Kosovo/Kosova As Seen, As Told The fact that the RTF was an operation geared towards a more comprehensive humanitarian response than the operation in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia meant that the staff was not exclusively assigned to human rights tasks. The general situation in Albania was much more complex and desperate than in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and the collection of information about human rights and humanitarian law violations presented a particular challenge there. Nevertheless, the human rights activities in Albania and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia were fully co-ordinated and directed according to the same operational protocols and methodology. Collection of information Information about the human rights situation in Kosovo was collected in two ways. One method was the establishment of OSCE tents in the camps in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia to provide privacy for the interviewing process. In Albania, however, it was not possible to establish tents, given the number of camps established throughout the country. OSCE-KVM vehicles were therefore used as mobile offices. An OSCE-KVM human rights officer, assisted by an interpreter, takes a statement in a refugee camp [zoom] The other way in which interviews were collected was more proactive. Some human rights teams established networks through local NGOs, interpreters, former OSCE-KVM staff, teachers,imams and others in a position to direct the teams to refugees who had settled in host families outside the camps. In the course of the refugee crisis in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, approximately 170,000 refugees were accommodated with host families. The OSCE-KVM teams were actively involved in interviewing 38 privately accommodated refugees. In the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia local "emergency councils" registered the arriving Kosovo Albanian families, and organized the local distribution of humanitarian aid. OSCE-KVM human rights officers spoke to refugees through various means: personal visits to local offices of emergency councils (run by local Albanian-speaking Macedonian citizens, but often assisted by Kosovo refugees), personal contact with local authorities (in particular the mayor's offices and humanitarian aid coordinators), announcements in the local press and radio, contact with local journalists, local clinics and hospitals, and so on. In the course of more than two months of interviewing, almost every village hosting refugees was visited http://www.osce.org/kosovo/documents/reports/hr/part1/ch2.htm (11 of 16)12/5/2003 11:48:40 AM