(WiPC/IFEX) – International PEN has recently learned that the Albanian poet, paediatrician and women’s rights activist, Flora Brovina, has been transferred from a prison near Pristina to another in Serbia. International PEN is alarmed by reports that she is in poor health and that she is being denied access to a lawyer. It is calling […]
(WiPC/IFEX) – International PEN has recently learned that the Albanian poet,
paediatrician and women’s rights activist, Flora Brovina, has been
transferred from a prison near Pristina to another in Serbia. International
PEN is alarmed by reports that she is in poor health and that she is being
denied access to a lawyer. It is calling for her immediate release and that
she be allowed to return to her home and family in Pristina.
**Updates IFEX alert of 30 April 1999**
Flora Brovina, aged 49, was arrested in Pristina by Serbian police on 22
April 1999. Her whereabouts were unknown until two weeks later when male
prisoners released from Lipjan prison, near Pristina, and who had managed to
flee Kosovo, reported that they believed she was detained in the women’s
unit of the same prison. It is thought that she spent some time in hospital
during this period. She is known to have suffered heart problems prior to
her arrest, and her hospitalisation may have been linked to this.
Hopes that Brovina and other prisoners in Kosovo would be freed with the
withdrawal of Serb troops were dashed after reports that a significant
number of prisoners arrested by Serb forces during the conflict had been
transferred to prisons inside Serbia. PEN has learned that some prisoners
were taken away in vehicles that were mixed among those of the withdrawing
Serb troops. Brovina was among them. She is now held in a prison in
Pozarevac, Serbia. Her lawyer has been denied access to her and there is
deep concern for her health. Those holding Brovina have yet to give reasons
for her arrest or provide details of the legislation under which she is
held.
International PEN believes that Brovina is held solely for continuing her
humanitarian work in Pristina during the war in Kosovo.
Recommended Action
Send appeals to authorities:
Flora
Brovina
allow
her to return to her family
medical attention and access to her legal counsel
Appeals To
His Excellency Slobodan Milosevic
President of Yugoslavia
Savezna Skupstina
11000 Belgrade
Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
Fax: + 381 11 636 775
</CON.
Please copy appeals to the source if possible.
