CRSV: Kosovo War
This case note documents the occurrence of sexual violence in violent conflict. It contains explicit mentions of different forms of sexual assault. Reader discretion is advised.
Background of the conflict
The Kosovo war was an armed conflict that lasted from February 1998 and June 1999, and was fought between the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) and the Kosovo Albanian separatist away called the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) (Boyle, 2014). The conflict ended with the NATO intervening through air strikes in March 1999, causing the Yugoslav forces withdrawing from Kosovo.
The conflict had its roots in a culture of discrimination based on ethnic identity. The KLA was established in the early 1990s to fight the prevalent discrimination of ethnic Albanians and the suppression of Kosovo’s autonomy by Serbian leader Slobodan Milošević (Reveron & Murer, 2006). After Kosovo was left out of the Dayton Agreement, and President Rugova’s peaceful resistance failed to bring Kosovo into the international agenda, the KLA initiated in fist campaign in 1995. In June 1996, it claimed responsibility for targeting Kosovo police stations and sabotaging public infrastructure during the Kosovo insurgency. Serb parliamentarians began a campaign of retribution targeting KLA sympathizers and polite opponents (Kubo, 2010). In 1999, the Yugoslav forces began a massive campaign of repression and expulsions of Kosovar Albanians after the withdrawal of the OSCE Kosovo Verification Mission and the failure of the Rambouillet Agreement. NATO intervened, with an aerial bombing campaign, justifying its entry into the war on the grounds of humanitarian intervention. The war ended with the Kumanovo agreement, signed on June 9, 1999 (Quackenbush, 2015). Following the agreement, Yugoslav and Serb forces were to withdraw from Kosovo to make way for an international presence. NATO forces then invaded Kosovo, without the approval of the UN Security Council (Haines, 2009). The war resulted in 8676 to 9269 Kosovar Albanian civilians being killed or going missing. As many as 90% of Kosovar Albanians were displaced during the war. NATO bombing resulted in the deaths of around 500 civilians. Women advocated for themselves in their pursuit of justice long after the conflict ended, and have received compensation from the government (Kvinna till Kvinna, 2012).
Prevalence of sexual violence
Sexual violence and rape were rampant during the Kosovo war, and most of the targets were Kosovo Albanian women (De Lellio & Schwandner-Sievers, 2006). Some attempts were made by international NGOs to document cases of sexual violence and rape, however, it was widely acknowledged that the actual number was likely much higher (Limanu & Marku, 2014; Subotić & Zaharijević, 2017). Several years after the war, reports suggested that there were 10,000-20,000 cases of rape and sexual violence, although the price numbers still remain unclear. Reports also show that most instances of rape and sexual violence were perpetrated by members of the Yugoslav army, police, and paramilitaries, and women and girls were targeted while fleeing for safety, in their homes and temporary homes, and in front of their families (Amnesty International, 2017).
Basis of the use of sexual violence
Most instances of rape and sexual violence were carried out with an intent to enable and further ethnic erasure, particularly by driving out, displacing, and killing Kosovar Albanians. Rape and sexual violence were also used to terrorize and intimidate women and girls, where they were either targeted while fleeing, or in their own and temporary homes, or even in the presence of their family members. It was also used as a form of torture. The larger intention was to break the social order of the Kosovo Albanians, through the humiliation of women and girls by subjecting them to sexual violence in the presence of their families and by subjecting them to the burden of stigmatization.
References
Amnesty International (2017). “Wounds that burn our souls”: Compensation for Kosovo’s wartime rape survivors, but still no justice. https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/eur70/7558/2017/en/
Boyle, M. J. (2014). Violence After War: Explaining Instability in Post-Conflict States. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
De Lellio, A., & Schwandner-Sievers, S. (2006). "The Legendary Commander: the construction of an Albanian master-narrative in post-war Kosovo". Nations and Nationalism. 12 (3): 522.
Haines, S. (2009). "The Influence of Operation Allied Force on the Development of the jus ad bellum". International Affairs. 85 (3): 477–490.
Kubo, K. (2010). "Why Kosovar Albanians Took Up Arms against the Serbian Regime: The Genesis and Expansion of the UÇK in Kosovo". Europe-Asia Studies. 62 (7): 1135–1152.
Kvinna till Kvinna (2012). Victory for victims of war-time rape in Kosovo . https://kvinnatillkvinna.org/2012/10/18/victory-for-victims-of-rape/
Limanu, L. & Marku, H. (2014). "The Problem with the Kosovo War Rape Petition". Balkan Insight.
Quackenbush, S. L. (2015). International Conflict: Logic and Evidence. Los Angeles: Sage.
Reveron, D. S. & Murer, J. S. (2006). Flashpoints in the War on Terrorism. Taylor & Francis.
Subotić, G. & Zaharijević, A. (2017). "Women between War Scylla and Nationalist Charybdis: Legal Interpretations of Sexual Violence in Countries of Former Yugoslavia". In Lahai, John Idriss; Moyo, Khanyisela (eds.). Gender in Human Rights and Transitional Justice. Springer. pp. 253–254.
