Author(s): George Dallas

Military | Europe

On April 5, 1999, local police in Serbia found a truck floating half-submerged in the Danube River. There was no sign of the driver, but a stone was sitting on the gas pedal. When the police finally managed to pull the truck out and open the cargo hold, they discovered that it was packed to the top with human bodies. The grisly evidence was quickly covered up.The truth would only emerge years later when the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia learned about a stunning and systematic campaign during the nineties to slaughter Kosovar Albanians and bury them in mass graves. More than 1,000 Kosovar Albanians disappeared during this period, in many cases leaving their grieving families to wonder about their whereabouts and safety.Elliot Behar, a war crimes prosecutor for the international tribunal, tells the stories of the men, women, and children who came to the trial in order to testify. Their stories attest to the strength and resilience of the human spirit as well as to the darkness into which human beings can descend.