ABSTRACT
Not long after the violent conflict in Bosnia-Herzegovina had been brought to an end another violent conflict broke out in a different part of the former Yugoslavia. This time the fighting parties were military and paramilitary troops from the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the Kosovo Liberation Army over the territory of Kosovo in Serbia. After the initial Rambouillet negotiations had broken down because the Serb representatives withdrew their support for the process, NATO, without the consent of the UN, initiated a fierce bombing campaign against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) in the spring of 1999. A couple of months later the FRY reluctantly consented to the deployment of an international peace enforcement mission to help implement a peace process in Kosovo. Subsequently UNSC resolution 1244 authorised UNMIK to implement the civilian aspects of the peace process. The resolution also put NATO in charge of implementing the military aspects of the peace agreement as NATO soldiers had done in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Thus in the summer of 1999, NATO deployed Kosovo Force (KFOR) soldiers in order to establish and maintain security in Kosovo. This chapter examines KFOR efforts to detain indicted war criminals and it discusses KFOR response to becoming involved in these detentions and why KFOR chose a reactive rather than a proactive approach to the task.
