Kosovo war crimes trial opens against fugitive Serbs
A trial over one of the worst war crimes in the 1990s Kosovo conflict opened on July 31 in Pristina, with 21 Serb officials to be tried in absentia over killings that had prompted NATO intervention.
The killings in the southern Kosovo village of Racak, or Recak, in Albanian, in January 1999 triggered international outrage after Serbian forces were accused of murdering 42 civilians.
The incident was eventually used to partly justify a U.S.-led bombing campaign that ended the conflict between Serbia and independence-seeking ethnic Albanian guerrillas.
Serbian officials, including the country's current President Aleksandar Vucic, have repeatedly denied the massacre occurred, instead alleging those killed were Kosovo Liberation Army fighters.
