Attack on Orahovac

Attack on Orahovac
	Part of the Kosovo War
	; View of Orahovac
Date	17–20 July 1998; (3 days)
Location	Orahovac, FR Yugoslavia; (present-day Kosovo)42°23′58″N 20°39′17″E / 42.39944°N 20.65472°E
Result	Yugoslav victory
Belligerents
FR Yugoslavia	Kosovo Liberation Army
Commanders and leaders
Veljko Radenović; Božidar Delić	Agim Çelaj †; Ismet Tara
Units involved
Police (Milicija); aid by 549. Brigade	121st Brigade; "Black Eagles" Unit
Strength
400–500	c. 1,000
Casualties and losses
2 Serbian police killed	25+ killed (KLA sources); 51–60 (Serbian sources)
	5 Serb and c. 48 or 58+ Albanian civilian deaths, 85 abductions of Serb civilians of which 40 were killed.
	Location within FR Yugoslavia

The attack on Orahovac was a three-day long clash in 17–20 July 1998 between the forces of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) and the Serbian police relieved by an army brigade. The KLA surrounded Serb villages intending to assert authority for the Kosovo Albanian provisional government through taking over a town and creating a corridor between the KLA hotbed in Drenica and the Albanian border region. The KLA offensive failed and they were pushed out of the region. An unclear number of KLA fighters and Albanian civilians were killed, ranging from 42 and upwards, while five Serb civilians and two policemen were killed. 85 Serb civilians were abducted in the area by the KLA, 40 of whom are presumed to have been murdered.