Forensic teams search a suspected mass grave from the Kosovo war

KALLUDER, Kosovo (AP) — Authorities in Kosovo have begun excavations in a northern village after the discovery of human remains there that are believed to be of people missing since the 1998-1999 Kosovo war in what at the time was a Serbian province.

Authorities say the site in Kalluder, in the municipality of Zubin Potok, has been cordoned off and had not been previously excavated in the search for evidence of war crimes.

The separatist war with Serbia began in 1998 when the ethnic Albanian rebel Kosovo Liberation Army launched a struggle for independence and Serbia responded with a brutal crackdown. The war ended after NATO bombed Serbia for 78 days in 1999, eventually forcing a withdrawal of its troops from the territory.

On Monday, Kosovo police arrested two Kosovo Serbs in connection with the case linked to the Kalluder site on suspicion of war crimes against the civilian population.

In Belgrade, the capital of neighboring Serbia, the government’s Office for Kosovo denounced the arrests, describing them as “terrorism, revenge and intimidation” of members of the Serbian community in Kosovo.

Ditor Haliti, a forensic team member, said preliminary assessments confirmed the remains were “of human origin and are of forensic significance.”

Kosovo’s Prime Minister Albin Kurti said Wednesday that authorities need to determine exactly what has been found.

“Our immediate suspicion, after learning that human remains had been found, was naturally that they could belong to the group of 23 intellectuals who were abducted and forcibly disappeared on April 19, 1999, in Mitrovica,” Kurti said while presenting a report on war victims.

About 1,600 people went missing during the war and remain unaccounted for, according to human rights organizations.

Interior Minister Xhelal Svecla on Tuesday said Kosovo “will not rest” until the fate of the last missing person has been determined and every perpetrator of war crimes has been brought to justice.

Svecla also accused Serbia of failing to cooperate. “Not only are they refusing to cooperate in clarifying the fate of the missing persons but, even worse, they are obstructing and sabotaging the work of Kosovo’s institutions, both in Serbia and in Kosovo,” Svecla said.

Serbia has not responded to the accusations about its alleged failure to cooperate. In May 2023, Serbia and Kosovo reached an agreement which included commitments by both sides to clarify the fate of those that went missing during the 1998–99 war.