Suva Reka, or Suhareka or Theranda, is a town and municipality located in the Prizren district of central-southern Kosovo. According to the 2011 census, the town has 10,422 inhabitants, while the municipality has 59,722 inhabitants. Suva Reka is located from the city ofPrizren, and from Kosovo's capital, Pristina.
Name
Suva Reka means "dry river" in Serbian. The Albanian spellings are Suharekë or Suhareka, while an alternative name was recently created by the Albanological Institute, Therandë, adopted from an unlocated Roman site.
History
Historical background
The municipality includes several medieval Serbian sites and old settlements, such as the villages of Banja, Dulje, Mušutište, Popovljane, Rečane, and churches of Virgin Hodegetria, St. George, Holy Trinity, St. Nicholas, among others. The settlement of Suva Reka itself was first mentioned in 1465.
Yugoslav period
From 1929 to 1941, Suva Reka was a village part of the Vardar Banovina of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. Between 1918 and 1941 the demographic structure of the municipality of Suva Reka has been affected by settlements and colonization such as the Serbian colonization and population settlement, for the most part from the Toplica District. On the night of 9–10 June 1984, ethnic Albanians desecrated 29 tombstones of the Church of the Holy Saviour.
During the Kosovo War, the Kosovo Liberation Army operated in the region and it was reported that it had killed and wounded several Serbian policemen and civilians. Among KLA attacks against police officers recorded in 1998 in the municipality were: on 16 August in Blace, on 23 August in Dulje and in Reštane, on 25 August in Dulje, on 28 September in Budakovo and in Vranić. KLA shot at an OSCE vehicle driving behind a FR Yugoslav military convoy between Suva Reka and Štimlje on 5 November 1998. In 10–16 January 1999, FR Yugoslav forces conducted counter-insurgency operations in Suva Reka. UNHCR estimated on 18 March 1999 that the Suva Reka municipality had 6,100 displaced and 5,600 returns. On 25 March, the town was surrounded by the Yugoslav army and police, and U.S. documents claim reports of at least 30 Albanians killed. There were reports that Serb forces extorted Albanians in Belanica on 27 March. In April and May 1999, Serb paramilitary repeatedly attacked the villages in the municipality, forcing the population to leave and gather in KLA territory. On 11–12 June 1999, a Serb family of four was kidnapped in Dvorane and never located. On 12 June 1999, KLA attacked Mušutište and kidnapped eighteen Serb civilians. After the war, Serbian heritage was destroyed all over Kosovo; the churches of Virgin Hodegetria, St. George, Holy Trinity, St. Nicholas and others were completely destroyed in 1999 after the arrival of KFOR. NATO set up a military base in the municipality, Camp Casablanca.
Church of St. Parasčeva, Mušutište, built 1973, destroyed 1999
Demographics
According to the 2011 census done by the Government of Kosovo, the municipality of Suhareka had 59,722 inhabitants of which 98.9% were Kosovo Albanians. According to OSCE, the whereabouts of the displaced Serb and Roma communities is unknown.
