In January 1921, Hasan Prishtina, the The President of the Committee of Kosovo and Dibra, sent a letter to the Royal Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Great Britain regarding Serbian atrocities against Albanian civilians in Luma and Dibra in 1918 and 1920. The telegram states that 20,000 Albanian men were murdered by the Serbs, and 1,500 women.

Transcribed:

Feb. 1 / 5° 25 – 5/345 – K. 8. D. 9.

We have the honour to lay before you the horrors inflicted by the Serbian army upon the unfortunate Albanian population of Kosovo, Dibra, and Kalia.

Here are the facts known to us:

In 1918, following the re-occupation of Kosovo by the Serbs, the latter have not ceased committing atrocities against the Albanian population inhabiting this region, where since then they have killed more than 20,000 men and 1,500 women and children.

Of the 168 villages that have been burned, 4,769 houses have been destroyed. The majority of this unfortunate population has found itself still in prisons, under a very harsh regime.

On 28-29-30 August 1920, in the region of Lower Dibra, 65 villages were burned, 7,800 houses were set on fire, and 250 people were shot alive, along with others — among them women, children, and the sick.

At the beginning of last December, in the district of Prizren (Kosovo), 250 houses were burned and 120 people were shot, and every day the number of Albanians who are victims and whose property has been sacked continues to increase.

We have just learned that the Yugoslav government is planning to carry out the emigration of Kosovars — cherished by the French army — to the region of Brenitsa as well as to other regions of Kosovo inhabited by Albanians.

In the name of these ordeals and of humanity, the Committee of Kosovo and Dibra implores your effective intervention with the Yugoslav government to put an end to these kinds of truly savage procedures, which have no other aim than the extermination of the Albanian race in the above-mentioned regions occupied by the Serbs.

The arrival of the said Kosovars would only cause an increase in discord between the Albanians and the Slavs, which could push the Albanians into acts of hostility in order to protect their goods and their national rights — something which would only complicate the situation in the Balkans.

Scutari, January 1921.

The President of the Committee of Kosovo and Dibra“

[Signed:] Hasan Prishtina