Kosovo Liberation Army

The Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) or Ushtria Çlirimtare e Kosovës (UÇK) in Albanian was the resistance movement against the Serbian forces in the 1990s. It was a small organization and lost about 2,000 members of its organization in the Kosovo War. It was founded in the late 1980s and early 1990s by three high school students, one of which is the only survivor of the war, Rexhep Selimi. You can find some information on Selimi here, however please note that it comes from a Serbian newspaper.

In the beginning stages, the KLA worked as a clandestine organization with a goal of liberation as their only goal. This goal remained the same throughout the 1990s, however the protection of Kosovo and family were of course priorities as well. The founders felt that fighting was the only way to obtain liberation from the Serbian state. Tim Judah, in his books War and Revenge and Kosovo: What Everyone Needs to Know, points out that in the early 1990s, many Kosovar Albanians were not supporters of the KLA because they wanted peace, not war with the Serbs. Also, many did not know who the KLA was or who was actually in the organization. It functioned with a few cells of 2-4 people out in the field doing recon and intel work, with only one member reporting back to the head of the KLA. The structure of these cells kept changing so that infiltration was harder, with only 1 person in the cell having contact with the KLA leaders. But with the help of Adem Jashari, the KLA became more of a military organization to serve the security of the Albanian people.

On anecdotal evidence, the KLA had approximately 10 members in 1994 and 200 in 1997. But in November 1997, support grew astronomically for the KLA. On November 25, the Serbian army attacked a KLA base and the next day the KLA responded, coming under more fire from the Serbian army. An Albanian school was shelled by the Serbian army and a teacher sustained a fatal wound, dying on the 27^th. In cultural and traditional Islam custom, the funeral was held on the 28^th, which also happened to be Kosovo National Flag Day. The KLA leaders capitalized on this funeral, where hundreds turned out to rally in support of liberation from the Serbian state. The leaders of the KLA, including Selimi, "unmasked" themselves and came out publicly in order to be less "cowardly." After this, support grew for the KLA and I’ve heard – again anecdotally – that there were about 20,000 KLA members by the onslaught of the war in 1999 (unfortunately I don’t have the time to check this, but hopefully as the blog grows, I will be more accurate and factual).

As we all know, NATO intervened in March 1999 with a bombing campaign that ended the war and brought Kosovo under an international protectorate. There is a Western criticism that the KLA provoked the Serbian army to attack civilians so that NATO would intervene sooner, however, this would be denounced by any KLA member or Kosovar Albanian for that matter. Throughout Kosovo, there are many, many memorials for the KLA and the tombstones of former KLA members are usually ornate and well kept.

The KLA lives on, aside from the memorials, graves, and memories. The KLA was "disarmed" after the war and the military was incorporated to what is now called the Kosovo Security Forces (KSF), which is a part of the Kosovo Protection Corps. The Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK) is the political offshoot of the KLA, and Prime Minister Hashim Thaci is a leader of this party. Officially, the KLA does not exist, but I've heard that unofficially the KLA is still a group.

This is a memorial for Adem Jashari over the entry to the Kosovo Security Forces.

Memorials and graves.

Behind this statue is the Albanian Flag, like the defacto flag of the KLA.

Adem Jashari

The legend behind the resistance to the Serbian Army in Kosovo in the 1990s and the rallying point to the War in Kosovo in 1998 and 1999. Of course you can wikipedia him and Tim Judah's book "War and Revenge" for more information on Adem Jashari (pronounced "Yash-ari") but he was a strong leader of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) in the mid to late 1990s, although he was not a founder of the organization. He was a wanted man by the Serbian government due to his prior small scale attacks on the Serbian army with his brothers and some friends. Jashari did not found the KLA, and to be clear, the KLA was an underground movement created by high school students in the late 1980s and 1990s as a civilian military to fight against the Serb army (more will come in a later post on the KLA). One of the founders and only surviving leader of the KLA, Rexhep Selimi, contacted Jashari in 1994 to help the KLA organize and unify because in 1991, Jashari escaped arrest from the Serbian army through use of force, setting a benchmark for Kosovar Albanian resistance. Jashari and his brothers at one point went to Albania to gear up for their attacks on the Serbs and are considered great military commanders in the Kosovar Albanian narrative. He is the face of Kosovar resistance and the KLA.

On March 5, 1998 the Serb forces surrounded his home from the hills above. They gave him a warning to come out peacefully, but this did not happen. The Serb military attacked and the Yashari family, which consisted of over 50 members at the time of the attack, fought back. It is said that Adem sang patriotic songs while fighting, which was later a rallying cry (and still is) for Kosovar Albanians. Jashari and 42 members of his family were killed, although this may not be the precise number. The memorial at the site of his home holds 43 tombs. Women and children were killed as well as a pregnant mother. One young girl survived the attacks and was the one who told of Adem singing while fighting. His house, which still stands, is now a testament to the will of the Kosovar Albanians and it is interesting that surviving Jasharis have built houses directly behind the former house. See the pictures below for the destruction and the memorial.

This is the memorial site.

Adem's tomb. There is a security detail there and 2-3 guards will stand by Adem's tomb when many people are around so not to desecrate it.

Below, on the right side, are the new houses built by the Jasharis.

The water tower represents the Serbian base in the hills. Unfortunately I cannot show the distance to the house, but I would say was about a mile or so away from the house. A sniper could easily pick someone off in front of the Jashari house.