Call for inquiry over 'Serbs killed for organs'

Published on Monday 5 May 2008 21:57

NEW evidence has emerged over claims that ethnic Albanian guerrillas killed Serbs and sold their organs at the end of the war in Kosovo, a watchdog said yesterday.

Human Rights Watch said it had information that bolsters allegations of abductions in June 1999. At the time, Nato and the United Nations were moving into Kosovo at the end of the war between separatist rebels and Serbian forces.

The claims were first made by Carla del Ponte, a former UN war crimes prosecutor. She said she had been told by "credible journalists" that Kosovo Albanians transported between 100 and 300 people to a house near the Albanian town of Burrel.

At the house, "doctors extracted the captives' internal organs", Ms del Ponte wrote in the recently-published book The Hunt: War Criminals and Me. Human Rights Watch said it had reviewed inquiries conducted by the UN war crimes tribunal and UN-run justice department in Kosovo, and concluded that the claims should be fully investigated.

The group said it viewed information obtained by the tribunal from journalists, including statements from seven ethnic Albanians guerrillas who "gave details about participating in or witnessing the transfer of abducted Serbs and others prisoners".

It also said it obtained a report by UN investigators in Kosovo who found an intravenous bag, syringes and medicine bottles in a stream next to the house in 2002-3. They also found blood, but were unable to determine if it was human and concluded the evidence was not enough to support the claims.

In Albania, Lulzim Basha the foreign minister, called the allegations "inventions and absurdities", but the rights group claimed that he was withholding evidence.

It said he had "personally investigated reports of detention facilities in northern Albania" when he worked for the UN-run justice department in Kosovo.