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20 JUNE 2003 ERP KIM Newsletter 20-06-03b UNMIK AND KOSOVO POLICE USE TEAR GAS IN ATTEMPT TO EVICT PATIENTS AND SERB PHYSICIANS FROM HOSPITAL IN KOSOVO POLJE CONTENTS: COMMUNIQUE OF
THE ERP KIM AND SNC KIM UNMIK
POLICE USE TEAR GAS TO ATTACK HOSPITAL, THREATEN MEDICAL STAFF AND
PATIENTS ERP KIM
Info Service The Diocese of Raska and Prizren and the Serb National Council most strongly condemn yesterday's brutal attack by UNMIK and Kosovo (Albanian) police in the building of the Kosovo Polje Health Center. During the attack police used tear gas resulting in injury to approximately 20 patients and Serb physicians. Serb medical staff and gathered citizens quite reasonably could not allow UNMIK and Albanian policemen to take over the hospital because the Health center was legally handed over by the Russians to the Serb medical peronnel which have been working in the institute for years. The building used until recently by Russian troops is owned by the Serbian Institute for Blood Transfusion, formerly located in Pristina. In addition to the team of Russian physicians and technologists, the dispensary and specialist section of the Russian military hospital employed a Serb team of physicians from the Kosovo Polje Health Center. This unprecedented and immoral act represents one of the most shameful stains on the four year work of the UN Mission in Kosovo. Instead of working on the implementation of Resolution 1244, UNMIK is increasingly being transformed into a public service for the establishment of an ethnically pure Albanian society in Kosovo and Metohija under the guise of building supposed multiethnic institutions and establishing democracy. While Albanian extremists wreak havoc throughout the Province, brutally and freely murdering entire Serb families, peaceful peasants, teachers and elderly people, destroying churches and digging up graves without punishment, UNMIK police and the former members of the Kosovo Liberation Army now wearing the uniforms of the Kosovo Albanian police are applying force against Serb physicians whose crime lies in wanting to continue to perform their humanitarian work and to help their people, who for the past four years have been living under ethnic repression and the terror of ekstremists. Kosovo Polje Health Center is one of few medical institutions in Kosovo and Metohija where Serb physicians were able to continue working after the war and where Serbs from the Kosovo Polje region are able to receive medical treatment. The Serb physicians were assisted for four years by their colleagues from the Russian KFOR contingent, which contributed to this medical institute becoming known as one of the most professional of its kind in the Province. Kosovo Polje Health Center is also an institute where, in addition to Serbs, ethnic Albanians and members of other ethnic communities receive medical care without any form of discrimination. Several of the Serb physicians who were collectively evicted from the Clinical Medical Center in Pristina before UNMIK and KFOR forces four years ago continued, thanks to Russian KFOR, to offer medical services in this hospital to the remaining Serb population of Kosovo Polje and Pristina municipality, which today can only receive medical treatment in this institute. As a result, UNMIK's intention to place this institute under the control of the provisional Albanian-run Kosovo health ministry and to prevent the normal work of Serb physicians represents a serious threat that has caused great fear among the Serb population. The state of health care in Kosovo and Metohija, like all other public services, is disastrous. There have been no Serb patients or Serb physicians in any of the regional medical centers for the last four years because Kosovo Albanians with the silent acquiescence of UNMIK have ejected all the Serb physicians with the intention of building an ethnically pure Albanian society. Serb patients cannot seek medical assistance in these insitutions because no one can guarantee either their right to appropriate treatment nor for that matter their right to life. Those who do not have the funds to seek treatment in central Serbia can only receive primary medical care in existing but poorly equipped Serb village dispensaries. As a result of this inhuman approach by Albanian institutions and UNMIK, many elderly people and chronic patients are condemned to silent death in poverty and absence of appropriate medical and social care. The Diocese of Raska and Prizren and the Serb National Council appeal to the international community to prevent the usurpation of the Kosovo Polje Health Center, and to enable the normal work of Serb medical staff. UNMIK's attempts to use force to evict patients and Serb physicians from these institutions in order to place them under Albanian control must be prevented by the Serb community using all legitimate means, in unison and decisively. Therefore, the Diocese of Raska and Prizren and the Serb National Council of Kosovo publicly express their solidarity with the physicians and people of Kosovo Polje and most sharply condemn the repressive policies of Michael Steiner and the provisional Kosovo health ministry. At the same time, the Diocese and the SNC call on the Serbian Government and the Coordinating Center to provide material and professionally support the work of Serb medical institutions in Kosovo and Metohija.
SNC MEMBER AND KOSOVO MP RANDJEL NOJKIC INJURED ERP KIM
Info Service The ERP KIM Info Service has learned that Mr. Randjel Nojkic, a member of the presidency of the Serb National Council of Kosovo and Metohija and an MP in the Kosovo and Metohija parliament, was also injured during yesterday's attack by UNMIK and Kosovo Albanian police against the hospital in Kosovo Polje. Mr. Nojkic sustained tear gas-related injuries and is currently recovering after receiving medical assistance. DR. RADA TRAJKOVIC: AN ACT THAT VIOLATES ALL INTERNATIONAL CONVENTIONS ON INVIOLABILITY OF MEDICAL INSTITUTIONS AND STAFF ERP KIM
Info Service "Attacking
physicians and patients with tear gas represents a truly unprecedented
development for which someone must be held responsible before the
law. The brutal attempts to place Serb medical institutions under the
control of Albanians will only serve to strengthen the resolve of the Serb
people in Kosovo and Metohija to protect what is theirs and to resist all
pressures," said Dr. Trajkovic.
ERP KIM
Info-Service is the official Information Service of the Serbian Orthodox
Diocese of Raska and Prizren and works with the blessing of His Grace
Bishop Artemije. If you received this message by error or you don`t want to receive our e-mails anymore, please write to us: erpkim@kosovo.net Our Newsletters are
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Dr. Rada Trajkovic, the
chairwoman of the executive board of the Serb National Council of Kosovo
and Metohija and the director of the Gracanica Health Center said in a
statement for ERP KIM Info Service that yesterday's forcible attack by
UNMIK and Kosovo police against the hospital in Kosovo Polje represents
"an act that violates all international conventions on the inviolability
of medical institutions and staff."