UN Urged to Finally Compensate Lead-Poisoned Kosovo Refugees

Roma children in 2009 at a camp in Mitrovica near the Trepca mining complex. Photo: EPA/VALDRIN XHEMAJ.

The United Nations’ special rapporteur for hazardous substances and wastes, Baskut Tuncak, said in a report on Monday that the UN must offer “individual compensation and a public apology” to Roma, Ashkali and Balkan Egyptian refugees who were poisoned while living in UN-operated camps in Kosovo that were situated on land contaminated by lead from a nearby mine.

“The lack of any tangible action by the United Nations comes despite clear findings of the HRAP [UN Human Rights Advisory Panel] of violations of the human rights of community members to life, freedom from inhuman and degrading treatment,” Tuncak said.

“The Special Rapporteur reiterates that the United Nations must engage with the victims regarding their demands and expectations and use this information to define an effective remedy for this tragedy and plan of action,” he added.

Some 600 Roma, Ashkali, and Egyptian people were displaced from the Kosovo town of Mitrovica after the 1998-99 war and resettled in camps near the Trepca mining complex on land contaminated by lead, according to campaign group Human Rights Watch.

Tuncak’s report said that “no one is questioning that Roma, Ashkali and Egyptian women, and children, were exposed to lead and other toxic substances causing severe impacts on health, in violation of their rights to life, health, and physical integrity, among others”.

“No one has questioned that it was the United Nations who housed the affected community on the site, and then failed to relocate the community for years when the harmful exposure to toxic substances known,” he added.

Human Rights Watch said in a statement on Monday that seven years after the last camp was shut down, the refugees are still experiencing health problems “and are still awaiting compensation and health and educational support for themselves and their families”.

“The United Nations should finally heed its own expert’s advice, clearly admit full responsibility, and finally provide a remedy to the victims,” Human Rights Watch urged.

In 2016 the UN Human Rights Advisory Panel found that the UN Mission in Kosovo, UNMIK, had violated the victims’ rights to life and health and recommended that the organisation should “take appropriate steps towards payment of adequate compensation”.

Instead, the UN established a trust fund to finance “community projects” for Roma, Ashkali and Egyptian minorities in northern Kosovo in 2017.

But the UN rapporteur said in his report on Monday that so far, the fund “has received an appalling single, solitary contribution of US 10,000 [dollars]”.

He said that if the victims want to be relocated outside Kosovo, the UN should intercede with member states to help them.