Yugoslav colonization of Kosovo

Yugoslav colonization of Kosovo (Phase II)
Division of Kosovo vilayet between the Kingdom of Serbia (green) and the Kingdom of Montenegro (purple) following the Balkan Wars 1913
LocationKosovo (spillover: Vardar Banovina, and Montenegro)
Date1918–1940
TargetAlbanians
Attack type
Colonization, mass murder, arson, discrimination, ethnic cleansing
Deathsc. 80,000
  • Kosovo: >12,000 (by 1921)
  • Montenegro: 18–30,000 (by 1919)
  • Macedonia: 30–40,000 (by 1919)
PerpetratorsKingdom of Serbia (1918), Kingdom of Montenegro (1918), Kingdom of Yugoslavia (1918–1940)
MotiveAnti-Albanian sentiment, Greater Serbia, Ultranationalism

The colonization of Kosovo was a programme begun by the kingdoms of Montenegro and Serbia in the early twentieth century and later implemented by their successor state Yugoslavia at certain periods of time from the interwar era (1918–1941) until 1999. Over the course of the twentieth century, Kosovo experienced four major colonisation campaigns that aimed at altering the ethnic population balance in the region, to decrease the Albanian population and replace them with Montenegrins and Serbs.[1] Albanians formed the ethnic majority in the region when it became part of Yugoslavia in early twentieth century.[2]

Fears over Albanian separatism and the need to secure Kosovo, a strategic territory for the country drove the state to pursue colonisation as a solution.[3][4][2] The Serbian political elite held that Kosovo was a former late medieval Serb territory that following the Ottoman conquest was settled by Albanians.[5] As such, the colonisation process along with the displacement of Albanians and purchasing of their property was understood as "a logical sequel to the liberation war", in which the four Balkan states defeated the Ottoman Empire.[6]

The first brief attempts at colonisation were made by Montenegro and Serbia during the Balkan Wars and First World War.[7][8] Following the end of the wars and the creation of Yugoslavia, the interwar period experienced the most colonisation activity. Between 60,000 and 65,000 colonists, of whom over 90% were Serbs, settled on the territory of the former Kosovo Vilayet captured from the Ottoman Empire in 1912.[9][10] In addition to them, numbers of state bureaucrats and their families also settled in Kosovo.[11] Along with Serb colonisation, a policy of forced migration of ethnic Albanians was implemented, enlisting the participation of Turkey to resettle them in its territory.[12][13][14]

During the Interwar period, tens of thousands of Albanians were killed in Kosovo, the Vardar province (modern-day North Macedonia), and Montenegro. Albanian armed resistance to Kosovo's incorporation into Yugoslavia following WWI emerged in the Kachak Movement, triggering a conflict that lasted until 1921 when the movement was suppressed. As a result, more than 12,000 Albanians were killed in Kosovo from 1918 to 1921.[15][16] In 1919, U.S. Army colonel Sherman Miles reported that between 18,000 and 25,000 Albanians had been killed in Montenegro, according to the British Mission in Shkodër and as many as 30,000 according to Albanian estimates.[17][relevant?] In July 1919, the French consulate in Skopje (North Macedonia) reported nine massacres of 30,000-40,000 victims.[18] According to Haki Demolli, 80,000 Albanians were killed in Yugoslavia by 1940.[19]

During the Second World War, Kosovo was attached to Italian controlled Albania and the colonist population fled to neighbouring Axis occupied Serbia and Montenegro.[20][21] At the end of the war, government of Yugoslavia prohibited return of colonist and stopped the colonization programme.[22][circular reference] Forced migration of Albanians to Turkey resumed and Serb settlers were installed in Kosovo until the ouster of Ranković in 1966.[23][24] In the 1990s, the government of President Slobodan Milošević attempted the colonisation of Kosovo using various financial and employment incentives to encourage Serb settlement and later through forceful resettlement of Serb refugees from the Yugoslav Wars.[25][26][27]

The colonisation of Kosovo is generally considered an unsuccessful project because it satisfied neither the state nor the settlers, nor the home population.[10][page needed] The politics related to the colonisation process and its effects upon various population groups of Kosovo remains a topic of interest and discussion in scholarship.[28]

  1. ^ Elsie, Robert (1997). Kosovo: In the heart of the powder keg. Columbia University Press. p. 212. ISBN 9780880333757.
  2. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference LeurdijkZandee13 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ Cite error: The named reference Karoubi175176 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference Iseni312 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  5. ^ Cite error: The named reference GulyasCsullog221222 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ Jovanović 2013, para. 10.
  7. ^ Cite error: The named reference Qirezi53 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  8. ^ Cite error: The named reference Hadri5960 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  9. ^ Cite error: The named reference Pavlovic235 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  10. ^ a b Jovanović, Vladan Z. (2006). "Settlement of Macedonia, Kosovo and Metohia between Two World Wars – Course and Outcome". Tokovi Istorije (in Serbian) (3). Institut za noviju istoriju Srbije: 25–44.
  11. ^ Cite error: The named reference GulyasCsullog231 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  12. ^ Cite error: The named reference Gingeras162163 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  13. ^ Cite error: The named reference LeurdijkZandee14 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  14. ^ Cite error: The named reference Qirezi49 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  15. ^ Ramet, Sabrina Petra (19 February 2018). Balkan Babel: The Disintegration Of Yugoslavia From The Death Of Tito To The Fall Of Milosevic, Fourth Edition (more than 12,000 Kosovar Albanians were killed by Serbian forces between 1918 and 1921, when pacification was more ... ed.). Routledge. ISBN 978-0-429-97503-5. Retrieved 19 August 2023.
  16. ^ Hoare, Marko Attila (2024). Serbia: A Modern History. Hurst Publishers. ISBN 9781805261575. Albanians engaged in armed resistance to Yugoslavia in the form of the Kaçak movement, whose forces numbered around 10,000 armed rebels by 1919... Serbian troops in Kosovo killed 6,040 people and destroyed 3,873 houses in January-February 1919.. One Albanian source claimed that by 1921 the figure reached 12,371 killed..
  17. ^ Department of State, United States (1947). Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States. U.S. Government Printing Office. pp. 740–741. Retrieved 19 August 2023.
  18. ^ Aggression against Yugoslavia correspondence. Faculty of Law, University of Belgrade. 2000. ISBN 978-86-80763-91-0. Retrieved 19 August 2023.
  19. ^ Demolli, Haki (2002). Terrorizmi. Prishtina: Law Faculty Prishtina. based on the national secret files, in the period 1918-40 around 80,000 Albanians were exterminated, between 1944 and 1950, 49,000 Albanians were killed by the communist Yugoslav forces, and in the period 1981-97, 221 Albanians were killed by the Serbian police and military forces. During these periods hundred of thousands of Albanians have been forcibly displaced towards Turkey and Western European countries.
  20. ^ Cite error: The named reference Sullivan15 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  21. ^ Cite error: The named reference GulyasCsullog236 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  22. ^ sh:Datoteka:Zabrana povratka kolonistima.jpg
  23. ^ Cite error: The named reference Mulaj45 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  24. ^ Cite error: The named reference Qirezi50 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  25. ^ Cite error: The named reference JanjicLalajPula290 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  26. ^ Cite error: The named reference Bellamy115 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  27. ^ Cite error: The named reference vanSelm45 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  28. ^ Bardhoshi, Nebi (2016). "Small Numbers, Big issues: The Border areas as Social Arena of Legal Systems". In Schüler, Sonja (ed.). Exchange, Dialogue, New Divisions?: Ethnic Groups and Political Cultures in Eastern Europe. LIT Verlag. p. 84. ISBN 9783643802095.