MACEDONIA: APPEAL FOR AID AS REFUGEES ARRIVE

(31 Mar 1999) English/Nat 20-thousand people from Kosovo have massed on the Macedonia border. Some of them had walked from Pristina while others are men who jumped off a train turned back to Kosovo by Macedonian authorities. One young woman made a dramatic appeal to Europe and America to help the people of Kosovo. We do not care about the houses and villages she said, but our people are all dying, either of starvation or at the hands of the Serbs. I am so afraid, she said, the Serbs can do anything. An estimated 118-thousand people have fled the conflict in Kosovo since NATO airstrikes began on March 24. Some 20-thousand of them have gathered on the border with Macedonia, desperate to flee the fighting. The expulsion of all journalists from Yugoslavia has made it difficult to assess the scale of the humanitarian disaster in the province. But as a greater number of people escape the stricken province, more details are slowly emerging. SOUNDBITE: (English) "I just wanted to say that everything is terrible, everything is so dangerous. I just wanted to say if anybody will understand us. We don't care about houses, we don't care about burning, we don't care about nothing. We are going to build city, we are going to do everything else. Please just to help people. There are too much people there waiting. The Macedonian people are letting to come here just a few of them. They are without bread, without nothing. Serbian people told us to come to leave our houses. And when we came here we came without bread, without nothing. If they stay there one day, two days more they are going to die, some of them. There are a lot of children. There are a lot of older people. I just wanted to say, just if somebody can hear me, just if somebody can help us, our people. I don't know what to say else. I left there my family." SUPER CAPTION: Refugee There is also anecdotal evidence that Serb forces in Kosovo may be committing atrocities against the mainly Albanian population. SOUNDBITE: (English) "Yes I stay in the basement three days and wait for somebody to kill us. We stayed in the basement, we heard everything. The Serbian people start to bomb Dragodan and they said that NATO has done that. It's not true. There are a lot of military people there. A lot of people are in Pristina. I hope that ... but I'm just afraid that somebody will kill them." SUPER CAPTION: Refugee With young and old struggling to escape to safety, the Kosovar refugee made a desperate appeal for help from the West. SOUNDBITE: (English) "American people, Europe people just to help us. Nothing else, just to help people there. There are too much." SUPER CAPTION: Refugee Witnesses described a line of cars stretching more than 3 miles (4-point-8 kilometres) into Kosovo on the other side of the border. Resources here are already stretched and many refugees are being turned away at the border. There is now genuine concern that Macedonia could be drawn into the conflict as a result. Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork Twitter:   / ap_archive   Facebook:   / aparchives   ​​ Instagram:   / apnews   You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/you...