Balkans | Commemoration of the Kosovo deportation in 1999 in Platsi

People who lost their lives are commemorated at the gathering place in Platsi, the border gate between Kosovo and Macedonia, which is one of the destinations for Kosovars who were driven from their homes by Serb forces in 1999 and forced into an exodus.

The President of the Alliance for the Future of Kosovo (AAK), Ramush Haradinaj, laid flowers at the “Bllaca 99” monument on the occasion of the 24th anniversary of the exodus of the people of Kosovo, including the Turks.

After the start of the NATO air operation, approximately 440,000 refugees from Kosovo, mostly Albanians, who had been deported by Serbian forces, passed through the concentration camp next to the Platsi border crossing.

The place where the Macedonian authorities set up the camp to register Kosovo refugees was also known as the “Valley of Death”.

In his statement, Haradinaj stated that the 1999 hijrah will not be erased from their memory for a long time.

“We are here to commemorate the memory of Kosovar Albanians, civilians who were forced from their homes, who fell on the road just to save their lives, without the chance to take anything with them. This deportation was not that simple, men, women, children and the elderly were held here for weeks,” he said. And as we know, their number is more than one and a half million.

Kosovars who were forced to emigrate were sent to camps set up outside various cities of Macedonia, where they stayed for several days under very difficult conditions in the assembly center Platsi.

Kosovaport