|
|
e emerged from the mist of no-man’s land, a hundred
meters away from where we stood on the Albanian side of
the border. A middle-aged, heavy-set man in a bulky gray
sweater, he looked agitated, his body swaying, his hands
shaking, unsure of what to do next. Someone appeared at
his side: a Serb military policeman, judging by his blue
uniform. The policeman moved behind the man, raised his
arm, and shouted something. The man lurched forward like
a puppet and fell to his knees. Finding his footing again,
he stood up and ran across the stone bridge to the red
gates of Morina.
 The
man struggled to catch his breath as he spoke. His name
was Sefer Hoxha. Just before daybreak, three Serb military
policemen had come to his home in Prizren, he said. They
had stormed through the house, ripping open mattresses
and emptying drawers onto the floor, looking for jewelry
and money. They forced Sefer and his oldest son, Hamit,
into a jeep and drove them to the police station. After
an hour, Hamit was taken away, and Sefer was bundled into
the jeep and driven to the border.
On
the road leaving Prizren, Sefer saw thousands of people
on both sides of the highway. Some were in cars, but most
were on foot, squatting together in family groups, or
resting on tractors or wooden hay carts heaped with household
wares.
|
|
|
|
|
As the mist slowly lifted one April morning, we watched
as thousands of refugees, their faces blistered by the
sun and wind, streamed into the Morina borderpost in Northern
Albania. |
Forced to leave their men behind, Kosovar Albanian women
in a tractor-pulled cart trundled into exile in northern
Albania at the Morina border crossing.
|
|
