fear Tuesday May 13, amid attacks against their churches and priests as cries for protection from peace keepers remained unanswered.
"I open the church gates only on Sunday mornings and on major holidays for the faithful to come to liturgy," the Forum 18 News Service (F18News) quoted Parish priest Fr Miroslav Popadic as saying.
"If someone comes to church without a call in advance I do not open the gates. When I visit local villages, I make the sign of the cross, sit in my car and drive fast at my own risk," he told the news service, which covers religious persecution.
His Serbian Orthodox Church of St Nicholas in Kosovo’s capital Pristina, was again stoned after nightfall on May 10 leaving many church windows broken, F18News said, citing church sources.
REVENGE ATTACKS
The violence has been linked to revenge attacks from the mainly Muslim ethnic Albanian majority of Kosovo, which suffered under years of oppression under former Yugoslav and Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic who has been accused of war crimes.
Serbian Church officials have repeatedly asked for more help from the NATO-led peacekeeping force in Kosovo, KFOR, which arrived in the province after the defeat of Serbian troops in 1999.
While their was some protection in the past, KFOR guards reportedly withdrew late last year from Pristina’s St Nicholas church, which was built in 1830 on the remains of the medieval monastery of St Nicholas.
However "there have been various attacks on this church before," despite the presence of KFOR forces and United Nations police said Fr Popadic, the only remaining priest serving the once thriving parish.
HAND GRENADE
"On 27 December 2000 a hand grenade was thrown into the churchyard, causing minor damage. But people keep stoning my apartment regularly, since I live in the parish house in the yard, " he told F18News.
Human rights organizations and church officials have also complained about previous violence directed against other churches as well as church leaders, individual believers, monasteries and Orthodox grave yards.
Over a hundred Orthodox churches are said to have been destroyed or badly damaged in Kosovo since the international community took control of the province nearly four years ago
The most recent attacks were reported last November, when the church in the village of Ljubovo near Istok was blown up and the church in Djurakovac was also attacked, which lead to protests from United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan.
KFOR VISIT
Following a letter from Serbian Orthodoc Bishop Artemije’s, KFOR commander Lt-Gen. Fabio Mini visited Fr Popadic two weeks ago, accompanied by police officers.
"I complained that I am unable to walk freely even in the churchyard, let alone in the streets of Pristina, that often in the night from 9pm to midnight my apartment is stoned, and that there are fewer than 200 Serbs now living in the whole of Pristina," Fr Popadic said.
"The police promised more frequent patrols, while General Mini told me we have to move forward and that he cannot give any more troops for the protection of churches." Like other believers, Popadic said he now lives "in a state of siege…"
Fr Popadic serves a community of 130 Serbs living in Pristina and, 70 Serbian translators working for the United Nations Mission In Kosovo (UNMIK) in Pristina. He also wants to start visiting a retirement home again where about 50 Serbian pensioners live, F18News reported.
