Adam Yashari Albanian hero who fought against the Serbs and offered his family as a sacrifice to liberate Kosovo

Adam Chari is one of the most prominent founders and leaders of the Kosovo Liberation Army and one of the symbols of Kosovo's independence. Although more than 23 years have passed since his assassination along with 58 members of his family at the hands of Serbian forces, he is still alive in the memory of his people and the conscience of free people around the world.

In conjunction with the increase in Serbian provocations in the Balkans in general and Kosovo in particular, Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar visited on Wednesday the tomb of the leader of the Muslim Kosovar resistance against the Serbs, Adam Yashari, who heroically resisted until he was martyred with all his family members after being surrounded by Serbian police forces for several Days before killing all of them, except for his nephew, who was only 11 years old at the time.

Jashari, "the father of the Kosovo Liberation Army", is considered one of the most prominent symbols of the Kosovars who fought for the independence of Kosovo. He was posthumously awarded the title of "Hero of Kosovo" in conjunction with the declaration of independence of the disputed territories in 2008. In recognition of his heroism and great sacrifices, the National Theater in Pristina and Pristina International Airport, as well as the Olympic Stadium were named in his honor.

And Yashari, whose commemoration of his martyrdom is held every year in official and popular events, is respected by Albanians because of his fight and resistance for the independence of Kosovo from Serbia. Who is this Kosovo hero who gave the most precious to liberate Kosovo?

Birth and upbringing

Adam Yashari, who bore the name Fazil at birth, was born on November 28, 1955 in the central Kosovar village of Brikaz, into a Muslim family of Kosovar Albanians who had a decades-old track record of fighting Yugoslav forces.

Adam Chari was brought up from a young age on Albanian war stories, and was rarely seen without a gun. According to journalist Tim Judah, Chari "hate Serbs, and although he was one of the first recruits in the KLA, he was not an ideological fighter." He was uncomfortable with rising Serbian nationalism after the breakup of Yugoslavia in the 1990s.

Chari worked as a farmer until he participated in an armed uprising against the Serbian authorities in Kosovo in 1991. During this period, the "Kosovo Albanian Unitary Organization" appeared for the first time, which later became known as the "Kosovo Liberation Army", and he joined it and became one of its most prominent military leaders.

Resistance leadership

After Kosovo's parliament declared its accession as the seventh republic of the Federation of Yugoslavia and promulgated a new constitution to support this move on July 2, 1990, Chari quickly joined forces with volunteers in the Republic of Albania to form what became known as the Kosovo Liberation Army.

From 1991 to 1992, Chari and about 100 Albanians willing to fight for Kosovo's independence underwent military training in Labinot Mal municipality in Albania. After that, Adam and his fighters began launching armed raids targeting the Serbian administrative apparatus in Kosovo.

While in Albania, Chari was arrested in 1993, before being released at the request of the Albanian army, to later return to Kosovo, where he continued to lead the Kosovo Liberation Army, an Albanian Kosovar organization that fought for the secession of Kosovo from the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. During the 1990s, he launched attacks against the Serb-led Yugoslav military establishment.

Brikaz massacre

In July 1997 a Yugoslav court convicted Adam Chari in absentia of terrorism, which Human Rights Watch later described as a trial that "failed to comply with international standards." Following this trial, the Serbian forces tried more than once to arrest Yashari or even kill him, but the descending of Albanian resistance fighters from the mountains and forests to support him in his village prevented these attempts, the last of which was on January 22, 1998.

After the failure of the last attempt to arrest him, his fighters, distributed in small cells, continued to attack the Serbian police forces in the Bríkaz region, killing some of them.

In response to the killing of Serbian police, the Serbs planned a "large-scale retaliatory mission" that included tanks, troop carriers and helicopters, as well as supporting them with artillery fire from a nearby munitions factory. With the aim of eliminating Yashari and his family, the police attacked the village of Brikaz without warning on 5 March 1998, surrounded his house and demanded that he surrender.

After Yashari and his fighters refused to surrender, armed clashes continued for two days, resulting in his death and the martyrdom of 58 members of his family, including 28 children and women, including his wife, brother, son and everyone else who was in the house at the time except for his 11-year-old nephew.

Following the martyrdom of the symbol of the Kosovar revolution, Serbian forces launched several military campaigns against the independence-seeking population of Kosovo, and committed many war crimes, killing thousands and fleeing hundreds of thousands from their homes between 1998 and 1999.