Page 873 - Kosovo Metohija Heritage

His Holiness the Archbishop of Peć, Metropolitan of Belgrade and Karlovci, Serbian Patriarch, Pavle (Paul) with the Bishops serving the Divine Liturgy in Gračanica on Vidovdan 15/28 June 1999 and holding memorial services at Gazimestan
ters known as UÇK. Desperate processions of the Serbian homeless people are moving north again.
...
Clinton triumphantly announces to the american na- tion: “My fellow americans, tonight for the first time in 79 days, the skies over Yugoslavia are silent. The one million men, women, and children driven from their land9 are pre- paring to return home... We have achieved a victory for a safer world, for our democratic values, and for a stronger america!... america still faces great challenges in this world, but we look forward to meeting them. So, tonight i ask you to be proud of your country and very proud of the men and women who serve it in uniform. For in Kosovo, we did the right thing; we did it the right way; and we will finish the job. Good night, and may God bless our wonderful United States of america.”
endless Refugee Processions and
Damjan’s New Zelenko10
May 31/June 13, 1999, Holy Apostle Hermas and Martyr Hermias
i arrive with the patriarch’s blessing in Kosovo via Ko- sovska Mitrovica. in Mitrovica—havoc and ruins. The French KFOR already got hold of the city and settled there. Many Western journalists go around the city. as if they already forgot the recent bombing campaigns of their gov- ernments, they ask questions: “Who’s ruined all this? Whence is this much havoc?” “The war” i say, “is brother to no one,” being stunned by the chaos i encounter...
We continue our trip to Priština. We pass by the col- umns of tanks and our army which leaves Kosovo. in the ibar valley we encounter many men, women, children, cars but also ox carts and wagons of sad, poor people loaded with necessities. These are terrified people from Kosovo and Metohija who leave their centuries-old homes. it is
9 To a great extent by an elaborate foreign propagandist scenar- io!—Ed.
10 Zelenko – legendary horse of Damjan jugović, one of the Ser- bian heros from the Battle of Kosovo in 1389—transl note
unknown whether they are ever going to return. By the road there is a herd of abandoned cows with milk-engorged udders: there are no more homemaker to milk them...
Four years before this, back in 1995, i happened to see the same endless procession on its way from Serbian Kraji- na, via Martin Brod, Drvar, Banja Luka and Derventa to Ser- bia. i asked one peasant who left with his flock of sheep over the hills past by Martin Brod: “Where are you going, old man?” as he was gathering the sheep, he peacefully replied: “To Serbia, father!” as if Serbia was somewhere there, be- hind the first grove. i have never found out whatever hap- pened to him and his treasure. Did he arrive at least to Mr- konjić Grad? Did the army buy his sheep in exchange for food as i once asked an officer to do? Not even the old man alone could have reached far, let alone his sheep...
There is a horse trotting by the road we are driving to Priština. He has obviously lost its owner, and frightened by all this that is happening, he is going to an unknown direc- tion following the carriage-road. His mane is waiving in the wind. His trot is solemn and dignified. i wonder: how long will he be able to follow the car wheels? i keep looking back as the car moves away... Zelenko fades in the distance with no intention of giving up... even today this horse stands before my eyes as something i rarely had a chance to see in my life.
We passed Priština where the British troops already stationed. Steel predators of the new conquistadors of the new post-Christian millennium tear up the wide Kosovo sky and its silence with their propellers and thunder. We arrive in Gračanica and spend the night there, only to re- turn to Mitrovica the next morning and from there to leave for the Patriarchate of Peć.
i constantly peer alongside the road, hoping to spot Ze- lenko somewhere. While the tanks keep coming and the army and people are in great haste toward the ibar valley, just a little bit further away from the place where i spotted Zelenko yesterday, i see him laying down, scared and already dead, his limbs stiff and outstretched, tilted to the sky, al- ready the prey to worms and ravens... i wonder: “Didn’t a
The Chronicles of the Renewed Crucifixion of Kosovo
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