UNMIK/PR/1170
PRISTINA – SRSG Harri Holkeri today visited injured survivors of yesterday’s fatal shooting incident at the Mitrovica Detention Centre after breaking his home leave to return to Kosovo.
Mr Holkeri talked with Ronald Hicks and Elizabeth Mechler, two of the wounded international officers now being treated in the field hospital at the US Army’s Bondsteel camp in southern Kosovo. During their conversation Mr Holkeri delivered a message of sympathy from UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and voiced his condolences for the loss of their colleagues. The SRSG also expressed his strong support for the efforts of the correctional service officers.
The injured officers were transferred to the Bondsteel military facility from Mitrovica hospital where they were taken after a still unexplained shooting incident at the detention centre on Saturday. Three people were killed in the incident: two female American officers and one Jordanian policeman. The injured include 10 Americans (five of them women) and one Austrian.
Mr Holkeri thanked Brigadier General Rick Erlandson, Commander of KFOR’s Multi-National Brigade East, for making available the skilled staff and professional facilities of his medical services.
The SRSG was accompanied on the visit by PDSRSG Charles Brayshaw.