KOSOVO ALBANIANS STONE MINIBUSES CARRYING MONKS

KOSOVO ALBANIANS STONE MINIBUSES CARRYING MONKS, GERMAN TV CREW - CHURCH
SRNA - January 21, 2004

Djakovica, 21 January: At noon today a group of (ethnic) Albanians stoned two minibuses in the centre of Djakovica, which were carrying monks from the Holy Archangel monastery near Prizren, and a German ARD TV crew. They managed to save themselves by fleeing to the nearby Italian Kfor (NATO-led Kosovo Force) base, SRNA has been told by the Raska-Prizren Eparchy.

According to monk Bojan Dejanovic, the ARD crew left together with the monks for Djakovica, escorted by German Kfor, in order to film the ruins of the Holy Trinity church and to film a report on five Serb women who have remained living in this town.

As they were passing through the centre of Djakovica a woman approached the minibus, then a group of 30 Albanians gathered around and started pelting the minibuses with stones, monk Bojan Dejanovic said.

He said that after the attack the monks were transferred to a German Kfor armoured vehicle and taken to the Holy Archangel monastery near Prizren, while the TV crew was prohibited from continuing to film the report.

The Raska-Prizren Eparchy information service condemned this attack, which happened only two weeks after an attack on monks and a Russian delegation, and asked German Kfor to carry out an investigation and to inform the public in due course about today's incident in Djakovica.

Source: SRNA news agency, Bijeljina, in Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian 2124 gmt 21 Jan 04

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