. The international monitors' task was to ensure that the fighting between the Serb forces and the KLA was stopped.

The mission's chief was William Walker, a former American diplomat, went to Recak the day after the massacre, where from what he had seen, he had said this is a serious crime against humanity.

Recak's massacre was part of the International War Crimes Tribunal's indictment in the former Yugoslavia against former Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic and several other Serbian officials. The process has remained in half after his death, and none of the accused was convicted of crimes committed in Recak.

For all of this, Xhemajl Beqiri from Recak in 2002 had witnessed before The Hague's Tribunal on the morning of January 15th, when police entered that village and along with 12 other neighborhood families headed toward the mountain to find refuge. He had mentioned the names of some of the Serbs he identified in the critical day's action.

In 2002, I witnessed at The Hague, there I also talked about these policemen I knew, who were police officers in the Market, they were in massacres, they were even leaders of this Recak massacre. They also know the leaders of Serbia, all of whom were there... there was Bozha where I identified her was of Shtrpce, a Stipka, they have their surnames, I gave them to The Hague”, he said.

After this witness, Beqiri says that no one has asked him or ever done anything.

After William Walker left the village, the inhabitants gathered the lifeless bodies and placed them in glass, where burial was expected. It was impossible for nearly three days, and during that time fighting was resumed between the Serb forces and the KLA. All the time, Serb forces denied that they had killed civilians and said those killed were members of the KLA, who were killed in combat.

Just as they are denying after two decades... Serbia's president, Alexander Vuciq, had previously described this massacre as fiction, where more than 40 people were killed and massacred.

Rame Shaban, who survived this genocide, is still holding pictures of Banus Ademi, the 99 - year - old man who had lost his head and the bodies who were slaughtered in the mosque after a few days.

He as the president who knows that there's been massacres, knows the whole world, as if it's not this massacre, you see people, young elders... I'm getting really bad at this, I don't know that the OSCE and Walker first saw Banushi, and he said massacre. The OSCE has been for us as well as for them.. Even today, they told me it wasn't massacre”

For this Bardhil Mahmut from Kosovo's “Genocide centre, "open wound”," says Kosovo Press, that the genocide issue is related to his denial. Those who do it to a specific nation, according to him, also have the strategy to hide it.

Serbia for 20 years has taken no step towards democratisation of the country, all previous structures that have been established and professionally prepared by the Milosevic regime today... All people involved in crimes have been advanced”, he says.

According to him, propaganda is also done with the terminologies used.

Using the term war crimes, we unconsciously reduce the crime of genocide to the third degree. The proper notion that should be used in these cases is crime during the war. There's another notion that's used, the issue of crime against humanity. It is very important that at the time of the genocide crime in Recak, William Walker qualified him as a crime against humanity. The convention of January 15, 16, 17, 1999, has been one where genocide had not yet been proven. For this reason, crime against humanity has been the most appropriate criminal category. The time has come when ethnic cleansing that is a category of genocide has been applied. It is virtually proven that Serbia has had an operational-military plan to destroy the Albanian as such”, he adds to Kosovas.

Hasan Metushi has been trying to find comfort near his mother's tomb, which is empty. Very close to his home, there is this memorial complex, where more than 40 troops slaughtered by Serb military and police forces were slaughtered.

On January 15, 1999, a terrible massacre has occurred in the village of Recak. Of the 43 civilians who were massacred. Among them were the father, the two uncles, and the mother. They're all buried. Only the mother of January 15, 1999, is not known for her destiny. We asked, we gave all the interviews, we did it. The AND, but now 21 years are becoming unknown to her destiny. We wait, we expect that maybe one day she will be found somewhere, buried among these 43 martyrs”...

Metushi expresses disappointment with the country's institutions, according to which very little has been worked over the years for whitening their fate.

Vuciqi's statement says it has once again opened the wounds to the residents of this village, and for that it urges Kosovo institutions not to have dialogue without recognition of the crimes.

Without being convicted of these crimes that Serbia has committed, there is no need for any such talks, someone who has committed these crimes must be convicted. It is not us in Serbia to commit crimes, Serbia has come here. They took us out of our homes, slaughtered us in the worst way. We seek justice, for those who are missing, to find”, he says.

All these crimes that have been committed in Kosovo are also being documented through books and various facts. Professor Jusuf Osmani after the war had gone to each Kosovo village to gather evidence of the massacres that were committed.

And according to the evidence that I've had most secularly towards the population and civilian persons, there are 43 local people. And the way they were killed, how they were massacred, can't be described in words, because the normal man can't do it. They deny it because we're not working in this direction, we need to prove to the world what crimes have been committed... they make up by writing untruths, by writing about what hasn't happened, by presenting the criminal Albanians to history even now, while the local Serb population as victims. It uses some kind of tool, in diplomacy, in various ways lobbie with a false”, Osmani declares Kosovas.

Massacre bodies are buried just a few meters from the village at the Memorial complex, where the national flag waves. The statue of William Walker, the man who first described Recak's massacre as a crime against humanity, has been erected here.