Kosovo Albanians Commemorate Anti-Milosevic Student Protest

Student protest in Pristina. Photo: BIRN.

In September 1996, Milosevic and the leader of the parallel system, Ibrahim Rugova, reached an agreement which would allow the Albanian students to use school buildings again.

But Milosevic failed to implement the agreement, sparking anger that led to the demonstration on October 1, 1997, organised by the Independent Student Union of the University of Pristina, demanding access to Pristina University's facilities.

The students in 1997 had planned to march from Pristina's Velania neighbourhood towards the city centre and to try to get into the university premises.

March in Pristina. Photo: BIRN.

But they were stopped by police, who detained the leaders of the Independent Student Union. The protest was seen as a key point in Kosovo Albanians' struggle against Belgrade's rule.

Tuesday's commemorative event followed the same route from the Velania neighbourhood to the 1997 march's intended conclusion at Pristina University.

Together with current and former students, women who were either teachers, mothers or wives of participants in the 1997 protest gathered to watch the event in Velania.

"One of my sons came here for the protest [in 1997]. I can't describe the fear I had. I knew that the Serbian police would stop them and I feared for my son's life, I thought that I might never see him again," one woman told BIRN.

"I have tears in my eyes when I remember the day," another woman, whose husband was a vice-dean at the time of the 1997 march, told Klan Kosova TV.

"It was both a feeling of enthusiasm and fear. Enthusiasm because we had the will to rise against the regime and fear because we could die. My husband could have never come home again, but he was...