Serbia jails 4 men for Kosovo war crimes

BELGRADE, Serbia, June 18 (UPI) -- A Belgrade court sentenced four former Serbian police officers to prison for 15 to 20 years in the killing of 14 Kosovo Albanian civilians in 1999.

The War Crimes Chamber of Belgrade District Court jailed the four members of the Serbian police special unit known as Scorpions for herding 19 women and children of the ethnic-Albanian Gashi family into their house's courtyard and opening fire with automatic rifles.

Five children, ranging in age from 1 to 14, were seriously injured but survived the massacre in March 1999 in the town of Podujevo, in northeastern Kosovo.

The five children testified at the trial.

The four men were arrested in Sremska Mitrovica, 50 miles west of Belgrade, in October 2007, and were put on trial in September 2008.

The Podujevo massacre was committed during NATO air raids that stopped Serbian police and military units' campaign against ethnic Albanian armed separatists and civilians in 1999.

NATO troops have been deployed in Kosovo ever since, and in February 2008, Albanian leaders unilaterally declared the province independent of Serbia.