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Today in history, 28 October: The mass expulsion of Albanians, March–June 1999

From late March to early June 1999 hundreds of thousands of Albanians were expelled or forced to flee Kosovo to Albania, Macedonia and Montenegro, through crossings such as Morinë and Blace.

The recorded event closest to today's date in the archive calendar.

Date of the event
Place
Morinë – Vërmicë border crossing, Kukës
Evidence status
Evidence status: Judicially established. Established in a final court judgment. It covers only what the court found, not every later interpretation.
A square crowded with people, tractors and vehicles, with the lake in the background
Kukës's main square during the exodus of Kosovars in 1999: people, tractors, trucks and tents along the edges of the square.Photo: Jonuz Kola · 1999 · CC BY-SA 4.0The identification of this image is not fully certain.

From late March to early June 1999 hundreds of thousands of Albanians were expelled or forced to flee Kosovo to Albania, Macedonia and Montenegro, through crossings such as Morinë and Blace.

The ICTY found that the deliberate actions of VJ and MUP forces caused at least 700,000 Albanians to leave Kosovo, and that the NATO bombing and KLA activity were not the cause of this mass movement [1] [2].

According to UNHCR statistics reproduced by the OSCE and HRW, the number of refugees from Kosovo had reached 862,979 by 9 June 1999 (Albania, Macedonia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina and the humanitarian evacuation programme). The OSCE estimates that over 90% of Kosovo Albanians — more than 1.45 million — had been displaced by 9 June, including about 590,000 displaced inside Kosovo according to a UNHCR estimate [3] [4].

Full event record, with sources and map

Historical context

1999

From the Reçak massacre to the entry of KFOR: six months that saw failed negotiations, NATO's intervention, the mass expulsion of Albanians and crimes documented by international courts.

Read the chapter “1999: Reçak, expulsions and the end of the war”

Sources

  1. [1]Tribunali Penal Ndërkombëtar për ish-Jugosllavinë (ICTY). Judgement Summary for Milutinović et al.. 2009-02-26. IT-05-87-T. https://www.icty.org/x/cases/milutinovic/tjug/en/090226summary.pdf. Accessed 2026-09-16.
  2. [2]Tribunali Penal Ndërkombëtar për ish-Jugosllavinë (ICTY). Prosecutor v. Milutinović et al., Judgement, Vol. 3 of 4. 2009-02-26. IT-05-87-T. https://www.icty.org/x/cases/milutinovic/tjug/en/jud090226-e3of4.pdf. Accessed 2026-09-16.
  3. [3]OSBE — Zyra për Institucione Demokratike dhe të Drejta të Njeriut (ODIHR). Kosovo/Kosova: As Seen, As Told: An analysis of the human rights findings of the OSCE Kosovo Verification Mission, October 1998 to June 1999. 1999. https://www.osce.org/files/f/documents/d/d/17772.pdf. Accessed 2026-09-16.
  4. [4]Fred Abrahams, Benjamin Ward. Under Orders: War Crimes in Kosovo. 2001-10-26. https://www.hrw.org/reports/2001/kosovo/. Accessed 2026-09-16.
  5. [5]UNHCR (përmes ReliefWeb). UNHCR Kosovo Crisis Update, 10 June 1999. 1999-06-10. https://reliefweb.int/report/albania/unhcr-kosovo-crisis-update-10-june-1999. Accessed 2026-09-16.

This post is created automatically from the archive's checked data and from public news feeds. Not one sentence was written by artificial intelligence. Published: .