Twenty-six years have passed since the end of the Kosovo war, and yet the pain endures for many families—not only because of who they lost, but because they still don’t know where their loved ones are buried.
Despite coming from different towns in Kosovo, Tafil Hasani from Skenderaj, Maliq Kryeziu from Gjakova, Afrim Halimi from Fushë Kosovë, and Bekim Gashi from Tërnjë are all bound through the grief they share caused by the disappearance of their loved ones during the 1998-99 Kosovo war.
The 1998-99 Kosovo war, which was ended through NATO intervention against Serbian forces, left behind more than just destruction in its wake. Over 13,000 people were killed, and more than 1,600 remain unaccounted for.
Despite the passage of time, many still hold onto hope, desperate for answers, closure, or the chance to lay their loved ones to rest.
In December 2024, Kosovo and Serbia agreed to fully implement a Joint Declaration on Missing Persons, initially signed in May 2023 within an EU mediated dialogue. It calls for unrestricted access to information, including classified data, and joint work through an EU-chaired commission.
Through a series of documentaries and investigative reports, BIRN has explored the many challenges Kosovo continues to face in locating and identifying people who went missing during the war.
These include a lack of cooperation from Serbian authorities, internal obstacles in the forensic identification system, and ongoing failure to provide adequate support for the families of the missing, many of whom have also fallen victim to false promises and fraudulent schemes.
Here are just four of the thousands of stories of Kosovo citizens whose family members disappeared during the 1998-99 Kosovo war:
A teacher’s lifelong search for his mother
Tafil Hasani. Photo: BIRN
The mother of Tafil Hasani, a teacher from Skenderaj, disappeared in April 1999, when Serbian forces forced residents of the village of Kllodernica to flee toward Albania.
“My mother and wife told me to run. They thought the Serbs wouldn’t harm women,” Hasani recalls. “They said, ‘We will survive, but they might do worse to you.’”
Tafil’s mother, then around 60 years old, was separated from the group and put on a tractor with the other elderly from the village. That was the last anyone saw her.
“They separated the men on one side and the women on the other. They all started walking toward Albania, while my mother, along with some other elderly people who couldn’t travel on foot, was placed on a tractor and sent off on the road to Albania.”
“After that, no one knows. I searched everywhere, even hospitals in Albania,” he told Prishtina Insight in despair.
“There is no crime more severe than forcing someone out of their home, making them sleep outdoors, without food, without water, filled with fear and stress,” Hasani emphasized.
A son taken at gunpoint
Maliq Kryeziu. Photo: BIRN
While many families wait for years to find the whereabouts of their loved ones, the confirmation of their death that comes when the remains are found is yet another source of pain.
Maliq Kryeziu from Gjakova remembers the moment his son Mentor, then 18, was taken while they were walking toward Albania—fleeing the war.
It was early April 1999 when “they stopped us at a checkpoint. Mentor grabbed my hand, pale with fear,” Kryeziu recalls.
“They saw us. They knew he was my son. They pointed a gun at his stomach and told us to go in different directions.”
“That was the most critical and painful moment of my life, something I can never forget. Sometimes, he would turn his head and look at me, but there was nothing I could do to help.”
Mentor was never seen alive again. He is one of the victims of the Kralan Massacre, where 87 ethnic Albanian civilians were killed by Serbian forces on April 2-4, 1999.
His body was recently identified among remains exhumed from a mass grave in Bishtazhin, after being transported there from the site of the Kralan massacre.
“It’s pain, but also some relief,” Maliqi explained, referring to the identification of his son’s remains.
“At least now we can bury him!”
A long-awaited call
Afrim Halimi. Photo: BIRN
For Afrim Halimi from Fushë Kosovë the call came in 2005.
His father had been missing since April 1, 1999, when Serbian forces massacred 26 people in their neighbourhood, including children as young as 15.
“Someone came and took my brother and mother to our uncle’s place in the Bregu i Diellit (Sunny Hill) neighbourhood in Prishtina, since it was considered safe. Meanwhile, my father stayed. They spoke once during the day, using a landline phone at a neighbour’s house because most phone connections for Albanians were cut off,” he told Prishtina Insight.
The bodies were initially buried near Fushë Kosovë, but later moved to a mass grave in Batajnica, Serbia.
“I got a call from the Commission on Missing Persons ” in 2005, Afrim remembers. “They told me that some bodies had been found and that one of them might be my father.”
The confirmation was bittersweet.
“There was sadness, but also a sense of closure,” he says.
“We finally knew where he was!”
Disappearance of a family
Bekim Gashi. Photo: BIRN
Twenty-six years have passed since Bekim Gashi from the village of Tërnjë in Suhareka last saw his mother and four sisters. They were killed by Serbian forces on March 25, 1999, but their remains have never been found.
“They killed 22 members of my family that day,” Bekim says. “My mother and four sisters are still missing. Fourteen others from the extended family also remain unaccounted for.”
“They came and threw a bomb at the entrance of the house where we were staying. One of the soldiers asked what to do. The unit commander shouted in Serbian, ‘Throw a bomb!’,” Gashi continued.
He was 25 years old at the time. He recalls the final moments he saw his loved ones, watching from the attic of a house as Serbian soldiers rounded them up in the yard of his uncle’s home.
His youngest sister was just 15 years old.
“The eldest was 31, the second 27, the third 17, and the youngest was 15. Our mother was 53 years old,” he recalled.
“They were still alive,” he says, “my mother had been asking for water for hours. But I couldn’t move. The whole place was surrounded by soldiers and paramilitaries.”
They remained there for days before being loaded onto a refrigerator truck.
After the war, Gashi filed a criminal complaint against eight individuals, members of Serbia’s army. Only one person, Rajko Kozlina, was convicted. He was sentenced to 16 years in prison, but never served a day.
“The process in Serbia was a formality,” Bekim says.
“He showed up for the court hearings and then disappeared. They claimed they didn’t know where he was, even though he had been an army officer, attending trial sessions without issue.”
“But I kept going every time with the hope that some information might come out about where the bodies are,” Gashi emphasised.
He continues to search for the remains of his mother and sisters, hoping one day to give them a proper burial.
“Maybe I haven’t achieved anything,” he says, “but at least the massacre was registered.”