The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

JIM LEHRER: Good evening. I'm Jim Lehrer. On the NewsHour tonight, the House votes down the gun control bill, Kwame Holman reports, Mark Shields and Paul Gigot analyze, then Charles Krause tells a murder aftermath story in Kosovo, Margaret Warner looks at making a war crimes case, and Robert Pinsky reads some Father's Day poetry. It all follows our summary of the news this Friday.

NEWS SUMMARY

JIM LEHRER: The House of Representatives killed the gun control bill today. The vote was 280-147, almost 2-1. The no's were a combination of Republicans who oppose firearms restrictions and Democrats who said it had become too watered down. They objected to a provision easing existing regulations on sales at gun shows. We'll have more on this story right after the News Summary. The US and Russia agreed today on a role for Russian troops in Kosovo. Under a deal signed in Helsinki, Russian forces will accept the overall direction of NATO, but remain under Russian command. In addition, the airport at Pristina, now held by Russian soldiers, will be opened to all nations. In Kosovo, NATO forces found still more evidence of Serb atrocities against ethnic Albanians. Tom Bearden has our summary report.

TOM BEARDEN: British troops are guarding the ruins of the Feronikl factory in the town of Glogovac, a place local Albanians say the Serbs used to kill up to 600 people.

RUSDE KARAXHA, KLA Soldier: [speaking through interpreter] They used this place as their main base. Here they tortured people, they brought civilians inside and executed them here. We heard that possibly the furnaces were used to burn people.

TOM BEARDEN: The massacre is alleged to have taken place after the factory was bombed by NATO on April 29. Locals also claim there are a number of mass graves surrounding the plant.

MAJOR NICK WALSH, British KFOR Forces: We've been given a list of 51 names for one of the grave sites, and we're looking into that. Part of the problem with these graves is the fact that there are mines in the area. And what we're trying to do is simply take them off. When we can get in there and get an investigation team in, that would be useful.

TOM BEARDEN: In Kushavic, near Djaovica, the remains of 87 people thought to be ethnic Albanians have been found in another mass grave. The killings allegedly occurred on May 7th, following heavy fighting between Serbs and the Kosovo Liberation Army. British armored forces have reached the town of Podujevo, near the Kosovo border with Serbia, where they were welcomed with open arms by local ethnic Albanians. NATO now estimates that 75 percent of the Yugoslav forces in Kosovo have departed. Sunday is the deadline for them all to be out. KFOR troops have become much more aggressive on the issue of KLA soldiers and weapons. German troops, who had been allowing KLA fighters to cross into Kosovo from Albania while still heavily armed, have now told rebels they can't carry weapons in public after midnight tonight. British and American troops have had several tense confrontations with the KLA, and in some cases have had to threaten force.

MAJOR TOBY BRIDGE, Royal King Hussars: We don't mind having our forces intermingled with the Serb forces. What we do not want is for there to be any security vacuum. To that end, we've moved up again to deploy our forces throughout the area, so that any attack by either community upon each other can be stopped by our forces.

TOM BEARDEN: The U.N. now estimates that more than 50,000 Kosovar Albanians have returned to the province, despite the fact that in some cities and towns more than 90 percent of the buildings have been destroyed. Relief agencies are putting a high priority on restoring power and water, and are calling on Kosovar professionals to return to help in the effort.

RON REDMOND, UNHCR Spokesman: People like water engineers, sanitation engineers, civil engineers, lawyers doctors, and administrators; some of these people who really have special knowledge and who are crucial for rebuilding society. We did a similar program in Bosnia, where we tried to get these people back first so that we could get the infrastructure back up and running.

TOM BEARDEN: Serb civilians continued their exodus from Kosovo, 33,000 so far, according to NATO. On a visit to Russia, the U.N. Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson, deplored that fact.

MARY ROBINSON: We have seen a terrible situation. My plea now is, very strongly, let us not see a repetition of more ethnic driving out of Serbs. Let us not see revenge. Let us see a Kosovo that can accommodate both Kosovo Albanians and Serb population.

TOM BEARDEN: The head of Serbia's Orthodox Church, Patriarch Pavel, also appealed for Serbs to stay. He said he had decided to move his patriarch to the western Kosovo town of Pec, the birthplace of the church, to set an example. Even so, reports of Albanian reprisals against Serbs continue. KFOR has stepped up patrols and is guarding Serb cultural sites following the ransacking of a Serb monastery near Mitrovica. In Prizren, German soldiers detained 25 KLA rebels after finding an elderly man dead and 15 others hurt in a police station the rebels had occupied. In Helsinki, Finland, Secretary of Defense William Cohen and Russian Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev signed an agreement on Russian participation in the Kosovo peacekeeping operation. It ended an impasse that began last week when Russian troops surprised NATO by rolling into the Pristina airport.

WILLIAM COHEN: Our agreement meets two fundamental requirements. It preserves the unity of command necessary to make KFOR an effective military force, and it gives Russia a unique role by providing for operations of Russian forces within KFOR sectors run by the United States, France and Germany. In addition, we have agreed on a plan to open the Pristina airport to all KFOR nations and on arrangements for operation of the airfield once this agreement is approved by NATO's North Atlantic Council.

TOM BEARDEN: NATO troops in Kosovo will take a more active role in bringing suspected war criminals to justice as a result of an agreement reached today between the allied nations and the International War Crimes Tribunal. Chief Prosecutor Louise Arbour announced the accord in Brussels.

LOUISE ARBOUR: I'm very confident that with existing arrest warrants served to all states, freezing orders served to all states against five very high-ranking accused, and every likelihood that morecharges against more accused will be forthcoming, that I'm very confident that some of these cases will be tried, but I cannot be very explicit, obviously, about what strategy I would want to put in place to facilitate their apprehension at this stage.

TOM BEARDEN: The first of a dozen investigative teams from the tribunal crossed the border into Kosovo this morning.

JIM LEHRER: We'll have more on Kosovo war crimes later in the program tonight. President Clinton was in Cologne, Germany, today for the annual economic summit of the Group of Seven industrial nations and Russia. He met separately with Japanese Prime Minister Obuchi to talk about a trade dispute over steel. The G-7 leaders agreed to forgive the debts of many poor nations. It will amount to nearly $100 billion. The three-day summit is scheduled to focus on economic problems caused by the Kosovo crisis. President Yeltsin is expected to join the group on Sunday. The expansion of state lotteries should be slowed; the regulation of Indian gaming should be stiffened: That was the gist of a report by the National Gambling Impact Study Commission. It was made public today and submitted to Congress, the White House, state governors, and tribal governments. The report also recommended a minimum age of 21 to place bets and a ban on betting on collegiate sports. That's it for the News Summary tonight. Now it's on to the gun vote in the House, Shields and Gigot, a Krause report from Kosovo, making the war crimes case, and some Father's Day poetry.

UPDATE - GUN CONTROL

JIM LEHRER: Kwame Holman has the gun control story.

SPOKESMAN: The Committee will be in order.

KWAME HOLMAN: The rhetoric in the House during three days of debate on juvenile violence and guns was passionate and often accusatory; the membership, tired and testy.

SPOKESPERSON: Thank you. I ask unanimous consent to revise and extend my remarks because I simply cannot understand -

SPOKESMAN: Without objection.

SPOKESPERSON: I don't understand how a House of people -- who were willing to wait four days for dry cleaning can't wait for a gun.

KWAME HOLMAN: Late last night and early this morning, the House took its long-anticipated action on requiring background checks at gun shows to prevent juveniles and criminals from getting access to guns.

REP. ROD BLAGOJEVICH, [D] Illinois: In fact, 54,000 guns were confiscated last year in crimes that came from gun shows, in the 5,200 gun shows that we had across the country.

KWAME HOLMAN: Under current law, federally licensed dealers at gun shows are required to conduct background checks on customers that can take up to three days if necessary. But private dealers at gun shows are exempt from having to conduct background checks. New York Democrat Carolyn McCarthy called that a loophole, and as the Senate did last month, she moved to close it. Six years ago, McCarthy's husband was killed and her son critically injured by a gunman on the Long Island railroad. She was elected to Congress three years ago after campaigning on a strong gun control platform. Last night, McCarthy held the attention of the House as she pushed her amendment to require all gun show dealers to take up to three days to conduct background checks. And her definition of a gun show was any event in which 50 guns or more were on display.

REP. CAROLYN MCCARTHY: Dear colleagues, this is an amendment that is common sense. It is common sense for the American people. I ask to you listen to the speakers and hopefully be open minded when you vote.

KWAME HOLMAN: But Michigan Democrat John Dingell arguedthat gun show dealers and patrons were being characterized unfairly.

REP. JOHN DINGELL: Now, gun shows are not saturnalias of criminals who are bent on destroying the lives and the well-being of innocent citizens. They are a group of innocent citizens who are doing something that goes back as far as Plymouth Rock. They are getting together to sell, trade and to engage in commerce.

KWAME HOLMAN: Dingell, the most senior member in the House, also proposed requiring all dealers to conduct background checks, but limiting the time for that process to a maximum of 24 hours, less than what current law requires. And at least ten dealers would have to be on hand for at a gun-selling event for it to be considered a gun show at all.

REP. JOHN DINGELL: To go beyond this is simply to harass innocent, law-abiding citizens and to hurt people who love to go to gun shows to see their fellow citizens, to talk about guns, to look at firearms, to perhaps purchase a firearm, or more likely to purchase some other kind of sporting accoutrement.

KWAME HOLMAN: Most Democrats argued against the Dingell amendment and for McCarthy.

REP. ROBERT ANDREWS: An angry, paranoid schizophrenic goes to a gun show at 10:00 on a Saturday morning, attempts to buy a gun. The police discover on Monday morning that he has a criminal background record of beating his wife and a long criminal rap sheet. Under the Dingell amendment, he gets to buy the gun. Under the McCarthy amendment, he does not.

KWAME HOLMAN: A solid group of northeast republicans argued the same way. New Jersey's Marge Roukema joined McCarthy as a co-sponsor.

REP. MARGE ROUKEMA: The checks occurring on a Saturday under the Dingell rule would mean that more than 60 percent of current denials would not have been made. That means literally a convicted rapist, child molester or any other felon could have gotten the gun.

KWAME HOLMAN: Some Republicans wanted no change in the law, but given the choice, most chose Dingell over McCarthy.

REP. BOB BARR: That date of three working days, which can balloon on a holiday weekend, which is very popular for gun shows, into six days was not chosen at random. Three days was chosen because would it put gun shows out of business. Yet it appears to be benign.

KWAME HOLMAN: And the majority of Republicans were joined by a sizable group of Democrats, mostly from the South and rural Midwest.

REP. BOB CLEMENT: Maybe the Dingell amendment won't have made any sense years ago. But we now have a national instant background check that we didn't have before. Therefore, we're in a position to check on the guns that are sold within a 24-hour period.

KWAME HOLMAN: It was Democrat Bart Stupak, who represents a large number of hunters in Northern Michigan and is a member of the National Rifle Association, who provided one of the most dramatic moments of the debate.

REP. BART STUPAK: I will vote to make sure that all prospective gun purchasers must follow the same instant check system -- no exceptions, no excuses, no special treatment. With so many gun owners and hunters in my district, the last vote and this vote are very tough votes for me politically. But I say to my colleagues, this is the right vote. I urge you to do the right thing. Vote for the McCarthy amendment. [Applause]

KWAME HOLMAN: There were several tense minutes as the votes were tabulated, first on the Dingell amendment. Those members actively involved in the debate voted immediately, and then waited anxiously for their colleagues to make their way from their individual offices across the street from the Capitol to the House floor. In the end, 47 Republicans voted against the Dingell amendment. But 45 Democrats voted for it. And it passed narrowly.

SPOKESMAN: On this vote the yeas are 41 -- 214.

KWAME HOLMAN: Still to come was the vote on the McCarthy amendment, and the New York Congresswoman made one final pitch.

REP. CAROLYN McCARTHY: Three business days, an inconvenience to some people. It is not infringing on constitutional rights. It is not taking away anyone's right to own a gun. I do not think that is difficult for us to do. And if we don't do it, shame on us, because I have to tell you, the American people will remember. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

KWAME HOLMAN: McCarthy got a standing ovation for her effort. But moments later, her amendment was defeated, with 49 Democrats voting with most Republicans against the stricter gun show regulations. When the House reconvened at 9 this morning, members approved a flurry of amendments, including a prohibition on possession of assault weapons by those under 18 and a requirement a safety lock be sold with every handgun. All the approved amendments were wrapped into a single bill, which mirrored the Senate's gun legislation except for the gun show provisions.

REP. BILL McCOLLUM: It may not be again what everybody wants, but it's a constructive proposal that does advance the purposes intended.

KWAME HOLMAN: But during the final vote this afternoon, it was clear the resulting bill went too far for some and not far enough for others. Nearly all Democrats voted against it, largely because of the looser gun show provisions. And 82 Republicans were happy to join them believing the bill contained too many restrictions on guns. A clear indication of the dilemma was the fact that representatives McCarthy and Dingell helped vote down the overall bill.

FOCUS - POLITICAL WRAP

JIM LEHRER: Some analysis of the House vote and other matters political now by Shields and Gigot, syndicated columnist Mark Shields, "Wall Street Journal" columnist Paul Gigot. Mark, this was a unlikely coalition. It wasn't a formal coalition -- liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans. Why were the Democrats so opposed to this final bill?

MARK SHIELDS: So opposed to the final bill?

JIM LEHRER: Yes.

MARK SHIELDS: They didn't want anything coming out of the House, Jim. They wanted to keep the issue alive. They -- the Democrats think it's -- in other words, if it had gone to conference, if they passed this bill, it would have gone to conference in its weakened condition and that would have meant that the House position would have been in support of the Dingell amendment and what has been weakened from the Senate bill. Thus the Senate leadership -- the House Democratic leadership concluded, and the membership agreed with them, that they were better off to keep this issue alive.

JIM LEHRER: With no bill.

MARK SHIELDS: With no bill, and the idea being at some point the Senate Democrats will try to put an appropriations bill, to send it over to the House, to force the House to deal with it again. Recall this -- that the Senate initially voted to reject this proposal, the strengthening of the bill, just last month, and then turned around when public pressure and public reaction to it, and changed its vote.

JIM LEHRER: All right, then Paul, explain the Republicans' opposition to it.

PAUL GIGOT: Well, the Republicans, about 80 of them or so who voted against it, they don't want any kind of gun control at all. They didn't even like the Dingell provisions which the National Rifle Association supported. Now a lot of the members of the leadership, the Republican leadership, did want this bill to pass finally with John Dingell's amendment because they want to get this issue off the table. I was in the Speaker's lobby today, which is right outside the floor, after the vote was over, and the members were filing out, some of them saying, these are NRA supporters, saying oh, my God, what did I just do? I have to vote on this again and again and again. They wanted it done, but some of the conservatives wanted nothing at all.

JIM LEHRER: Well, the President said last night on the Dingell thing and it was repeated today by some of his supporters that the NRA had defeated this. Is that on the money?

PAUL GIGOT: Well, I'm reminded of that photo of the NRA ad campaign where they have people saying, I'm the NRA. Well, in this case "I'm the NRA" was John Dingell, a Democrat. This was really defeated, if that's what it was, by John Dingell. He's the one who brought 45 Democrats with him on this bill. Now I happen to think ultimately he did a two step on the Republicans and did the Democrats a favor, because by offering that amendment, what he did is he gave an awful lot of vulnerable Democrats a covering vote on gun control. These are people from rural districts. These are people where guns are popular. And he gave them cover. Then he turned around today and opposed the final passage, creating chaos on this issue. He helped his colleagues on this, I think.

JIM LEHRER: Now, who -

MARK SHIELDS: Dissent. Dissent quickly. Every Republican -- I was on the Hill today myself up where Paul walked and every Republican I talked to cited one thing: John Dingell, John Dingell, John Dingell. John Dingell wasn't giving Democrats cover as much as he's giving Republicans cover. The Republicans don't want to this be a Democrat-Republican issue. I mean, Jim, let's be quite frank about it. 80 percent of the Democrats voted one way, 80 percent of Republicans voted the other. It is interesting to talk about the guys in the middle.

JIM LEHRER: The ones who decided it, but the fact is the majority -

MARK SHIELDS: The fact is the Democrats are overwhelmingly for this proposal, the Republicans are overwhelmingly against it. And I think that, to me, is the key here.

JIM LEHRER: Okay. Now, what are the politics? Who wins, who loses on it? Who can go out and raise cane and votes on this one?

MARK SHIELDS: My reporting this afternoon in talking to pollsters of both sides and what they found since the Senate acted, what we're seeing is a sea change in suburban areas, particularly among one demographic group, which is crucial to the election of 2000, and that is women in the suburbs with children. We are seeing margins of up to 9-1 women with children saying anything at all. Now this is obviously a consequence of Littleton, of Georgia, of Kentucky, of Arkansas and the schools, and the schools no longer being safe to a lot of people in a lot of people's minds. And that is a crucial critical element in the politics of this. The question remains there is no doubt that the National Rifle Association has been an effective and efficient lobby. I think I've got to give it credit. It has been enormously effective. And its membership has been single minded in its voting. They've voted against any candidate who supported any gun control. The question that's in people's minds, even though the numbers are with the gun control people, whether the intensity's there, whether that same sort of passion and conviction where people who were for gun control will say, damn it, I'm going to vote on this issue because candidate X whom I've always voted for in the past is soft on this issue or weak on gun control. I'm going to vote for the challenger.

JIM LEHRER: How do you read the fallout?

PAUL GIGOT: I met with a Republican woman member, very prominent woman member who has kind of a split district. And she said that -

JIM LEHRER: Split in what way?

PAUL GIGOT: Rural - half of it -- suburban - half of it.

JIM LEHRER: Okay.

PAUL GIGOT: So she gets crosscurrents. And her argument was that the intensity used to be all on the gun control - on the NRA side. Those were the people who had 4,000, 5,000, that will come out and hurt you. But she said there is a sea change, like Mark said, and there is something of a change in the intensity from the gun control side. And that's influencing some of the suburban Republican districts. There is no question about it. And what is fascinating - the bigger picture here - and I think this is behind the scenes what was going on with a lot of the Democrats is Al Gore. He was calling up on Capitol Hill, I'm told. He really wants this issue. And he wants to use it against George W. Bush in the election. He wants to keep it alive. So you had the President today and the Vice President denouncing the whole House for killing this bill when 197 Democrats helped to kill it.

JIM LEHRER: But you think it's not over yet. I mean, it will come back in some form - the issue after all?

MARK SHIELDS: This issue -- and Tom DeLay was boasting the fact that - the House Republican Whip -- it was over but I don't think it is over by any means.

JIM LEHRER: All right. Speaking of Al Gore and George W. Bush, both of them got ought in their campaigns this week. Let's take them one at a time. George W. Bush. How -- what kind of opening act did he have this week do you think?

MARK SHIELDS: Well, I was up in New Hampshire with Governor Bush and covering him. And I'll say this, Jim: Ordinarily when a candidate starts running for President, he works the Rotary Club in Mason City, Iowa, or the Kwanis Club in Merrimack, New Hampshire; 55 people in the room, you work the act. You burnish your speech, you see what lines work. Nobody is watching you. George Bush came out. There were 29, count them, 29 television cameras and 200 reporters. And he was very surefooted. He handled himself well. I know it's a word that they don't want to hear. But he is Clintonesque. He is that good in retail politics -- the retail politics, the kind of politics we - the voters one-on-one, one on three. He is terrific.

JIM LEHRER: You think he is going to remember your name the next time.

MARK SHIELDS: I got to tell you. I walked behind --

PAUL GIGOT: Mark -

JIM LEHRER: Retail politics.

MARK SHIELDS: I walked behind him and this little fella in sort of a polyester jacket, very diffident, man 75 or so, excuse me, Governor, I'm Eddie -- I couldn't hear his name. He reaches out in a bear hug and says Eddie, I'll never forget what you did for my dad. And I'm telling you, this guy's life was made. So he is --he had a good, good week. There's no question about it.

JIM LEHRER: How do you read the Bush thing?

PAUL GIGOT: It's almost like an incumbent campaign, Jim. This is not a challenger's campaign. This was not an off-Broadway show. And it was very impressive, the organization, the slickness of it. And the candidate was impressive, I thought, in his being relaxed. You know, he could have gone up there and said, boy, look at all those cameras, I'm on the big stage. He wasn't. He did extremely well. He is affable. I would say hewas Reaganesque in one sense. I think that's an adjective I think he would prefer -

JIM LEHRER: To being Clintonesque. Okay.

PAUL GIGOT: In his optimism. Reagan made conservatives seem optimistic, forward looking. George W. Bush has some of that same quality to him. And that's one of the things he seems to be trying to do is a way to separate himself from the congressional Republicans, is to say, look, there's a lot of good going on. Let's make it better. And he has that cheerful tone, I think it very effective.

JIM LEHRER: All right. Al Gore, what kind of esque did he do this week?

PAUL GIGOT: Goreesque. [laughter] In fact, what was noticeable about - I thought -- first of all, I thought he did very well, too. But what was noticeable to me, it was hard to tell who was trying to contrast himself more with Bill Clinton this week: George W. Bush or Al Gore -- because Al Gore was very much trying to I'm my own man; I'm not Bill Clinton; my agenda is Clintonism without the character flaws, Clintonism without the perjury; all that stuff, all that character stuff, you're not going to get that with me. So Tipper is front and center, his daughter, his pregnant daughter front and center. He went out of his way to try to -

MARK SHIELDS: His married pregnant daughter.

PAUL GIGOT: Yes. I didn't say she wasn't. Family values.

JIM LEHRER: Never mind.

PAUL GIGOT: If he mentioned family values one more time you could close your eyes and think it was Dan Quayle. But I thought that was effective. I think he has to do that. It is going to be hard because he six months ago he was telling us he was the greatest President of all time, Bill Clinton, comparing him to Washington and Lincoln, but he has to try.

MARK SHIELDS: Al Gore -- it perplexes me, Jim -- Al Gore is somehow faulted and found wanting for his campaign performance, his lack of charisma as a candidate. I don't know who is he being compared to, President George Bush, President Gerry Ford, President Richard Nixon, President Jimmy Carter. No, the problem is, he is being compared to Bill Clinton, who was gifted and is an enormously gifted candidate. I think this about Al Gore: The race in 1988 and the race in 2000 are very similar. You had a governor, major industrial state, popular, sort of submerged his issues, with a big lead and a lot of money. And he was running against a vice president who hadn't established his own identity, people weren't sure of, weren't sure of his own independence and strength. The part of Al Gore in 1988 was played by George Bush. The part of George W. Bush in 2000 was played by Michael Dukakis with the big lead. So I think, you know, we are an awful long way from the voting in New Hampshire and Iowa. I don't -- I think Gore has a difficult task. There is no question about it. He has to convince people that they want a third term of Bill Clinton.

JIM LEHRER: Ceci Connolly of the "Washington Post" said on this program last night that Al Gore and George W. Bush operated this week like it was already the general election campaign. Do you agree with that?

PAUL GIGOT: I do. It's striking to me. They are both running almost as if they've won the nominations in the general election campaigns.

JIM LEHRER: Hits against each other?

PAUL GIGOT: Oh, yes. And the ridiculous -- it got ridiculous when Al Gore started speaking Spanish in his speech, which is one of George W. Bush's kind of campaign ticks. But, you know, it was almost as if they've already won the nomination.

MARK SHIELDS: You didn't know there was a bodio in Carthage, Tennessee. Nobody else did. I think this, that George W. Bush was trying to pick a fight with Pat Buchanan. In other words, the fight on the Republican side is a different fight from the Democrats. The fight on the Republican side is to who will be the Republican equivalent of Bill Bradley. Bill Bradley, by the fact that nobody else ran against Al Gore, is the only alternative. He is - I mean, he's their number two. There are only two choices. Everybody else on the Republican side is fighting right now, whether it's John McCain or Mrs. Dole or John Kasich or Steve Forbes, is fighting to be the Bill Bradley of the Republican side. That's the kind of support and enthusiasm that George W. Bush has had in this first week.

JIM LEHRER: Okay, thank you both very much.

FOCUS - MURDER IN KOSOVO

JIM LEHRER: Still to come on the NewsHour tonight, the murder of a human rights lawyer in Kosovo and making the war crimes case, plus some Father's Day poetry. Charles Krause has the murder in Kosovo story. A caution: Some of the video is very graphic.

CHARLES KRAUSE: With KFOR troops now in full control of Kosovo's capital, Pristina, the Nekibe Kelmendi came out of hiding yesterday for the first time since the night of March 24th. It was the night NATO first bombed Serbia and the night Serb police first came for Nekibe Kelmendi's husband here in Pristina at their home. Byron Kelmendi was Kosovo's leading human rights lawyer; he was also one of a small group of Albanian intellectuals who worked closely with the United States over the past year to try to avoid the spasm of violence and death that in the end finally came. U.S. Ambassador of Macedonia Chris Hill met with Byron Kelmendi on numerous occasions with him and knew him well.

CHRISTOPHER HILL: He was very principled, very articulate, very animated when he spoke. I mean, he was a leader. And that's why he was on the group of people that we were putting together in order to have a negotiation - very, very active person. You know, he was a big guy. I remember, he had this shock of white hair. You could tell that he was a lawyer who, in a court of law, could, you know, do very well.

CHARLES KRAUSE: Nekibe Kelmendi last saw her husband and their two sons alive that long night in March nearly three months ago. It was not until yesterday that she herself felt safe enough and emotionally ready to go home.

NEKIBE KELMENDI: [speaking through interpreter] They force it open by kicking and banging with their weapons.

CHARLES KRAUSE: There were three Serb policemen who broke into the Kelmendis' home that night -- all three of them in uniform, and all three of them heavily armed.

NEKIBE KELMENDI: [speaking through interpreter] They were regular policemen, their police force. Here it was written police force. They weren't masked. Their faces were uncovered. Then they went upstairs. My son was sitting right there when one of the policemen entered with a gun. He fired inside here and look what they've done. The bullet went that way and broke right through the microwave. My son was sitting there. That means they were shooting at him, but the bullet missed. They forced to us lie down on the floor. I was lying down right here with my hands like this, and I was afraid to raise my head. Both of them had their guns pointed towards our heads. I didn't dare move at all.

CHARLES KRAUSE: After nearly an hour of ripping apart the house, the policemen left with her husband and two sons.

NEKIBE KELMENDI: [speaking through interpreter] They took them and it was 2 o'clock, when they finally left the house. And I called, "Look, the phone is not there anymore."

CHRISTOPHER HILL: I got a call from a Kosovo Albanian, who was another member of the Rambouillet process, informing me that he and his sons had been abducted. So the first question was, is there anyone we can get to in Kosovo to deal with that? The problem was, everyone had been pulled out some week before. So the problem is once the person has been abducted, alas, there was not a lot that could be done about it apart from going straight to the Serbs. And, believe me, the Serbs were not taking telephone calls.

CHARLES KRAUSE: The next day Nekibe Kelmendi begged the Serb police for information. She was told there was none. Then 48 hours after they were abducted, the tortured and bullet-riddled bodies of Byron Kelmendi, his 30-year-old son, Kastriate, and 16-year-old Kastrim were found on a street in Pristina.

CHARLES KRAUSE: Do you believe that Slobodan Milosevic is responsible for the death of your husband and your two sons?

NEKIBE KELMENDI: [speaking through interpreter] Absolutely. Yes. Absolutely, yes. Milosevic did anything he wanted to do in Kosovo. When he wanted, he used a peep hole. When he wanted to, he sent troops into Kosovo. And when he wanted to, he brought them back. You have seen the weapons he had. Do you really think that all of this was done without his knowledge?

CHARLES KRAUSE: As we sat in her ransacked living room, Nekibe Kelmendi was almost obsessed, wanting to show us the many legal documents she and her husband had prepared over the years. In addition to gathering evidence of human rights abuses by Serb authorities in Kosovo, it was Byron Kelmendi who first went to the international court of justice in the Hague to demand that Serbian President Milosevic be indicted as a war criminal. The indictment came shortly after Byron Kelmendi and his sons were murdered.

CHARLES KRAUSE: Do you think that the murder of your husband was an act of revenge, or were they worried about what he would do if he were still alive?

NEKIBE KELMENDI: [speaking through interpreter] It was revenge against Byron, my husband, not only to abduct him for going before the Hague tribunal but also they had such a hatred of him for such a long period of time he had been trying to speak openly about what is happening here and he opened the eyes of the world for the crimes and genocide and everything they had done here.

CHRISTOPHER HILL: The name of the game for the Kosovar Albanians in the ten years prior to the insurgency was to get international recognition of their problem. And they didn't want to do it through an armed insurgency. They wanted to do it through people like Mr. Kelmendi. So he was very important to the process.

CHARLES KRAUSE: How great a threat was he to Serb control over Kosovo?

CHRISTOPHER HILL: Well, you recall that up until only a year ago the Serbs insisted this is purely an internal affair; this is not the affair of the international community. And so anyone who was successful in bringing the international community into this, and Mr. Kelmendi was successful, was indeed a threat.

CHARLES KRAUSE: Did you ever think of leaving Kosovo when the bombing started?

NEKIBE KELMENDI: [speaking through interpreter] No. Even though I was in great danger, the police came in and out of the house ten times and they robbed and looted my house. Maybe they were looking for me. I have never considered leaving Kosovo. I want to die here. I cannot abandon the land where my family is buried.

CHARLES KRAUSE: Will you continue the work that you and your husband began?

NEKIBE KELMENDI: [speaking through interpreter] I will continue my work for as long as I live, until we achieve what we have been struggling for in Kosovo, but peacefully. I cannot do it any other way.

CHARLES KRAUSE: Do you believe that the western powers will see to it that Milosevic and the others are brought to justice at the Hague?

NEKIBE KELMENDI: [speaking through interpreter] If they don't do that, then the indictment will be merely declaration. The tribunal will then be completing its mission. It will be just an historic document without any practical effect.

CHARLES KRAUSE: What will it mean to you and your people if Milosevic and the others are not brought to justice at the Hague?

NEKIBE KELMENDI: [speaking through interpreter] Total disappointment.

CHARLES KRAUSE: As the Serb withdrawal from Kosovo continues, more and more mass graves are being uncovered throughout this war-torn province. And, like thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of their countrymen, Byron Kelmendi and his two sons are today buried in shallow graves, their bodies are resting at least temporarily just beneath the surface of Kosovo's bloodstained earth.

FOCUS - WAR CRIMES

JIM LEHRER: Now, building a case against accused war criminals in Kosovo, and to Margaret Warner.

MARGARET WARNER: And for perspective on the task ahead, we turn to two men with extensive experience in investigating and prosecuting war crimes. Eric Stover has investigated numerous mass killings, particularly in the former Yugoslavia, and he has written several books on the subject. He just spent three weeks in Albania taking testimony from Kosovar refugees. He's also director of the Human Rights Center at the University of California at Berkeley. And Terree Bowers was a prosecutor for the international criminal tribunal for the former Yugoslavia from 1994 to 1998; he served as acting chief of prosecutions his final year. He's now with the Justice Department. Welcome, gentlemen.

Eric Stover, how will investigators go about trying to figure out who committed all these killings that are now being unearthed in Kosovo?

ERIC STOVER: Well, it's going to be a process that really -- it is going to be a stop and go. They are going to have a number of teams going out to seven sites throughout Kosovo. These teams are all going to come from Canada, the United States, Britain and possibly Norway, if I'm right. And as they move into the country, they are going to go in with KFOR protection. They are going to be brought up to the seven sites.

MARGARET WARNER: Excuse me. These are the seven sites that were named in the indictment of Mr. Milosevic and the four others.

ERIC STOVER: That's right. There are seven sites that have been designated by the war crimes tribunal. When they arrive with KFOR troops -

MARGARET WARNER: We have a map. You can't see it but we have a map showing those sites. Go ahead. I'm sorry.

ERIC STOVER: That's all right. As they move in, the KFOR troops are going to de-mine the sites. That's extremely important. If it turns out there are mines, it is going to be stop and go because they'll have to wait until the areas are cleared. And then the teams are going to move in and they are going to survey the site, essentially marking in where the graves are, where there might be buildings that people may have been held. It's a very slow, methodical process. And once that is done - and they are going to be looking for bullet casings and other things that may be there -- they'll slowly begin exhuming the graves, and in this process they'll bring an archeologist who will do this very painstakingly. The remains will be taken out and they will be taken to a morgue, usually a makeshift morgue somewhere where the autopsies will be performed.

MARGARET WARNER: Now, in addition to this physical evidence, what kind of other evidence do the investigators needs?

ERIC STOVER: Well, there are three types of evidence. It doesn't matter if it is in South Philadelphia or Kosovo. That is first of all documentary evidence. This is what the tribunal already has. From human rights organizations like Human Rights Watch and Physicians for Human Rights and the tribunal's only investigators, they've collected testimony about these sites. And then with the second type of evidence, which is documentary evidence, these can be radio broadcasts, it's the proverbial paper trail. It can be intercepted between commanders. They've received quite a bit of information from NATO governments through intelligence. That is information that is important because it takes you up the chain of command eventually to Slobodan Milosevic. Now the third, and this is where they're going in -- where the teams are going in now, that's physical evidence. Physical evidence is really the corpus delicti. It is finding the bodies, the victims, exhuming and identifying the victim - and that's very important, and determining the cause of death. What you want as a prosecutor is really to have evidence from each of those three categories. That gives you your strongest case.

MARGARET WARNER: All right. Mr. Bowers, you are a prosecutor. How, given all the sites, all the evidence, all the testimony, how do investigators decide what to concentrate on, which crimes to concentrate on? Do they concentrate on high profile killings or killings of high profile people such as we just saw, Mr. Kilmende, or do they go to the mass graves? What's the standard?

TERREE BOWERS: Well, in this particular case you have to take into account the existing indictment. So I think the initial effort will be to focus on the charges in that indictment against the five primary architects of the ethnic cleansing in Kosovo. So you'll go to those sites and you'll try and bolster the evidence of the actual alleged atrocities so that you can really strengthen the case to present at trial as far as the crime base is concerned. The other thing, as Eric mentioned, you want to try and develop as much evidence as possible with regard to the command understand control exercise ed by these five individuals charged in the indictment. That can be through the testimony, people witnessed what was happening as the troops and the police came into the villages and took over, so there can be visual representations of the exercise of command. If we're fortunate, we may actually uncover documentation that will help us with command and control. In Bosnia, we found out after the Dayton agreement, when the crime scenes were secured, we were very, very fortunate in developing some actual documentary evidence that assists us in formalizing the chain of command in proving that these leaders are actually responsible for the activities on the ground.

MARGARET WARNER: Okay. Let me ask you about that, though. We just heard the widow of Mr. Kilmende say that he she saw the three Serb policemen that came in. They did not have masks on. A lot of these killings were done, according to testimony anyway, by bands of military and paramilitary. Are they not also targets? Or not?

TERREE BOWERS: Well, they are targets as well. But one of the things you have to understand is the tribunal has very finite limited resources. So it will be impossible for the tribunal to handle all of the atrocities which occurred in Kosovo. What will you focus on is developing as many strong cases as possible against mid-level commanders, mid-level leaders and ultimately the five primary architects, including Milosevic, charged in the existing indictment. So it's a difficult selection process. You can't develop cases that might just involve a single murder, a neighbor on a neighbor for example. But it may be very important to take a particular local commander who is responsible for a large massacre and develop a case against him individually and plug that in as a component against the overall case against Milosevic.

MARGARET WARNER: I see. Okay. Eric Stover, let's go back to the physical evidence and the sites that are being looked at. Now, we've had reports that, for instance, even during the Serb occupation, sometimes the bodies were just left and the Kosovars who were hiding would come out at night, take the bodies of the neighbors and family members and go bury them, but move them and bury them. Now of course you have the Kosovars going back and surely want to bury bodies they are finding. Does that disturb the evidence too much? What's the effect in terms of from an investigating point of view?

ERIC STOVER: I think the important thing is to remember that, you know, this is a process involving human beings. And many of the families of course once they were killed, their loved ones were killed, they wanted to bury them. And, you know, there is really no stronger force on earth than a mother or a father who has lost a daughter or a son. Family members want to come back find the dead. They are going to go to the sites. In a criminal perspective, you of course want to keep the site as uncontaminated as possible. So I think it is going to be a very important task for the War Crimes Tribunal and other humanitarian organizations to ensure that when those families arrive, if you've cordoned off the site if they've come, is to in some way keep them informed because through all of the experience that I've had in a number of countries, it's critical that the families feel part of the process. And it's important from an investigator's point of view as well because they are the ones that are going to have anti-mortem information, which includes dental X-rays or medical records. And they're going to help in the identification process. But it is extremely important they feel that they are involved. So I would hope that the tribunal will have a system in place that will deal with the families in that regard.

MARGARET WARNER: All right. Mr. Bowers, at what point do authorities, and I suppose this will be NATO forces, start actually arresting people?

TERREE BOWERS: Well, I'm sure knowing prosecutor Louise Arbour, she is already discussing potential strategies for the arrest and detention of the war criminals. Just as an aside, there were already approximately six or seven indicted war criminals in Serbia before the events in Kosovo began.

MARGARET WARNER: I'm sorry. Let me interrupt you. I'm talking about people who committed atrocities in Kosovo or accused of it, many of them being military and paramilitary who were on their way back to Serbia.

TERREE BOWERS: Right. I mean, that's the difficulty. If they make their way back into Serbia, it's more difficult to launch some sort of arrest campaign to get them out of Serbia. If they're still in Kosovo and are still within the control of the troops who are now taking over that area, then there are different strategies we can pursue to arrest them. One of the things that we have used very effectively is the sealed indictment. So if we encounter opportunities where there may be Serbs accused of war crimes or, for that matter, Kosovo Albanians accused of war crimes and they are still within the area secured by the troops, we can develop strategies to try and go out and arrest those people. For us to get custody over the individuals in Serbia, it's going to require a major international commitment to embark upon a variety of mechanisms to try and force those people either to self-surrender or to try and affect some sort of campaign to gain custody over them and have them transported to the Hague.

MARGARET WARNER: All right. But in the Bosnia case, for instance, have you all -- has the US Government or the Hague really, the War Crimes Tribunal, been successful at all in extraditing anyone from Serbia?

TERREE BOWERS: We've had no success in extraditing anyone from Serbia. Milosevic has used the bogus argument that the constitution prevents that. However, we did successfully lure the former mayor of Vukovar, Dakmanovic, we lured him out of Serbia and arrested him in Croatia and he actually went to trial at the tribunal. So we explore all mechanisms that may be available. And I'm sure Louise Arbour is talking with a lot of people right now trying to figure out the best ways to get some of these people in custody.

MARGARET WARNER: Eric Stover, quickly before we go, if there are say 10,000 killings in Kosovo which the British are saying they think there are, how many of those do you think the killers will even be identified much less prosecuted?

ERIC STOVER: I think quite a few of the killers will be identified. Remember, these were local police. There were some paramilitaries wearing masks and so on. They may not be identified but certainly the leaders of those paramilitary groups will be identified. But from the testimonies I heard, people knew who the killers were. Many of the police, Serbian police, local police in the beginning, carried out these killings. Then they also will know the military units. People are used to, you know -- they'll remember what sort of insignia they were wearing. So, I think it's very possible to identify a large number of those who were responsible for these killings.

MARGARET WARNER: All right. Well, Eric Stover and Terree Bowers. Thank you very much.

FINALLY - FATHERS DAY

JIM LEHRER: Finally tonight, some Father's Day words for dads and granddads from NewsHour contributor Robert Pinsky, the Poet Laureate of the United States.

ROBERT PINSKY: Sometimes grandparents do some of the raising of children. Sometimes they do all of it. The poet Elizabeth Bishop's grandfather acted as her father when she was a child. Bishop's poem "Manners" is a tribute to that man. In the poem, Bishop actually makes us feel respect for the often-ridiculed notion of parental instruction in behavior. Here for Father's Day is Elizabeth Bishop's poem, "Manners."

ROBERT PINSKY: "Manners. For a Child of 1918. My grandfather said to me as we sat on the wagon seat, 'be sure to remember to always speak to everyone you meet.' We met a stranger on foot. My grandfather's whip tapped his hat. 'Good day, sir. Good day. A fine day.' And I said it and bowed where I sat. Then we overtook a boy we knew with his big pet crow on his shoulder. 'Always offer everyone a ride; don't forget that when you get older,' my grandfather said. So Willy climbed up with us, but the crow gave a 'caw!' And flew off. I was worried. How would he know where to go? But he flew a little way at a time from fence post to fence post, ahead; and when Willy whistled he answered. 'A fine bird,' my grandfather said, and he's well brought up. See, he answers nicely when he's spoken to. Man or beast, that's good manners. Be sure that you both always do.' When automobiles went by, the dust hid the people's faces, but we shouted, 'Good day! Good day! Fine day!' At the top of our voices. When we came to Hustler Hill, he said that the mare was tired, so we all got down and walked, as our good manners required.

RECAP

JIM LEHRER: Again, the major stories of this Friday. The House of Representatives killed the gun control bill. The vote was 280-147, almost 2-1. And the US and Russia agreed on a role for Russian troops in the Kosovo peacekeeping mission. We'll see you online, and again here Monday evening. Have a nice Father's Day Weekend. I'm Jim Lehrer. Thank you, and good night.