For some, the war ended” The confessions of women whom war punished and society silenced

Twenty such stories of women sexually raped by Serbian forces are summed up in a book by Garentina Kraja and Anna Di Lelio.

For a category of women in this book it seems that this war has never ended, because they have been forced to live with its consequences in silence”, Kraja says.

Kraja, researcher and journalist, and Di Lelio, sociologist and political analyst, have forwarded the 1998/99 war to Kosovo in various capacities.

But since 2015 I think of you” The Alketa Xyfa Mripas, dedicated to victims of sexual violence during the war, they sought a way to contribute to the change in the turitive for this war in Kosovo.

And finally, the result is a book published on June 12, in English, with 20 stories of women experiencing sexual violence during the war.

“We have conceived this book in response to the silence and indifference we have often met within Kosovo and abroad to recognise and punish the crime killers committed against thousands of women and men in Kosovo who continue to burden the lives of survivors”, says Kraja for Radio Free Europe.

The exact number of persons raped during the recent war in Kosovo is unknown. But according to a report by the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention, this figure is up to 20,000.

However, the legal status of survivors of sexual violence during the war has taken only about 2,000.

Kraja says that in post-war Kosovo, where collective memory is focused about heroes of the liberation war and military resistance, this book brings to the centre the very ones that often remain in shadow: women raped during the war.

Their confessions are not limited to the time of the war but throughout their lives. For Kraja, this has been important to show how these women, in their lives, have experienced only emotional breakdowns since school education, the cause of the thinking of families.

Their life knows only deterioration. And it does not end with the crime that happens to them, but it continues even after the war. They not only do not get support from institutions, but they do not get support from even their families”, Kraja says.

Because of what the social circle in Kosovo described as family honour loss, Kraja says many women decided to remain silent about their experiences.

So far in Kosovo, only Vasfije Krasniqi-Goodman, Shyhrete Tahiri-Sulimani and Ramadan Nishori have spoken publicly about the sexual violence they had experienced during the war.

Since most other confessions like those shared for Radio Free Europe over the years have been anonymously given, Kraja and Di Lelio have dedicated a chapter to “issues”.

There are different types of silence. At first, after something like this happens to a woman, the first silence is from a friend. Then the other silence is because getting violated is bad, and what about the 17 families killed? Someone's experienced even worse”, says Di Lelio of Radio Free Europe.

What it says has surprised him in Kosovo is that, later, these women have experienced great prejudice from other women in their families.

Kraja, from the beginning of her career as a war journalist to working as adviser to former Kosovo President Atifete Jahjaga, has closely followed the stories of sexually violent survivors during the war.

While Di Lelio, currently legalising for humanitarian interventions and combat ethics at New York University, during 1999 she was engaged as adviser to the UN Food Programme in Kosovo.

It's very important for Di Lillio to emphasize the strength of these women. For this reason the book is also entitled “The strongest link” (in English, The Strongest Link) has shown the strength they have shown within their families and the strength that women leading nongovernmental organizations have shown to offer help to those in need.

The power of their soul is incredible. The strongest link to them refers to the way they managed to live after everything that happened to them, how they managed to fight for their rights”, says Di Lelio.

For him, comparison with other countries is inevitable. She says the stories of the survivors of sex violence in Kosovo did not take much time to publicize when similar stories are taken into account in other countries.

She mentions German women raped by Russian forces, Korean and Chinese women used as sex slaves by the Japanese army as examples of such stories only 60 or 70 years later.

“We can never be satisfied, we want to do more. But it didn't take long. And the fact that they've entered categories of civilian war victims, they've retired, it's very important”, says Di Lelio.

But can there be more? Of course, she says.

Di Leillo remains critical of the way the Government Commission operates in recognition of the status of survivors of sexual violence during the war in Kosovo.

They must facilitate some of the standards for verifying retirement beneficiaries”, she says.

Di Lelio mentions the case of a woman who had been forced to go to interview the Commission building for what she had experienced during the war. It was in that building that it was banned by Serb forces during the war.

Among the organisations with which survivors have worked that, for example, 17 years, they should know that something happened to them and that they are asking for free money”, she adds.

The status of the victim of war sex violence provides beneficiaries with a pension of 230 euros per month and some other benefits, such as free health services and priorities in employment.

Under the law in Kosovo, which was adopted in 2014, such status belongs to each person, who manages to convince a government commission that he was the victim of sexual violence during the war in Kosovo, respectively, in February 27, 1998, June 20, 1999.

Organizations that work with survivors of sexual violence during the war need to be physically interviewed only when it is inherent. In recent years they have complained that almost every applicant is invited for the interview.

But, now, 26 years after NATO troops entered Kosovo, Kraja says it is time to think more deeply about the consequences of what happened in Kosovo in the late 1990s.

“While June 12th is a holiday, I want this day to also serve to reflect on those people who have not experienced the end of the war like the rest of us, to document this chapter as part of the history of Kosovo”, says Kraja.

Di Lelio says that, since the stories of survivors of sexual violence during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina are internationally recognised and have brought changes to international laws, the same is not true of Kosovo.

The key to this is this internationally recognised [Kosovo history of sexual violations], she says, explaining why the book was published in English.

Kraja says that through the account of these stories, they aim to help prevent and prevent these cases and awareness of how they should be handled.

This goes beyond Kosovo”, Kraja concludes. / REL/