demanded that the autonomous province be fully reintegrated into Serbia, and the government of the Serbian Republic agreed. The non-Serbian republics of the Yugoslavian federation, cognizant of Serb dominance of Yugoslavia prior to the Second World War, however, were wary and reluctant to approve such a change.
On 28 March 1989, the Serbian Republic acted unilaterally to reintegrate Kosovo. Ethnic Albanians in Kosovo protested, and 30 of their leaders were jailed. A total of 20 ethnic Albanians were killed by federal police in the quelling of riots. The federal government of Yugoslavia contended that the riots were a part of a move to join Kosovo Province with the Republic of Albania. The actions by Serbia and the federal government widened the gulf between Serbia and the Muslim-dominated republics in the Yugoslavian federation.
Serbia doubled the Serb police presence in Kosovo, banned all public gatherings. Bozur, a Serb nationalist group based in Kosovo Polje, just outside the provincial capital Pristina, began pursuing plans to repopulate Kosovo with Serbs who left the province subsequent to the Albanian uprisings in 1981. Bozur's goal was a 50-50 ethnic split in Kosovo. The Bozur action steeled the resolve of the ethnic Albanians in Kosovo to the actions of the Serbs at all levels of government.
To Serb nationalists, Kosovo, the heart of the medieval Serbian empire, is their holiest shrine. Subsequent to Serbia's reintegration of Kosovo, ethnic Albanians were systematically fired from their jobs. Lecturers and professors at Pristina University were fired, together with thousands of school teachers and factory workers. The ethnic Albanian response was one of passive resistance. The ethnic Albanians attempted to establish their own separate society in Kosovo. The ethnic Albanians established their own schools that met in private homes. The ethnic Albanian goals were independence within Kosovo's existing bord...