Florin Shala and his wife, Aferdita, have found temporary shelter in America, but they are determined to return home RELATED VIDEO CNN's Ed Garsten visits with a Kosovo refugee family in suburban Detroit Windows Media 28K 80K A look at the Fort Dix, New Jersey, refugee camp. (June 7) Real 28K 80K Windows Media 28K 80K How will 1 million Kosovo refugees be returned to their homes? CNN's Jonathan Aiken investigates. (June 8) Real 28K 80K Windows Media 28K 80K Dr. Drew Fuller's video diary of his time in a Macedonia refugee camp Real 28K 80K Windows Media 28K 80K IMAGE GALLERY The many faces of refugee relief NATO off target  ALSO: G-8 reaches consensus on draft Kosovo resolution Fort Dix speeds up relocation of Kosovo refugees  THE DELUGE OF REFUGEES: Where are they going?  IN-DEPTH SPECIAL: Strike on Yugoslavia

June 8, 1999
Web posted at: 11:48 a.m. EDT (1548 GMT)

In this story: 'He was very sick' Weather a factor in refugee return Home could be 'empty walls' 'My whole life is there' RELATED STORIES, SITES

WATERFORD, Michigan (CNN) -- The story of forced evacuation told by Florin Shala and his wife, Aferdita, is one heard repeatedly from thousands of other ethnic Albanians ordered out of their homes in the Serb province of Kosovo. Most are now living in overcrowded refugee camps.

But as refugees go, the Shalas and their two young children are among the lucky ones who've found a new, if temporary, life in the United States.

Just weeks ago, the couple was at home in the Kosovo capital of Pristina, celebrating their son Laurent's second birthday when, they say, Serb soldiers arrived, giving them five minutes to gather their personal belongings and leave.

'He was very sick'

The only food they could bring was "a liter of milk and two cookies for the kids," Florin told CNN. The children were "in their pajamas, celebrating the baby's birthday. The cake was on the table."

The family, which says Serb soldiers took their car, walked for five days through mountains to reach Macedonia. The journey almost killed Laurent, according to the toddler's father. "He was very sick... from lack of food.

With help from Lutheran Social Services, Aferdita's brother, Driton Berisha, a restaurant owner who lives in suburban Detroit, sponsored the family's move to the United States.

For now, the Shalas are living in Berisha's home while Florin, who was a humanitarian worker in Kosovo, works as a cook in his brother-in-law's restaurant. How long such a living arrangement will be necessary is anyone's guess.

Sometimes scared by the site of a passing police car, the Shalas are learning to adjust to their new surroundings. "Back home, you were beaten (and) tortured in the street when you spoke your mind," says Aferdita. "Here, when you speak your mind, you are free."

Weather a factor in refugee return

Even so, if the Shalas had their way, they would return home to Kosovo "as soon as the situation gets to where it will be calm again," says Berisha.

For the moment, though, NATO says it will continue bombing targets in Yugoslavia until the government in Belgrade agrees to withdraw its troops from Kosovo and allow in a NATO-run peacekeeping force.

If and when that happens, relief officials say Kosovo community leaders, elders and women will be escorted back to their hometowns to assess the situation, and then return to refugee camps to report what they found.

Preparing the refugee camps for harsh winter weather will be costly

Home could be 'empty walls'

The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that more than 860,000 people, the vast majority of them ethnic Albanians, such as the Shalas, have left Kosovo since NATO began its air assault against Yugoslavia on March 24. NATO says the ethnic Albanians were forced out in an ethnic cleansing campaign by Serbs. Yugoslavia says they were fleeing the fighting.

The vast majority are being housed in Albania and Macedonia.

In addition, many of Kosovo's 1.8 million ethnic Albanians were already displaced before the current exodus.

The United States, one of several countries that has agreed to take in refugees, has received nearly 6,000 so far and has promised to take in up to 20,000 on a temporary basis.

A top U.N. official, meanwhile, said not all the uprooted Kosovo Albanians could be returned to their homes before the cold weather season begins in September because of the numbers of refugees involved and the massive destruction in the province.

More than 860,000 refugees have fled Kosovo since March

"Time is short," Sergio Vieira de Mello, the U.N. undersecretary-general for humanitarian affairs, said Monday in Washington.

He noted that the number of Kosovo Albanian refugees and displaced persons could be as high as 1.5 million, and that only about three months remain before wintry weather arrives in the Balkans.

In many cases, the Kosovo Albanians will be returning to "four empty walls," Vieira de Mello told reporters.

"There is no roof. All their property has been looted, stolen. That is all they will find when they go back home for the majority of them," Vieira de Mello said.

'My whole life is there'

With no timetable on when the refugees can return, it's hard to put a price tag on their ongoing need for food, shelter and medicine.

But it will take at least $520 million to winterize tents at refugee camps or provide pre-fabricated housing.

This young refugee cries as she recalls her homeland

That doesn't include: the cost of upgrading utilities and latrines in the camps or making the roads safe for year-round travel by supply convoys.

The final cost could well exceed $1 billion.

De Mello said funding for the humanitarian operations must be quicker than for Bosnia after the war ended in that former Yugoslav Republic in 1995, when he said it took months to raise just $20 million.

As refugees wait for signs they can return to their homeland, their fatigue is mixed with despair. "My whole life is there (in Kosovo)," sobs a young girl, standing in front of the tent her family now calls home.

And no one -- politicians, soldiers or relief workers -- can tell her how long it will be before she and the others can return home.

Detroit Bureau Chief Ed Garsten and Reporter Jonathan Aiken contributed to this report.

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