Twenty-seven years after the end of the Kosovo war, the demining organisation HALO Trust has completed its humanitarian work in the country. What remains will be handled by the national authorities.
During the 1998-1999 war, more than 800,000 Kosovo Albanians were forced to flee. Many returned to fields that could kill. Between 1999 and 2024 there were 585 mine casualties, three-quarters of them in 1999 and 2000, before clearance was well under way.
Cleared land has allowed people to farm again, build homes and even redevelop Pristina airport, which lies next to a former minefield. Life expectancy, which was 58 during the war, is now 78. Thousands of Kosovans have worked for HALO over these three decades.
