In the evening of March 25th, as Serb tanks began encircling the village of Celina in the Rahovec district of Kosovo, Agim and Florim Dina had a short, heated argument with their cousins and uncles. Believing that the Serb army wanted to kill only Kosovan men, they tried to persuade their relatives to leave their families behind and get out of the village. Despite the pain of the decision, Agim and Florim ran from Celina and made it to Nagaves, a village roughly 4 km away. The rushed decision saved their lives.
Within hours, Selver (68), Shaqir (65), Rramen (51), Hamez (38), Skender (31), Dritan (23), Xhaferr (27), Hida (72), Hisa (70) and an old woman, Xhemila (97) were all murdered by what the women eyewitnesses recognised as "Arkan's band". Agim and Florim have also kept a list of the names of 36 other villagers they knew, who died over the two days when Celina was burnt to the ground. Agim says, holding out the list: "This is all we could remember, but there were many others."
Agim and Florim's mother, Sevije, described what happened: "We all went down into the basement at about four in the morning. There were about 30 of us. We stayed there until 3 p.m. that day until Serbs arrived and ordered us all out of the basement. They were wearing strips of red and white sheets as arm bands and had black paint on their faces. They separated out the men and the women and told women to go into the mountains. Then they took the strips of sheets and put them on the men as blindfolds and sent them back into the basement. We were so scared we couldn't breathe but we had to go. As we were leaving we could hear shots."
The following night, Agim and Florim returned to the forest near Celina and heard that their wives and children were safe and hiding in the mountains. Before joining them they returned to the village to see what had happened. Florim found his murdered relatives: "They had been shot in the head and stomach. But they put them sitting up against the wall."
Xhaffer, a paraplegic whom the family couldn't get into the basement, died in a neighbouring house which was burnt to the ground.