Cargo for Serb population is on its way to Kosovo

A convoy of the Russian Emergency Situations Ministry has arrived in Novorossiisk with a cargo of aid for the Serb population of Kosovo, reports Yuri Brazhnikov, deputy-head of the Russian Emergencies Ministry.

Brazhnikov said that the cargo was currently being cleared through customs in Novorossiisk. On Wednesday, the lorries will be loaded on a ferry which will then depart for the Bulgarian port of Burgas. Further on, said Brazhnikov, the convoy will go through Bulgaria and Macedonia and after that will arrive in Kosovo.

The entire humanitarian operation will last three weeks and tentatively end on November 6th.

"Taking into consideration the time of the year, we shall be bringing to the Serb population of Kosovo such vitally important humanitarian cargoes as electrical heaters, sets of stoves, electrical generators, warm clothes and shoes, as well as wood-working machines and foodstuffs - altogether about 200 tons," stressed Yuri Brazhnikov.

The Emergencies Ministry's convoy left Moscow on October 16th. The decision to help the Serb population of Kosovo was taken by the Moscow government in connection with the repeated appeals of representatives of the Serb-Russian Friendship Society and the Serb Orthodox Church, as well as the Serb diaspora in Moscow to Yuri Luzhkov.