Letter: What now for Serbs?

Sir: Robert Fisk's excellent report from Pristina (9 June ) gives a realistic picture, I believe, of things to come in a Kosovo liberated - or occupied - by Nato.

But as with so many stories before, no mention is made of the fate of Kosovo's terrorised and scattered 80,000 Roma, or Romanies.

Both the Romani Congress Party in Belgrade and the Skopje-based Romani Alliance Party want to see the UN and Nato enable Roma refugees, as well as ethnic Albanians, to return safely to their homes. Roma continue to suffer at the hands of both sides and need a guarantee that their civil, cultural and political rights will be safeguarded under whatever new regime emerges in the province.

The 5th World Romani Congress takes place in The Hague next April and we shall be reviewing then what progress has been made in fulfilling the human rights aims which have been the justification for the war. The fate of Romanies will, we assert, provide a sure gauge of the health of any new democracy in Kosovo.

GRATTAN PUXON

Colchester, Essex

The writer is a former general secretary of the International Romani Union