TURKEY: ARRIVAL OF KOSOVO REFUGEES (2)

(6 Apr 1999) Eng/Turkish/Nat The first of around twenty-thousand ethnic Albanian refugees arrived in Northwestern Turkey on Monday night. They were reportedly selected at random by Macedonian officials who are growing ever more apprehensive about their swelling numbers. The Kosovans are to be sheltered in prefabricated houses in Gaziosmanpasa, Kirklareli, which were built for ethnic Turks who fled Bulgaria a decade ago and also used to accommodate Muslims fleeing the Bosnian war. After NATO announced plans by many member-states to temporarily take in some one-hundred and ten-thousand Kosovo refugees the first arrived in Turkey from Macedonia on Monday night. More than one thousand exhausted refugees stumbled off six planes at Corlu Airport in Northwestern Turkey. Many of them were reportedly picked at random for the airlift, now their misery is compounded by the fact that they do not know when they will see their loved ones again. Medical staff checked the one-thousand-three-hundred-and-sixty refugees while aid workers distributed desperately needed food and clothing. The road to Corlu has been a long and tiring one for these people. The old and weak suffer the worst. The pain and wretchedness will be etched in their memories for years to come. For them the hours of diplomatic discussions and the NATO airstrikes amounted to too little too late. Stories of the struggle they faced in their flight to freedom continue to filter through. SOUNDBITE: (English) "The situation was very bad. They threw us out from our houses. They came with police signs on them. They robbed us from our pockets. They took all. We had 1000 marks. They took everything." SUPER CAPTION: Faik Lahu, Albanian refugee This girl and her family were lucky, they were given twenty-four hours to leave rather then the fifteen minutes some were left with. SOUNDBITE: (Turkish) "They came at night wearing masks like secret police. They came into our houses and told us to leave within 24 hours or they would kill us. We were forced to leave our homes in the middle of the night." SUPER CAPTION: Pristina Refugee Turkey has promised to accept twenty-thousand ethnic Albanians fleeing Kosovo, Yugoslavia's embattled province. Six-thousand refugees have already been settled in Turkey, most of those having relatives who migrated there after World War One. Buses ferried the refugees to their new homes in Gaziosmanpasa, Kirklareli sixty miles away. Prefabricated houses await them. Built for ethnic Turks who fled Bulgaria a decade ago, and also used to shelter Muslims fleeing the Bosnian War. The bulk of the Kosovo refugees will live in a huge tent camp which will be set up nearby. Turkey has close cultural, ethnic, historic and religious ties to the Balkans, which were ruled by Turks for hundreds of years during the Ottoman Empire. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that nearly four-hundred-thousand people, the vast majority of them ethnic Albanian, have left Kosovo since NATO began its air assault on Yugoslavia on March 24. Turkey, a NATO member, has 11 fighter jets participating in the air strikes. Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork Twitter:   / ap_archive   Facebook:   / aparchives   ​​ Instagram:   / apnews   You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/you...