The scenes of despair and degradation in and around Kosovo have left us in shock. Tens of thousands of refugees are crying out for help. Most of us feel appalled, but powerless to help and are simply feel relieved that it's happening in another country. But Bradford aid workers Rachel Duncan and Cameron Skinner went to Kosovo to deliver vital funds just before the outbreak of war and were horrified by what they witnessed. But that made them all the more determined to carry on helping. This month Rachel is returning to the area with another aid convoy

RACHEL DUNCAN can't help but get upset when she looks at the photographs taken on her trip to war-ravaged Kosovo.

One shows a room full of people, smiling at the camera. "These people are our friends, they made us really welcome, yet we don't know where they are, whether they are alive or dead, it's just dreadful. It's terrible to imagine what might have happened to them."

Rachel, 30, of Little Horton, and Cameron Skinner, 33, of Thornton Road, Bradford, travelled to Kosovo in December on a mercy mission to take funds to help Kosovo Albanian miners who were sacked in 1991. At the same time, schools throughout the country began to close and universities stopped admitting ethnic Albanians.

Says Cameron: "It's been going on for a long time - it's only now, when it's got this bad, that people are being made aware of it."

With the third member of the party, driver Dave Redhead, from Manchester, they travelled to Belgrade, Pristina and the mining town of Mitrovica. And, Rachel admits, they were not prepared for what they saw, and they were shocked by the treatment of the Albanians, who make up 90 per cent of the population of Kosovo.

"I don't think anyone can prepare you for what it feels like to be in a police state. There were road blocks on the way in and police and soldiers were patrolling the streets. You could not go out at night."

In the mining communities, families survived on charity donations. Says Rachel: "There is no social security. They were living in desperate poverty. We saw one family with one pair of shoes between seven children."

The party, who also donated funds to the education union, were stopped by police up to eight times a day, and because they were admitted on a tourist visa they could not be seen meeting leading officials from the independent Albanian movement.

Fighting had broken out close to Pristina shortly after their arrival in Kosovo.

Says Rachel: "People were frightened. They were aware that they would have to fight to the death - we heard statements like this from middle-aged female school teachers."

They were told that human rights violations had increased since overseas observers had arrived.

Soldiers had begun to seal off parts of the town and began searching people's homes. Serb civilians were armed, leaving people in fear of their neighbours, and some students were forced by police to eat their Albanian textbooks. "It was heart-rending to hear about it," adds Rachel.

Amid the growing unease, the party was forced to cut short their visit. But, says Rachel, they were reluctant to go. A founder member of Bradford Aid for Kosova - which takes its name from the Albanian spelling of the region - she adds: "The people treated us so well, and were so warm and friendly. And they were so thrilled that we had gone there, that we had showed an interest. They were desperate for us to tell the truth, they said please, please tell people what is happening."

A year before their visit President Milosevic had instigated the first round of ethnic cleansing, burning down houses amid a huge police presence in the Drenica and Shala regions of the country. That prompted Rachel to set up the Bradford-based aid organisation.

She is keen to point out that while in Belgrade, the party met members of the Serbian Resistance Movement. "They were totally in support of us bringing in aid and they understood the call from ethnic Albanians for Kosovo to be independent, given the background of years of oppression. A lot of people were anti-Milosevic, but they kept their heads down."

Now the lives of the ethnic Albanians are in turmoil, with families torn apart, made to leave their homeland with nothing but the clothes they stand up in.

Serb forces have begun destroying birth records and property deeds, so no record remains of their ever having lived there.

Later this month, Rachel will join an international workers aid convoy to Montenegro, where many ethnic Albanians have gone in the hope of finding sanctuary.

Rachel says she is eager to return to help the huge humanitarian crisis in any way she can: "The trip we made had a massive impact upon me. As soon as this started happening I just wanted to go back. I'm desperate to go and do anything I can to help."

An appeal has been launched for funds to finance a Bradford Aid for Kosova trip in July. If you can help contact aid co-ordinator Parvez Iqbal on Bradford 307708.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.