UCPMB

The Liberation Army of Preševo, Medveđa and Bujanovac (Albanian: "Ushtria Çlirimtare e Preshevës, Medvegjës dhe Bujanocit", UCPMB) was a guerrilla group fighting for independence from Serbia (then Yugoslavia) for the three municipalities: Preševo, Bujanovac, and Medveđa, home to most of the Albanians of Central Serbia, adjacent to Kosovo. UCPMBs uniforms, procedures and tactics mirrored those of the disbanded KLA. The UCPMB operated from 1999 to 2001. The goal of the UCPMB was to secede these municipalities from Yugoslavia and join them to a future independent Kosovo.

After the end of the Kosovo war in 1999, a three-mile "Ground Safety Zone" (GSZ) was established between Kosovo governed by United Nations) - and inner Serbia and Montenegro. Yugoslav army units were not permitted to patrol the area, only lightly-armed police forces. [ [http://www.ce-review.org/00/43/kosovonews43.html CER | A calm Kosovo moves towards a tense future ] ] The exclusion zone included the predominantly Albanian village of Dobrosin, but not Preševo.

Former KLA members quickly established bases in the demilitarized zone, and Serbian police had to stop patrolling the area to avoid being ambushed. Attacks were also made on Albanian politicians opposed to the KLA, including the murder of Zemail Mustafi, the Albanian vice-president of the Bujanovac branch of Slobodan Milošević's Socialist Party.

Between June 21 1999 and November 12 2000, 294 attacks were recorded, most of them (246) in Bujanovac, 44 in Medveđa and six in Preševo. The attacks resulted in fourteen people killed (of which six were civilians and eight were policemen), 37 people wounded (two UN observers, three civilians and 34 policemen) and five civilians kidnapped. In the attacks, UCPMB used mostly assault rifles, machineguns, mortars and snipers, but also RPGs, handgrenades, anti-tank and anti-personnel mines.cite news| first=Ninoslav| last=Krstic| coauthors=Dragan Zivkovic| title=Извођење операције решавања кризе на југу Србије изазване деловањем наоружаних албанских екстремиста (терориста)| work=Vojno delo| id=ISSN 0042-8426| page=180 ]

Seeing that the situation was getting out of control, NATO allowed the Yugoslav army to reclaim the demilitarized zone on May 24th 2001, and at the same time giving the UCPMB the opportunity to turn themselves over to KFOR. KFOR promised to just take their weapons and note their names before releasing them.

More than 450 UCPMB members took advantage of KFOR's "screen and release" policy, among them Shefket Musliu, the commander of the UCPMB, who turned himself over to KFOR at a checkpoint along the GSZ just after midnight May 26 2001.

See also

*Preševo Valley conflict

External links

* [http://www.un.org/Depts/Cartographic/map/other/kumanovo.pdf www.UN.org - Map of the area]
* [http://www.elpais.com/articulo/internacional/nueva/guerrilla/reta/Serbia/elpepiint/20010103elpepiint_10/Tes] 1/3/2001, El Pais, "Una nueva guerrilla reta a Serbia." In Spanish.

References