Eleven months ago, war erupted in Kosova with a military attack on the entire Jashari family in the region of Decan. As humanitarian workers know everywhere, children suffer the most during wars. And this war is no different. There is no "war front".
Yugoslav armed weapons fire directly on homes, often at five a.m. when the family is still asleep.
The systematic burning of houses is particularly frightening to children, as fire rages unchecked out smahed windows and roofs.
The children see the family cow shot--an animal they have been responsible for raising and caring for and that they love much as American children love their dog or cat.
They have seen their grandparents stumbling and running fearfully across the fields, hiding in gullies and ravines as machine gunfire rattles overhead. When the fighting dies down, their father (if he has survived) will go back at night to see if there is anything to salvage from what was their home.

Sooner or later, these children (see photo) left Drenica and headed by tractor for Prishtine. Here in the capitol, someone loaned this family of six the use of his garage.
The space is mouldy, damp, and dark. They keep a blanket over the one window for privacy. They have a woodstove, but the children have no shoes and are out in the street, this winter 1999, barefoot.

The children tell me that they appreciate the room, but they don't like it here. They want to go home, but they can't.
Their house was burned.
Their faces have that blank, haunted stare characteristic of traumatized children.
They seem confused about what has happened to them. No one has given them words to describe the events or feelings they've experienced.
No one visits them here.

Text and foto, Alice Mead, US writer