The highest-ranking member of the Kosovan Aid Committee (KAC), Agron Loxha, is to visit Keighley next Thursday to thank the town for its generosity.

Mr Loxha has been leading convoys of relief to the strife-torn refugees of the Balkan crisis.

The President of the KAC, who escaped from Kosovo two years ago, has been helping Cambridge-based Friendship Link deliver the aid to northern Albania which is trying to cope with many of the refugees.

A lorry-load of blankets, tents and waterproof clothing donated by Keighley people is due to leave Cambridge on Thursday. Aid has flooded in to the Keighley Disabled People's Centre in Temple Row since advice officer Keith Bell appealed for help. He is a member of Friendship Link and has been involved in helping disabled people in Albania since the mid 1990s.

Leslie Wooler, founder of Friendship Link, says: "Mr Loxha is to travel to Keighley next Thursday to meet local people and to speak at Keighley mosque. He will thank people for raising funds and tell them how successful we have been in getting aid out there. The cost of each 3,500-mile round trip was £1,200 and in the last two weeks five lorries have travelled from Cambridge loaded with aid from the UK. The latest batch, which left this week, carried blankets, food and medical equipment."

Mr Bell says: "The response from Keighley has been marvellous - it's typical of Keighley people who are always generous."

Meanwhile, volunteers are needed to help collect cash to help thousands of the refugees. Oxfam wants people to help with a street collection in Haworth tomorrow from 10am-3pm. Money collected will go towards providing safe water supplies in refugee camps in Macedonia and Albania, where many of the refugees have fled to.

Anyone wanting to take part in tomorrow's event should contact Paul Hook, at Oxfam Campaigns in Bradford, on 01274 491858.

Two lorry-loads of goods collected for the refugees were also taken from Keighley's Salvation Army premises this week following an appeal by the Scout movement.

Goods for the Kosovo cause should no longer be taken to the Salvation Army citadel - the collections there have ended.

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