David Brauchli's  Kosovo Diary

June 18, 1998 - Shkurte Selmani, left, grieves for her slain husband, Adem Selmani. He was shot and killed by Serbs while on Albanian soil two days before. The shooting has heightened tensions along the Albanian border which is near the troubled Kosovo area.
 

A funeral for the first Albanian to die in Albania by Serbs in this current crisis. A man, perhaps a smuggler, perhaps a simple herder, as his family claimed, was shot by Serbs on the Albanian side of the border along with his horse. Actually the Serbs shot his horse first and then as he was discussing what to do about getting back to Tropoja from the top of the pass where he was with his cousin, he was shot in the back twice and the head once. He dropped like a stone, dead on the spot. His cousin ran away behind a rock and hid until he could scamper down the pass and alert the village.

The Albanian border police tried to recover the body, but when they approached it, they came under fire by Serb snipers and had to retreat. The OSCE observers here, guys who drive around and try to see what the Serbs are up to, confirmed the incident and Bill, the head of mission here, said what would most likely happen would be the Serbs would take the body across at night and then give it back in a body exchange at some future date. That was close to what happened, the Serbs did indeed drag the body across the border, but only 30 meters or so because the KLA engaged Serb forces in a fire fight on the mountain top and the Serbs were unable to remove the body from the mountain. The next day, which was yesterday, the herder’s cousin and brother came up to the mountain at about 2100 and scrambled across the border, retrieved their relative and hurried down the mountain.

The consequence of this fighting means that the refugees who do want to flee Kosovo are trapped. They can’t go back to their villages because they have been bombed, shelled and burned and they can’t go to Albania because of the fighting on the pass. So I suppose they remain in purgatory, on the mountain waiting for resolution.

The funeral was one of the saddest I’ve seen. I think every person in the village of Tropoja over 20 was there. It seems that Adem Selmani, the man who was killed, was well known. As is custom at Muslim funerals, the women sat with the body in a dark room and mourned while the men gathered outside. A reception line of Adem’s relatives formed to receive all those who came to pay their respects. Each man, as he shook hands and passed by, whispered "long life" and touched his other hand to his chest. It was moving. Adem’s family offered cigarettes to each man who sat down in the back yard.

At five O’clock the men of the family moved into the room with the body and moved it into the road outside. Then all the men in the backyard came out and filed slowly by, paying their last respects. The family stood on one side of the coffin watching, crying and, I guess, praying.

Then, a shock from the 20th century hit us all in the face as Brent Sadler of CNN did a standup in front of this incredibly moving, sad and intensely personal moment. I thought it was perhaps the most crass, disrespectful thing I have ever witnessed in my time in the media and I was angered because it made all of us there, who were being VERY respectful, into media vultures. That sickened me. A colleague of mine at the grave later asked Sadler if he were going to do the next standup in the grave. Unfortunately he didn’t get the point of the joke.

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