(22 Jan 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Pristina, Kosovo – 22 January 2025
1. Wide of Children of War Museum
2. Various of visitors looking at exhibits
3. Wide of a blanket
4. Close of a doll in exhibit
5. Close of plaque by exhibit
6. Wide of artist Petrit Halilaj looking at drawings
7. Various of drawing by Halilaj
8. SOUNDBITE (English) Petrit Halilaj, artist:
"It’s an extremely strong emotion to actually be in front of this, this picture, this drawing, 25 years after its realization. I did this in a very different context. I was in a refugee camp and I was given colors and paper. And as a kid, this is an amazing moment because it brings you joy to share what you just lived. And this was one of the biggest nightmares and dreams I was seeing. And my fear is that this was the end. Luckily, we didn’t get killed in the war, and luckily we can tell actually as witnesses today all these memories and all this traces."
9. Tilt up of scissors at exhibit
10. Various of visitors at exhibition
11. SOUNDBITE (English) Bjeshke Gurri, museum director:
"So, the purpose of this exhibition, this alternative museum that we are in, is to create a platform for children, for people who were children during the war, a platform of empathy, and also to educate the audience, because in Kosovo we lack a proper education on what really happened during the war. And yes, we we faced off many obstacles during the way because, for example, there was a skepticism towards other respondents, the interviewees because many hesitated because, in their minds, their stories are invalid in a way and are not important enough to share with the public. So we struggled with that. And also because this museum is multiethnic, many people, especially from the marginalized communities, hesitated to give interviews because they are marginalized and their stories are seen as not valid."
12. Various of visitors at the museum
STORYLINE:
For a few years after the Kosovo war of 1998-1999, Petrit Halilaj had a disturbing dream: Serb soldiers and a tank going to his family’s house, setting it alight and killing them all.
Then only 13 years old, Halilaj committed his dream to paper with crayons he was given at the refugee camp where he lived.
Twenty-five years later, his picture is hanging in a museum dedicated to telling the stories of the children who suffered through the war.
Dolls, toy monkeys, bears, airplanes and cars sit alongside pictures made by children at the time, all of them depicting burning houses or armed soldiers.
“Luckily we can tell, as witnesses, today all these memories and all these traces,” said Halilaj.
Now 39-years-old, he works as a visual artist dealing with documents, stories and memories of Kosovo’s history, particularly what happened during the war.
“Going through these collective and personal dramas is a first step to understanding better and accepting each other,” he said.
Kosovo was a Serbian province until NATO’s 78-day bombing campaign in 1999 ended a war between Serbian government forces and ethnic Albanian separatists in Kosovo, which left about 11,400 dead, mainly ethnic Albanians, and pushed Serbian forces out.
Kosovo proclaimed independence in 2008, which Serbia doesn’t recognize.
According to Kosovar authorities, 1,133 children were killed or died during the war, 109 of them still missing.
More than a million Kosovars were displaced, forced to flee by Serbian authorities, military, police, and paramilitary forces.
Most of them went to neighboring Albania, but also to North Macedonia and other countries.
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