Attempted Peace Talks
Responding to international outrage the leadership from Serbia, Kosovo, and the KLA agreed to have peace talks, but these negotiations failed in March 1999. The international observers left Kosovo and the Serbian forces moved rapidly by shelling the edges of Pristina, the capital of Kosovo on March 22.
On March 24, NATO began air strikes on Serb targets in Yugoslavia increasing in intensity each day. However the Serbian forces continued in their efforts committed one of the most extreme atrocities in the village of Meja on April 27. Between two hundred and three hundred men between the ages of 18 and 65 were taken from their families and systematically shot.
From March to June 1999 about 860,000 Albanian refugees left Kosovo and arrived in the neighbouring countries of Albania and Montenegro.
On 27 May 1999 the UN War Crimes Tribunal formally indicted Milosevic for crimes against humanity.
On June 3, the Serbian parliament agreed to a plan that was made by representatives from Russia, the European Union, and the United States. Serbia was to withdraw its troops from Kosovo and NATO bombing would end. NATO would provide a peacekeeping force. This plan was also approved by the UN Security Council.
The NATO bombing ended in Yugoslavia as the Serbian troops withdrew from Kosovo on June 10. Russian troops arrive in Kosovo on June 12 as NATO troops started to move into Kosovo from Macedonia. An agreement is reached to allow 3,000 Russian troops remain in Kosovo as peacekeepers under German, French, and American control.
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