Kosovo/Kosova As Seen, As Told escape from a cordon but were unable [to] because they had set a circle of fire enclosing us. We continued to walk and arrived at a field in Kolic and stopped. As soon as we did the Serbs opened fire with automatic weapons killing 20 or 21 people. It was about 16:30 hours. I witnessed 20 or 21 of these deaths, [of] women, children and old people as well as men. We had to flee. We went towards UCK positions near Kolic. Later UCK members recovered the bodies. We were in the mountains. After the UCK returned I was informed that 56 people had been killed in that field. This, however, was a mistake as there had been two fields in which people were killed. Twenty-one in one field and 56 in the second field: 77 in total. The Serb offensive stopped at this stage. Aerial bombardment. Nogavac/Nagafc village (Orahovac municipality) came under heavy attack by Yugoslav and Serbian forces at the end of March. One grenade hit an area where a group of people was hiding. Seven people were killed in that attack. On or around 1 or 2 April Nogovac was bombed by Yugoslav aeroplanes. Over 100 civilians were reportedly killed when houses they were sheltering in were hit in this attack. Villages in the Popovo and Majaca valley in Podujevo municipality were also bombed in late March/early April, although it is not clear if one or more bombing raids took place. Either one or two aeroplanes, recognized as Serbian MiGs, are described as dropping bombs on the villages. The number of people given as killed ranges from 11 to 18. There is also a refugee report from Djakovica/Gjakova municipality of Yugoslav planes bombing a building in Bardonic/Bardhaniq used as a UCK hospital on 28 March when a mother and child were killed in the bombing, and two children injured. Another interviewee reported that five days later Yugoslav planes also bombed the nearby village of Jablanica/Jabllanice, causing more people to leave the village. (For casualties caused by NATO bombing, see below.) Killing by Serbian forces of civilians with UCK connections There was a pattern of targeting people who had or were perceived to have UCK connections. Whereas prior to 20 March this might have led to arrest (see Chapter 9, Arbitrary arrest and detention), after that date the intentions of the Yugoslav and Serbian forces were more likely to be murderous. On 27 March at about 08:00 hours a tank was seen shelling the house of one family (named in reports) in Obilic/Obiliq town. Around 14:30 there were four Pinzgauers and a heavy machine gun sited on top of a Russian-made vehicle in the area, while 30 to 40 mostly masked men were seen approaching the house. They were variously described as men in green camouflage with police insignia, as paramilitaries and local Serbs in black uniforms, some of whom were masked. Members of the family who were unable to flee were told to go back to the house, where shooting suddenly began. Ten members of the family, including three women, were later found dead. The family reportedly had a son who was in the UCK and who had been visiting at the time. Another incident where family members had connections with the UCK and were targeted by Serbian forces happened in Veliki Kicic/Kqiqi i Madh (Kosovska Mitrovica/Mitrovice) on approximately 28 March. Heavily armed, masked police forces shot dead a man whose brother was a UCK commander in http://www.osce.org/kosovo/documents/reports/hr/part1/ch5.htm (10 of 15)12/5/2003 11:50:53 AM