war crimes in the kosovo war war crimes in the kosovo war numerous war crimes were committed by all sides during the kosovo war, which lasted from early 1998 until 11 june 1999. according to human rights watch, the vast majority of abuses were attributable to the government of slobodan milošević, mainly perpetrated by the serbian police, the yugoslav army, and serb paramilitary units. during the war, regime forces killed between 7,000–9,000 kosovar albanians, engaged in countless acts of rape, destroyed entire villages, and displaced nearly one million people. however, the kosovo liberation army (kla or the uçk) has also been implicated in atrocities, such as kidnappings and summary executions of civilians. moreover, the nato bombing campaign has been harshly criticized by human rights organizations and the serbian government for causing numerous civilian casualties, with estimates ranging from roughly 500 to over 2,500. us marines provide security as members of the royal canadian mounted police forensics team investigate a grave site in a village in kosovo on 1 july 1999. in 2014, the humanitarian law center released a list of people who were killed or went missing during the war, including 8,661 kosovo albanian civilians, 1,797 ethnic serbs and 447 civilians who were members of other ethnicities such as romani people and bosniaks. background by the 1980s, the kosovo albanians constituted a majority in kosovo. during the 1970s and 1980s, thousands of serbs and montenegrins left kosovo, including some 57,000 during the 1970s alone. social-economic, migration from underdeveloped areas, an increasingly adverse social-political climate and direct and indirect pressures were cited as the reasonings behind the departures. slobodan milošević gained political power by exploiting the grievances of kosovo serbs and pandering to the rising nationalist movement in serbia. milošević abolished kosovo's autonomy in 1989. with his rise to power, the albanians started boycotting state institutions and ignoring the laws of the republic of serbia, culminating in the creation of the republic of kosova which received recognition from neighbouring albania. serbia (now in union with montenegro as fr yugoslavia) tried to maintain its political control over the province. with the formation of the kosovo liberation army, a large number of the kosovo albanians joined and supported the movement. the serbian police and yugoslav army response was brutal. in 1997, international sanctions were applied to the federal republic of yugoslavia because of persecution of kosovo's albanians by yugoslav security forces. yugoslav war crimes streetscape of destroyed village during kosovo war, 1999 serbian military, paramilitary and police forces in kosovo have committed a wide range of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and other violations of international humanitarian and human rights law: forced expulsion of kosovars from their homes; burning and looting of homes, schools, religious sites and healthcare facilities; detention, particularly of military-age men; summary execution; rape; violations of medical neutrality; and identity cleansing.— report released by the u.s. department of state, washington, dc, may 1999 persecution and ethnic cleansing during the armed conflict in 1998, the yugoslav army and serbian police used excessive and random force, which resulted in property damage, the displacement of the population and the death of civilians. belgrade unleashed the alleged operation horseshoe in the summer of 1998, in which hundreds of thousands of albanians were driven from their homes. the withdrawal of the organization for security and co-operation in europe monitors on 20 march 1999, together with the start of nato's bombing campaign, encouraged milošević to implement a "campaign of expulsions". with the beginning of the nato bombing of yugoslavia, operation horseshoe was implemented, though the yugoslav government maintained that the refugee crisis was caused by the bombings. the yugoslav army, serbian police and serb paramilitary forces in the spring of 1999, in an organized manner, initiated a broad campaign of violence against albanian civilians in order to expel them from kosovo and thus maintain the political control of belgrade over the province. kofi annan, secretary-general of the united nations in refugee camp in kukës, albania according to the legally binding verdict of the international criminal tribunal for the former yugoslavia, the federal army and serbian police systematically attacked albanian-populated villages after the nato bombing of yugoslavia that began on 24 march 1999; abused, robbed and killed civilians, ordering them to go to albania or montenegro, burned their houses, and destroyed their property. nemanja stjepanović claimed that within the campaign of violence, kosovo albanians were expelled from their homes, murdered, sexually assaulted, and had their religious buildings destroyed. the yugoslav forces committed numerous war crimes during the implementation of a "joint criminal enterprise" whose aim was to "through the use of violence and terror, force a significant number of kosovo albanians to leave their homes and cross the border in order for the state government to retain control over kosovo." the ethnic cleansing of the albanian population was performed in the following way: first the army surrounded a location, followed by shelling, then the police entered the village and often with them and the army, and then crimes occurred (murders, beatings, expulsions, sexual violence ...). according to the united nations high commissioner for refugees, by june 1999, the yugoslav military, serbian police and paramilitaries had expelled around 850,000 albanians from kosovo, and several hundred thousand more were internally displaced, in addition to those displaced prior to march. approximately 440,000 refugees crossed the border into albania and 320,000 fled to north macedonia, while bosnia and herzegovina received more than 30,000. presiding judge iain bonomy, who imposed the sentence, said that "deliberate actions of these forces during the campaign provoked the departure of at least 700,000 ethnic albanians from kosovo in the short period from late march to early june 1999." destruction of settlements hrw claims that the yugoslav army indiscriminately attacked kosovo albanian villages. police and military forces had partially or completely destroyed thousands of albanian villages in kosovo by burning or shelling them. according to a unhcr survey, nearly 40% of all residential houses in kosovo were heavily damaged or completely destroyed by the end of the war. out of a total of 237,842 houses, 45,768 were heavily damaged and 46,414 were destroyed. in particular, residences in the city of peja was heavily damaged. more than 80% of the 5,280 houses in the city were heavily damaged (1,590) or destroyed (2,774). rapes "heroinat" (heroines) monument in pristina. it is dedicated to the female victims of sexual violence during the kosovo war widespread rape and sexual violence occurred during the conflict and the majority of victims were kosovo albanian women. in 2000, human rights watch documented 96 cases while adding that "it is likely that the number is much higher". years after the war, the figure put forward for the number of rape victims was 10,000-20,000. the figure of 20,000 however has not been verified, given the lack of serious investigations into wartime rapes, though the number is often cited in public opinion and by politicians in kosovo. this number originated from a world health organization report and the us center for disease control from information gathered by local ngos. the kosovo women's network gave the figure of over 10,000 girls and women who experienced wartime rape. due to a lack of prosecutions against perpetrators, there has been a reluctance for women to come forward or testify. throughout the duration of the war, members of the yugoslav army, police and paramilitaries would remove girls and women fleeing for safety from refugee columns and rape them, at times more than once and later released them to continue their journey. other women had been subjected to rape in their homes, at times in front of their family or in temporary refuges located by the women for their elderly parents or children as they attempted to flee the conflict. other women stayed in kosovo and were without protection. the crimes by the yugoslav military, paramilitary and police amounted to crimes against humanity and a war crime of torture. although numbers are difficult to determine, following the conflict, there were cases of women committing suicide, aborting their pregnancies, giving birth to children and later raising them or placing them up for adoption with a few instances of attempted strangulation of their babies. postwar, the issue of wartime rape did not receive enough attention in the media and in political discourse within kosovo and victims were left to deal with their experiences in private. the government has founded a programme to help those victims. as by october 2018, 250 women have signed up, despite pushing on behalf of the kosovan government by giving free specialized healthcare and trauma counseling for wartime rape survivors. many of the girls were young girls, from 13 to 19 years old. mostly rape were committed paramilitaries associated with arkan group, where the majority of rapes are carried out in the presence of children and men who later were killed. vasfije krasniqi-goodman was first woman to break a taboo in kosovo society by telling her story of sexual violence publicly. on april 14, 1999 paramilitaries and serbian police in the village of stanovc, vushtrri entered the house of krasniqi, who was 16 years old and took her to the church of babimovc where she was raped. afterwards, she was threatened with the lives of her family if she revealed what happened. victims from rural areas however face difficulties obtaining documents which prove they had medical treatment, gave birth or had abortions as a result of rape from medical centres that were set up for refugees in albania, north macedonia or montenegro after they were expelled from their homes. victims have also been asked to provide statements they gave to prosecutors in investigations which they were interviewed as victims of rape. destruction of mosques, monuments and other traditional architecture destroyed mosque and houses numerous albanian cultural sites in kosovo were destroyed during the kosovo conflict (1998-1999) which constituted a war crime violating the hague and geneva conventions. religious objects were also damaged or destroyed. of the 498 mosques in kosovo that were in active use, the international criminal tribunal for the former yugoslavia (icty) documented that 225 mosques sustained damage or destruction by the yugoslav serb army. in all, eighteen months of the yugoslav serb counterinsurgency campaign between 1998-1999 within kosovo resulted in 225 or a third out of a total of 600 mosques being damaged, vandalised, or destroyed alongside other islamic architecture during the conflict. additionally 500 albanian owned kulla dwellings (traditional stone tower houses) and three out of four well preserved ottoman period urban centres located in kosovo cities were badly damaged resulting in great loss of traditional architecture. kosovo's public libraries, in particular 65 out of 183 were completely destroyed with a loss of 900,588 volumes, while islamic libraries sustained damage or destruction resulting in the loss of rare books, manuscripts and other collections of literature. archives belonging to the islamic community of kosovo with records spanning 500 years were also destroyed. during the war, islamic architectural heritage posed for yugoslav serb paramilitary and military forces as albanian patrimony with destruction of non-serbian architectural heritage being a methodical and planned component of ethnic cleansing in kosovo. identity cleansing identity cleansing was a strategy employed by the government of yugoslavia during the kosovo war. identity cleansing is defined as "confiscation of personal identification, passports, and other such documents to make it difficult or impossible for those driven out to return". expelled kosovo albanians claimed that they were systematically stripped of identity and property documents including passports, land titles, automobile license plates, identity cards and other documents. in conjunction with the policy of expelling ethnic albanians from the province, the yugoslavs would confiscate all documents that indicated the identity of those being expelled. physicians for human rights reports that nearly 60% of respondents to its survey observed yugoslav forces removing or destroying personal identification documents. human rights watch also documented the common practice of "identity cleansing": refugees expelled toward albania were frequently stripped of their identity documents and forced to remove the license plates from their vehicles. the occurrence of these acts suggested that the government was trying to block their return. in addition to confiscating the relevant documents from their holders, efforts were also made to destroy any actual birth records (and other archives) which were maintained by governmental agencies, so as to make the "cleansing"