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Date: Sun, 21 May 2000 23:05:37 +0200
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Subject: Albania nixes forced return of refugees (UPI, 21-May-2000)
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http://www.clari.net/hot/wed/be/Ualbania-kosovo-refugees.RNA9_AyL.html

Albania nixes forced return of refugees

Sunday, 21-May-2000 10:20AM
By LULZIM COTA

TIRANA, ALBANIA, May 21 (UPI) - Albania's government will not permit
western countries to return Kosovo refugees through Albanian territory
against their will, Albanian media report on Sunday.
     "During the summer we expect a big flow of voluntary Kosovo
refugees return from the countries (where the fled to escape the) Kosovo
crises," said Spartak Poci, Albanian Minister of Public Order.
     "I underline, this flow will be a voluntary return and not one
Kosovo Albanian will be repatriated to his country without his will,"
Poci said, while visiting the Morini border checkpoint expect to handle
many refugees.
     Poci said Albania had signed two similar agreements with Germany
and Switzerland a few months ago to return Kosovo refugees through
Albania and the voluntary return was the ``used term in these
agreements.''
     Bernard Kouchner, head of U.N. operations in Kosovo, is concerned
Germany plans to repatriate and expel Kosovo refugees who will be faced
with unemployment and endanger the fragile peace process in Kosovo.
     "This (expulsion) risks peace as well as province economy, which is
rebuilding. We do not wish a new crisis when we just managed to pass the
winter," Albanian Telegraphic Agency quotes a Kouchner interview, which
will be published on Monday at Der Spiegel, a German magazine.
     Kouchner said Otto Schily, German Minister of Interior, is wrong
when he thinks the employment situation was improving in Kosovo.
Kouchner said 50 per cent of the Kosovo labor force is unemployed.
     There are some 160,000 Kosovo Albanians in Germany, and 180,000
were there at the end of 1999. Only 14,614 Kosovo refugees had gone to
Germany during the conflict in Kosovo, reports Der Spiegel.
     German authorities have complained that some ethnic Albanians in
Germany are involved in drug trafficking and other crimes.
     Switzerland forcefully repatriated by 50 Kosovo Albanians, saying
those refugees were engaged in criminal activities in Switzerland.

Story from UPI / LULZIM COTA 
Copyright 2000 by United Press International (via ClariNet)