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ground, reveal that the pattern of attack of these combined MUP and VJ forces consisted of a process lasting three or four days. Having chosen a particular village or area for action25, the MUP and VJ forces would approach with armoured vehicles, often including tanks, seal off the roads leading to the area, and set up positions around or on two sides of the area. From these, the area would then be shelled over a continuous period of time, often a day and a night. This shell-fire was not generally designed to inflict substantial damage on the village or area itself, although civilian casualties often resulted, but to encourage the local population to leave their property and homes. For this purpose, the attacking forces would generally leave a corridor open to allow the fleeing population to move in the desired direction.

After this process was largely completed, the MUP infantry "troops" would enter the village or area and move from house to house, searching for those residents who had chosen to remain in their homes. Such persons would be gathered together in a central area and the men may be separated from the women and taken to a nearby police station for further questioning and detention. The accounts of the witnesses to such events relate the threats, intimidation and physical violence to which they were subjected during this process. At the same time, the police forces in the villages would engage in large-scale looting and destruction of property. Any items of value were taken away on trucks and houses and crops were often subsequently set on fire and livestock killed. In addition, snipers would often be located throughout the relevant area and would often-times fire upon those of the local residents who had been allowed to remain in their homes, or who had been released. After this phase of the operation, the majority of the forces involved would be withdrawn and only a small police contingent left behind to patrol the area and continue the intimidation of the population over the following days26.

Sometimes, the displaced Kosovar residents returned to their homes relatively swiftly following such operations, although often those who had fled were hesitant to return, fearing further attack. These preferred instead to remain with friends or relatives in other parts of Kosovo, or even camp out in the open over a prolonged period. It was observed

  1. It has been commented by several persons during the research for the present report, that operations or attacks upon particular locations would often be commenced by the Serbian/FRY forces during the weekends, presumably on the assumption that international observers and other groups would be less active at the weekends.
  2. On the basis of extensive field research, a recent report by Human Rights Watch also confirms this pattern. The report – "A Week in Terror in Drenica" – states:
    "The experiences related by people from various villages that have been destroyed in Kosovo present a strikingly similar pattern. First, a village was surrounded by Yugoslav forces, sometimes after fighting with the KLA, and soon thereafter shelling of the village began, usually by the army. Villagers would flee to escape the shelling, leaving the village abandoned except for those unable to flee. Time and time again, villagers would tell Human Rights Watch how they watched from a nearby vantage point as their village was systematically looted and burned by the Serbian police. The testimonies of these witnesses is corroborated by Human rights Watch’s own observations: police forces were repeatedly seen entering areas as military forces were withdrawing. Although the main forces of the army have generally been less involved in the most egregious atrocities committed in Kosovo – maybe because they have focused on destructive long-range bombardment rather than close combat – the pattern of operation described confirms close coordination between the Yugoslav Army and the various police units involved in the Kosovo conflict."