Train To Kosovo

Daily Life, first prize stories

15-10-2000

Windows have repeatedly been smashed by Serbs, and by Albanians throwing stones, when international KFOR soldiers attempted to use Albanian conductors. The heavily-guarded train provides the only safe way for Serbs and Romas to travel through Albanian-dominated parts of Kosovo. Passengers face the risk of revenge attacks, after the massacre of thousands of Kosovar Albanians by Serb forces in the 1999 conflict. Set up by NATO, the train runs from near the capital Priština through a string of villages until it reaches the Serb strongholds of North Mitrovica and Zvecan in the north of the province. KFOR soldiers guard the passengers, who are split into three sections - Serbs at the front, Romas at the back, the middle reserved for Albanians. The train itself has been bombed in Albanian and Serb areas.

Photo Credit: Andrew Testa

Andrew was born in London, England in 1965. He began his photographic career in the early 1990’s working as a freelance for the Guardian and Observer newspaper. Throughout the decade he documented the growing Environmental Protest and Animal Rights movements. In 1999 he shifted his attention to the Balkans covering the war in Kosovo. At the end of 1999 he moved to Kosovo, which he used as a base to cover events throughout Easter Europe, Central Asia and the Middle East. In 2005 he moved to New York where he was based for five years. He now lives in London with his wife and two children.

He is a regular contributor to the New York Times and his work has been widely published in magazines such as Newsweek, Time, Stern, Geo, Paris Match, Der Spiegel, The Sunday Times Magazine, The Independent Magazine, Mother Jones, Mare, and Granta

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