Kosovo’s Prime Minister, Albin Kurti, commemorated the 25th anniversary of the signing of the Kumanovo Agreement, which ended the war in Kosovo on military, technical, legal, and international fronts.
In a Facebook post, Kurti wrote that after much suffering under Serbia’s oppressive regimes, Kosovo was liberated, and its people began building a new historical phase.
“Recalling the last days of the war in Kosovo and the first days of Kosovo’s liberation from the occupying Serbia. The people and state of Kosovo are grateful and thankful for the international help and support while not forgetting and not forgiving Serbia’s crimes,” Kurti wrote.
Full Post:
On June 9, 1999, the Technical-Military Agreement was signed in Kumanovo between the International Security Force (KFOR) and the governments of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the Republic of Serbia.
The path for negotiations was paved after the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia accepted the peace plan offered by the EU envoy, Finland’s President Martti Ahtisaari, and the Russian envoy, former Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin, on June 3. The plan required the withdrawal of all armed Serbian forces from Kosovo and the entry of peacekeepers into Kosovo under a UN mandate.
On June 7, negotiations in Kumanovo were suspended as the parties did not agree on the terms of the agreement.
After resuming negotiations, the agreement reached on June 9, 1999, stipulated that all armed Serbian and Yugoslav forces, including military, police, and other units, would fully withdraw from Kosovo territory by June 20.
A 25-kilometer zone on the border was designated as an Air Safety Zone, and a 5-kilometer zone as a Ground Safety Zone, within which Serbian and Yugoslav forces were prohibited from entering.
During their withdrawal from Kosovo, Serbian armed forces committed crimes until the last hours, such as the cases of civilian killings in the municipality of Podujeva, from which they withdrew towards Merdare on June 19.
The Kumanovo Agreement was reached after 78 days of NATO’s bombing of Yugoslavia, nearly two years of war with hundreds of massacres and over 10,000 civilian victims, ten years after Serbia suppressed Kosovo’s autonomy in 1989, and 86 years after Serbia initially occupied Kosovo in 1912/1913.
The Kumanovo Agreement was signed on behalf of KFOR by General Michael David Jackson, and on behalf of the Yugoslav and Serbian Governments by General Svetozar Marjanović of the Yugoslav Army and General Obrad Stevanović of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.
NATO’s bombing of Yugoslavia ceased on June 10, 1999. The following day, June 11, Kosovo Liberation Army soldiers entered Pristina, and KFOR soldiers began entering Kosovo the same day.
Over the next ten days, all Serbian and Yugoslav armed forces left Kosovo’s territory. After much suffering under Serbia’s oppressive regimes, Kosovo was liberated, and its people began building an entirely new historical phase.
Recalling the last days of the war in Kosovo and the first days of Kosovo’s liberation from the occupying Serbia. The people and state of Kosovo are grateful and thankful for the international help and support while not forgetting and not forgiving Serbia’s crimes!
