Below: KLA soldiers following the conclusion of a battle with Serbian military forces during the Kosovo War in 1999 (retrieved from lightstalkers.org)
Long a province of Serbia, Kosovo's story of independence is a long, bloody, and still hotly debated topic. The dissolution of Yugoslavia led to the inflammation of nationalist sentiments by the majority of countries that once comprised the now former pan-Slavic state. Most of said countries gained independence peacefully, albeit through a lengthy process. Those that didn't witnessed a series of violent conflicts, most notably the Croatian, Bosnian, and Kosovar wars of Independence. Kosovo was the last of the three to be contested and it featured the forces of Slobodan Milosevic's Yugoslav national forces based in Belgrade, the capital of Serbia against a series of organized insurgencies comprised primarily of Kosovo's Albanian majority population. The Kosovo War of Independence began in 1999 and concluded that same year following the NATO bombing of Belgrade. The end of the war constituted the conclusion of a series of conflicts that tore apart the Balkans for the better part of a decade during the 1990s.
Kosovo is a country conceived from war, an event that more often leads to destruction, rather than creation. What follows is a compilation of stories that cover the more modern issues that still stem from this conflict that is over a decade-and-a-half past. It discusses the current issues facing the Kosovar government and its people, but also intertwines the present with the past by covering aspects of the war that are still resonating.
Please visit the "About" page for a background of the blog itself.
Kosovo is a country conceived from war, an event that more often leads to destruction, rather than creation. What follows is a compilation of stories that cover the more modern issues that still stem from this conflict that is over a decade-and-a-half past. It discusses the current issues facing the Kosovar government and its people, but also intertwines the present with the past by covering aspects of the war that are still resonating.
Please visit the "About" page for a background of the blog itself.