Twenty-seven years after the Reçak massacre, the former Ambassador of Albania to the United Nations, Ksenofon Krisafi, recounts how he helped raise international awareness about Serbia’s aggression against the innocent Albanian population, KosovaPress reports.

Ksenofon Krisafi served as Albania’s Ambassador to the UN during the period 1998–2002.

In an interview for KosovaPress, he says that at the time he was in Geneva and, two days later, he had contacted several heads of international organizations. In the meetings he held with them, Krisafi says he noticed that they were treating the genocide in Reçak too lightly.

“I was in Geneva exactly at the time of the massacre. It was January 1999. On January 15 the massacre occurred, and two days later, it was a Monday, I remember it very well, there was a knock on the door of the Albanian ambassador’s office, my office, and a young man rushed in—a young man from Kosovo whom I had met only a few days earlier. It was Tahir Shabani, a prominent activist of that time. He was pale, almost breathless, shocked and terrified. He came up to me and spread a bundle of photographs across my desk until the entire surface of the desk and the CD was covered. Through tears, almost sobbing, he began to explain: ‘Look at what has happened.’ I told Tahir that I was already aware of these events because I had been following the news and had seen them, but nevertheless, what he brought was extremely moving. And in Tahir’s presence, I immediately informed my government, because that is the procedure, in order to obtain authorization. I then started calling several heads of international organizations based in Geneva. Mary Robinson was the Chair of the Human Rights Commission. Sadako Ogata was the head of the refugee organization, Brunson McKinley was responsible for migration, among others, and I requested meetings,” he recounts.

He says that he insisted on meeting all these heads of international organizations, but it was strange how they did not seem as concerned as he was about the genocide in the village of Reçak.

Serbs have always been the aggressor

The former Albanian Ambassador to the UN, Ksenofon Krisafi, today participated in a scientific roundtable organized by the Forum of Intellectuals on the topic “Serbian Denials of Crimes and Genocide, Destabilization for the Balkans.”

He emphasized that the Serbs have always been the aggressor, while portraying themselves as the victim.

The village of Reçak in the municipality of Shtime, located about 30 kilometers from Prishtina, nearly three decades ago marked a major turning point in the history of Kosovo.

On January 15, 1999, Serbian forces brutally killed 45 Albanian civilians in the village of Reçak in the municipality of Shtime. The first to tell the world that a crime against humanity had been committed there was the then head of the OSCE Kosovo Verification Mission, William Walker. The grave event in Reçak triggered an international reaction, after which NATO decided to strike Serbian military and police targets. /KosovaPress