Between March and June 1999 hundreds of thousands of Kosovo Albanians were violently deported by this railway route, packed into overcrowded trains departing from Prishtina toward North Macedonia. Serbian forces emptied neighbourhoods, stripped families of their documents and expelled them in one of the largest forced displacements in Europe since the Second World War.

Through the 1990s hundreds of thousands of ethnic Albanians had gradually left Kosovo before the world began paying attention. The 1999 exodus was, however, incomparably more traumatic: two thirds of the entire population were driven from their homes over 10 weeks. Much of today’s population were made into refugees.

“Exodus ’99” insists we do not forget this experience. We present 48 interviews with people who underwent it, recounted 27 years later. The stories divide into four themes: expulsion, time in refugee camps, time with host families, return. Some did not leave: they tell of hiding out throughout the military campaign, joining the guerrillas, or their train being turned back after leading politician Fehmi Agani was taken from it and summarily executed.

The testimonies screened within this railway carriage are those of survivors of mass expulsion who returned to Kosovo, reclaimed their homes and rebuilt their lives, defying a concerted campaign of ethnic cleansing.

Between March and June 1999 hundreds of thousands of Kosovo Albanians were violently deported by this railway route, packed into overcrowded trains departing from Prishtina toward North Macedonia. Serbian forces emptied neighbourhoods, stripped families of their documents and expelled them in one of the largest forced displacements in Europe since the Second World War.

Through the 1990s hundreds of thousands of ethnic Albanians had gradually left Kosovo before the world began paying attention. The 1999 exodus was, however, incomparably more traumatic: two thirds of the entire population were driven from their homes over 10 weeks. Much of today’s population were made into refugees.

“Exodus ’99” insists we do not forget this experience. We present 48 interviews with people who underwent it, recounted 27 years later. The stories divide into four themes: expulsion, time in refugee camps, time with host families, return. Some did not leave: they tell of hiding out throughout the military campaign, joining the guerrillas, or their train being turned back after leading politician Fehmi Agani was taken from it and summarily executed.

The testimonies screened within this railway carriage are those of survivors of mass expulsion who returned to Kosovo, reclaimed their homes and rebuilt their lives, defying a concerted campaign of ethnic cleansing.