NATO's Kosovo Colony

NATO's Kosovo Colony

By DIANA JOHNSTONE

Across this last weekend, the Western propaganda machine was working overtime, celebrating the latest NATO miracle: the transformation of Serbian Kosovo into Albanian Kosova. A shameless land grab by the United States, which used the Kosovo problem to install an enormous military base (Camp Bondsteel) on other people's strategically located land, is transformed by the power of the media into an edifying legend of "national liberation".

For the unhappy few who know the complicated truth about Kosovo, the words of Aldous Huxley seem most appropriate: "You shall know the truth, and the truth shall drive you mad."

Concerning Kosovo, truth is like letters written in the sand as the tsunami of propaganda comes thundering in. The truth is available--for instance in George Szamuely's thoroughly informative piece last Friday here on CounterPunch. Fragments of the truth sometimes even show up in the mainstream media, mostly in letters from readers. But hopeless as it is to try to turn back the tide of officially endorsed legend, let me examine just one drop in this unstoppable sea of propaganda: a column by Roger Cohen entitled "Europe's new state", published in the Valentine's Day edition of the International Herald Tribune.
Cohen's op ed piece is fairly typical in the dismissive way it deals with Milosevic, Russia and the Serbs. Cohen writes: "Slobodan Milosevic, the late dictator, set Serbia's murderous nationalist tide in motion on April 24, 1987, when he went to Kosovo to declare that Serbian 'ancestors would be defiled' if ethnic Albanians had their way."
I don't know where Roger Cohen got that quotation, but it is not to be found in the speech Milosevic made that day in Kosovo. And certainly, Milosevic did not go to Kosovo to declare any such thing, but to consult with local Communist League officials in the town of Kosovo Polje about the province's serious economic and social problems. Aside from the province's chronic poverty, unemployment, and mismanagement of development funds contributed from the rest of Yugoslavia, the main social problem was the constant exodus of Serb and Montenegrin inhabitants under pressure from ethnic Albanians. At the time, this problem was reported in leading Western media.
For instance, as early as July 12, 1982, Marvine Howe reported to the New York Times that Serbs were leaving Kosovo by the tens of thousands because of discrimination and intimidation on the part of the ethnic Albanian majority:
"The [Albanian] nationalists have a two-point platform," according to Beci Hoti, an executive secretary of the Communist Party of Kosovo, "first to establish what they call an ethnically clean Albanian republic and then the merger with Albania to form a greater Albania.
Mr Hoti, an Albanian, expressed concern voer political pressures that were forcing Serbs to leave Kosovo. "What is important now," he said, "is to establish a climate of security and create confidence."
And seven months after Milosevic's visit to Kosovo, David Binder reported in the New York Times (November 1, 1987):
Ethnic Albanians in the Government [of Kosovo] have manipulated public funds and regulations to take over land belonging to Serbs. Slavic Orthodox churches have been attacked, and flags have been torn down. Wells have been poisoned and crops burned. Slavic boys have been knifed, and some young ethnic Albanians have been told by their elders to rape Serbian girls.
The goal of the radical nationals among them, one said in an interview, is an "ethnic Albania that includes western Macedonia, southern Montenegro, part of southern Serbia, Kosovo and Albania itself."
As Slavs flee the protracted violence, Kosovo is becoming what ethnic Albanian nationalists have been demanding for years, and especially strongly since the bloody rioting by ethnic Albanians in Pristina in 1981--an "ethnically pure" Albanian region
This was in fact the first instance of "ethnic cleansing" in post-World War II Yugoslavia, as reported in The New York Times and other Western media, and the victims were the Serbs. The cult of "memory" has become a contemporary religion, but some memories are more equal than others. In the 1990s, the New York Times evidently forgot completely what it had said about Kosovo in the 1980s. Why? Perhaps because meanwhile, the Soviet bloc had collapsed and the unity of independent, non-aligned Yugoslavia was no longer in the strategic interest of the United States.
Back to Milosevic in Kosovo Polje on April 24, 1987. An incident occurred when local police (under an Albanian-dominated Communist League government) attacked Serbs who had gathered to protest lack of legal protection. Milosevic famously told them, spontaneously: "No one should beat you any more!" If this is "extreme nationalism", perhaps there should be more of it.
But nowhere do I find a trace of the statement attributed to Milosevic by Cohen. In his speech to local party delegates that followed, which is on the public record, Milosevic referred to the "regrettable incident" and promised an investigation. He went on to stress that "we should not allow the misfortunes of people to be exploited by nationalists, whom every honest person must combat. We must not divide people between Serbs and Albanians, but rather we should separate, on the one hand, decent people who struggle for brotherhood, unity and ethnic equality, and, on the other hand, counter-revolutionaries and nationalists."
I turn again to Aldous Huxley for comfort: "Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored."
But Huxley also said: "Great is truth, but still greater, from a practical point of view, is silence about truth. By simply not mentioning certain subjects... totalitarian propagandists have influenced opinion much more effectively than they could have by the most eloquent denunciations."
Last Tuesday in Geneva, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov tried to convey to journalists his grave concern about the way the United States was handling the Kosovo problem.

"We are speaking here about the subversion of all the foundations and principles of international law, which have been won and established as a basis of Europe's existence at huge effort, and at the cost of pain, sacrifice and bloodletting," he said.

"Nobody can offer a clear plan of action in the case of a chain reaction [of further declarations of unilateral independence]. It turns out that they [the United States and its NATO allies] are planning to act in a hit or miss fashion on an issue of paramount importance. This is simply inadmissible and irresponsible," the Russian diplomat said. "I sincerely fail to comprehend the principles guiding our American colleagues, and those Europeans who have taken up this position," he added.
Roger Cohen dismisses such considerations in five words: "the Russian bear will growl". Russia, he adds, "will scream. But it's backed the wrong horse." There are no issues here, no principles. Just growling and gambling. "Milosevic rolled the dice of genocidal nationalism and lost", says Cohen.

This is not only a false statement, it is a grotesquely meaningless metaphor. Milosevic tried to suppress an armed secessionist movement, secretly but effectively supported by neighboring Albania, the United States and Germany, which deliberately provoked repression by murdering both Serbs and Albanians loyal to the government. Like the Americans in similar circumstances, Milosevic relied too heavily on military superiority rather than on political skill. But even the NATO-sponsored International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia in The Hague had to abandon any charges of "genocide" against Milosevic in Kosovo. For the simple reason that there was never a shred of evidence for such a charge.
Milosevic is no longer alive, and Russia is far away. But what about the Serbs who still live in the historic part of Serbia called Kosovo? Cohen takes care of that problem in a few words: "Some of the 120,000 Serbs in Kosovo may hit the road."

As Aldous Huxley pointed out, "The propagandist's purpose is to make one set of people forget that certain other sets of people are human."

Then you can tell them to "hit the road".
The "Unique" Case
Russia has warned that Kosovo independence will set a dangerous precedent, encouraging other ethnic minorities to follow the example of the Albanians and demand secession and an independent State. The United States has dismissed such concerns by flatly asserting that Kosovo is "unique". Well yes, Kosovo is a unique case, and is the only one recognized by the United States until the next "unique case" comes along. When legal criteria have been thrown out, we just have one "unique case" after another.
The "uniqueness" claimed by the United States is a propaganda construction. It is based on the supposed "uniqueness" of Milosevic's repression of the armed secessionist movement, which was not unique at all. It was standard operating procedure throughout history and the world over, in such circumstances. Deplorable, no doubt, but not unique. It was minor indeed compared to the similar but endless and far bloodier anti-insurgency operations in Colombia, Sri Lanka, and Chechnya, not to mention Northern Ireland, Thailand, the Philippines And unlike the counter-insurgency operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, which kill incomparably more civilians, it was carried out by the legal, democratically elected government of the country, rather than by a foreign power.
The propaganda "uniqueness" is an abstraction. Like every place on earth, Kosovo is indeed unique. But in ways that have nothing to do with the U.S. pretext for taking it over and turning it into a military outpost of empire.
To know how a place is unique, you have to be interested in it.
I have not visited Kosovo since before the 1999 NATO war. On one occasion, in August 1997, I drove around the province in a failing Skoda, at my own expense, just looking. Driving in Kosovo was a bit risky, partly because of the number of dead dogs in the road, and mostly because of local drivers' habit of passing slower vehicles on hills and curves. In northern Kosovo, just outside the town of Zubin Potok, this habit produced one of its inevitable consequences: a head-on collision with serious casualties, which shut down the two-lane highway for hours while ambulances and police sorted things out.
Unable to proceed toward Pristina, I drove back to Zubin Potok to pass the time on the shaded terrace of a roadside restaurant. I was the only customer, and the lone waiter, a tall, handsome young man named Milomir, gladly accepted my invitation to sit down at my table and chat as I sipped glass after glass of delicious strawberry juice.
Milomir was happy to talk to someone familiar with the French city of Metz, which he had visited as a student and remembered fondly. He loved to read and travel, but in 1991 he got married and now had two small daughters to support. Job prospects were poor, even though he had been to university, so he had no choice but to stay in Zubin Potok. As for Europe, even if he could get a visa (impossible for Serbs anyway), he spoke no language more Western than his mother tongue, Serbo-Croatian. He had studied Russian (he loved the literature) and Albanian as his foreign languages. He learned Albanian in order to be able to communicate with the majority in Kosovo.

But such communication was difficult. Milomir was very much in favor of a bilingual society, and thought everyone in Kosovo should learn both Serbian and Albanian, but unfortunately this was not the case. The younger generation of Albanians refused to speak Serbian and learned English instead.

The town of Zubin Potok was located near the dam on the Ibar River built in the late 1970s to create hydraulic power. Coming from Novi Pazar, I had driven along the 35-kilometer-long artificial lake created by the dam, looking in vain for a nice place to stop. It seemed that there must have been villages along the Ibar River before the dam was built, and I asked Milomir about this. Yes, he said, the artificial lake had flooded a score of old villages, of ethnically mixed, but mostly Serb population. The Albanian Communist authorities in Pristina had resettled the Serbs outside of Kosovo, around the town of Kraljevo. There were about 10,000 of them.
This was a minor example of the administrative measures taken to decrease the Serb population during the period, before Milosevic, when Albanians were running the province through the local Communist League.
Milomir was not complaining, but simply answering my questions. He did not go too often (by bus--he had no car) to the nearest large city, Mitrovica, because he was afraid of being beaten by Albanians. This was just a fact of life, at a time when (according to Western media) Albanians in Kosovo were being terrorized by Serbian repression.
While we were chatting, a friend of his came along and the conversation turned to politics. There was a presidential campaign underway. The two young men wanted to know which candidate I thought would be best for Serbia in the eyes of the world. Milomir was tending toward Vuk Draskovic, and his friend was for Vojislav Kostunica. Neither would dream of voting for either Milosevic or Seselj, the nationalist leader of the Radical Party.

Zubin Potok Today
I have no idea what has become of Milomir, his wife, his two daughters, or his friend. Zubin Potok is the western-most municipality in the heavily Serb-populated north of Kosovo. From the internet I learn that the population of Zubin Potok municipality (including surrounding villages) has nearly doubled since I passed through. It now comes to approximately 14,900, including about 3,000 internally displaced Serbs (from other areas of Kosovo where the Albanian majority has driven them out), 220 Serbian refugees from Croatia and 800 Albanians. The local assembly is overwhelmingly dominated by Kostunica's Democratic Party of Serbia, but includes two Kosovo Albanian representatives.
Up until now, schools, hospitals, and other public services, as well as the local economy, have continued to function thanks mainly to subsidies from Belgrade. The Albanian declaration of Kosovo independence will create a crisis by demanding an end to such vital subsidies--which, however, an "independent Kosovo" is unable to replace. Moreover, bands of Albanian nationalists are declaring that Zubin Potok "is Albanian" and must be "liberated from the Serbs". They can be seen on You Tube, using the Statue of Liberty as their symbol, and threatening Serbs in Albanian rap.

The European Union is moving in to provide law and order. But the "order" they claim to be protecting is the one defined by the Albanian nationalists. What does that mean to people like Milomir and his little family?
For Roger Cohen, the answer is easy: "hit the road!"
Serbia, by the way, already has the largest number of refugees in Europe, victims of "ethnic cleansing" in Croatia and Kosovo. And Serbs cannot get visas or refugee status in Western Europe. They have been labeled the "bad guys". Only their enemies can be "victims".

Before and After
Kosovo before the NATO war and occupation was, nevertheless, a multiethnic society. The accusation of "apartheid" was simply Albanian propaganda, as the Albanian nationalist leaders chose to use that heavily-charged term to describe their own boycott of Serbs and Serb institutions. Every police action against an Albanian, for whatever reason, whether for suspicion of armed rebellion or for ordinary crime, was described as a "human rights violation" by the Albanian human rights network financed by the United States government.

It was an extraordinary situation that the Serbian and Yugoslav governments allowed an illegal separatist "government of Kosovo", headed by Ibrahim Rugova, to hold shop in the center of Pristina, regularly receiving foreign journalists and regaling them with tales of how oppressed they were by the horrid Serbs.
But the laws were the same for all citizens, there were Albanians in local government and in the police, and if there were cases of police brutality (in what country are there no cases of police brutality?), the Albanians at least had nothing to fear from their Serb neighbors.

Even then, it was the Serbs who were afraid of the Albanians. Only outside Kosovo could anyone seriously believe that it was the Albanians who were under threat of "ethnic cleansing" (much less "genocide"). Such a project was simply, obviously, out of the question. It was the Serbs who were afraid, who spoke of sending their children to safety if they had the means, or who spoke bravely of remaining "no matter what".

Later, in March 1999, when NATO began to bomb Kosovo, Albanians fled by the hundreds of thousands, and their temporary flight from the war theater was presented as the justification for the bombing that caused it. The press did not bother to report on the Serbs and others who also fled the bombing at that time.
In Kosovo, in 1987, in Pristina and Pec, I observed a peculiar sort of group behavior that reminds me only of school playgrounds in Maryland in my childhood. A gang of kids get together and by various signs, body language, and a minimum of words, convey to some outsiders that they are excluded and despised. I have seen Albanians act in this way toward stray Serbs, especially old women. This variety of "mobbing" was not violent in 1987, but turned so after NATO occupied the territory. It was encouraged by the official NATO stamp of approval of Albanian hatred for Serbs, delivered by bombs in the spring of 1999.
Of course, there must have been Serbs who hated Albanians. But in my limited, chance experience, what struck me was the absence of hatred for Albanians among Serbs I met. Fear, yes, but not hatred. A great deal of perplexity. Sister Fotina at the Gracanica monastery had a very Christian explanation. We tried to help the Albanians care for their many children, she said, and yet they turn against us. This must be God's way of punishing us for turning away from Christianity during the time of Communism, she concluded. She blamed her fellow Serbs more than the Albanians.
The divine punishment has not been confined to Christians, however. In the southernmost corner of Kosovo live an ancient population called Gorani (meaning mountain people), who converted to Islam under the Ottoman Empire, like most of the Albanians. But their language is Serbian, and this is unacceptable to the Albanians. Estimates vary, but it is agreed that at least two thirds of the Gorani have left since NATO "liberation". Pressure and intimidation have taken various forms. Albanians have moved into the temporarily vacant homes of Gorani who went to Austria and Germany to earn money for their retirement. The NATO-protected Albanian authorities have found ways to deprive Gorani children of schooling in the Serbian language. In the main Gorani town of Dragash, an Albanian mob attacked the health center and caused health workers to flee. Then, last January 5, a powerful explosion destroyed the bank in Dragash. It was the only Serbian bank still allowed to operate in the south of Kosovo, and served mainly to transfer the pensions that allowed local Gorani to survive.

As usual, the crime went unpunished.
David Binder, who used to report on Yugoslavia for the New York Times, before he was excluded for knowing too much, reported last November * on a long investigation of conditions in Kosovo commissioned by the German Bundeswehr. The existence of this report is proof that the Western governments, while publicly claiming that Kosovo is "ready for independence", know quite well that this is not true. Among other things, Binder reports:
The institute authors, Mathias Jopp and Sammi Sandawi, spent six months interviewing 70 experts and mining current literature on Kosovo in preparing the study. In their analysis the political unrest and guerrilla fighting of the 1990s led to basic changes which they call a "turnabout in Kosovo-Albanian social structures." The result is a "civil war society in which those inclined to violence, ill-educated and easily influenced people could make huge social leaps in a rapidly constructed soldateska."
"It is a Mafia society" based on "capture of the state" by criminal elements.
In the authors' definition, Kosovan organized crime "consists of multimillion-Euro organizations with guerrilla experience and espionage expertise." They quote a German intelligence service report of "closest ties between leading political decision makers and the dominant criminal class" and name Ramush Haradinaj, Hashim Thaci and Xhavit Haliti as compromised leaders who are "internally protected by parliamentary immunity and abroad by international law."
They scornfully quote the UNMIK chief from 2004-2006, Soeren Jessen Petersen, calling Haradinaj "a close and personal friend." The study sharply criticizes the United States for "abetting the escape of criminals" in Kosovo as well as "preventing European investigators from working."
It notes "secret CIA detention centers" at Camp Bondsteel and assails American military training for Kosovo (Albanian) police by Dyncorp, authorized by the Pentagon.

In an aside, it quotes one unidentified official as saying of the American who is deputy chief of UNMIK, "The main task of Steve Schook is to get drunk once a week with Ramush Haradinaj."
Who Goes and Who Stays
Schook has been fired by UNMIK, but UNMIK, the nominally United Nations mission, is being taken over arbitrarily by the European Union. The EU "mission" is a sort of colonial government which, alongside NATO, plans to govern the ungovernable Albanian territory. However, already movements of armed Albanian patriots are planning their next "war of liberation" against the Europeans.
So, after the Serbs, the Roma, the Gorani, will the Europeans have to "hit the road"? Only the Americans seem sure of staying. Ensconced in their gigantic "Camp Bondsteel", they control the strategic routes from Serbia to Greece, and incidentally offer the mass of unemployed Kosovo Albanians their best-paying employment opportunities, notably by taking menial and dangerous jobs serving U.S. forces in Iraq or Afghanistan.
The reality of this shameless land-grab is available to all. I have written about it, Binder has written about it, Szamuely has written about it, many Germans have written about it. The Russians, the Greeks, the Rumanians, the Slovaks and many others know about it. But in the Brave New World Order, it does not exist. People don't know.

I leave the last word to Aldous Huxley:
"Most ignorance is vincible ignorance. We don't know because we don't want to know."
(* The Binder story can be found at http://www.balkanalysis.com/)
Diana Johnstone is the author of Fools' Crusade: Yugoslavia, NATO and Western Delusion (Monthly Review Press.) She can be reached at diana.josto@yahoo.fr

Western pressures on Serbia and the Alternatives

http://www.serbianna.com/columns/borojevic/070.shtml

Thursday, May 1, 2008




INTERVIEW WITH DR. SRDJA TRIFKOVIC
Western pressures on Serbia and the Alternatives
By Boba Borojevic
April 30, 2008

The government of Serbia underwent a period of severe crisis following the unilateral declaration of independence by the Albanian leaders in its southern province of Kosovo and Metohija on February 17. Three weeks later Prime Minister Kostunica called early parliamentary elections, thus acknowledging the collapse of the coalition government over disagreements about how the country should respond to Kosovo's UDI
Dr. Srdja Trifkovic, director of the Center for International affaires at The Rockford Institute, Illinois, in his interview for the “Voice of Canadian Serbs” says that on May 11th the citizens of Serbia will vote in the most important parliamentary election since the fall of Slobodan Milosevic. “It may be said that this is also the most important parliamentary election in Serbia since before World War One,” says Trifkovic, “because ever since that time we’d had ‘Yugoslavia’ in one form or another, and after the collapse of Yugoslavia we’d had a period of Milosevic’s authoritarian rule. This is the first elestion for the National Assembly of Serbia in almost a century that offers the people two clearly articulated yet fundamentally different strategic options.”
The differences between the “pro-European bloc” led by the Democratic Party (DS) of President Boris Tadic, and the “popular bloc” of that coalition, led by the Democratic Party of Serbia (DSS) of Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica, had become insurmountable. The DS believes that it is possible to continue with what they call “the process of European integrations” regardless of the status of Kosovo. They claim that it may be possible to have a dual-track diplomacy and dual track policy, whereby the refusal of Serbia to accept Kosovo’s independence would not influence – and therefore would not hinder – the process of getting closer to EU. The DS is keenly advocating the signing of the Stabilization and Association Agreement with the EU. That document has not been offered to Serbia yet, but may well be in the next few days.
The argument of the DSS of PM Vojislav Kostunica is that following the recognition of Kosovo by some of the leading countries of the EU, such as France, Germany, Great Britain and Italy, and following the decision of the EU to send the EULEX mission to Kosovo composed of 2000 policemen, judges and administrators – even though this mission has not been authorized by a UN SC resolution – is proof positive that it is no longer possible to pretend that this dual track policy can continue.
Specifically, the DSS (as well as the Radical Party, which is the biggest parliamentary party in Serbia) argue that the EU has adopted a sustained and elaborate policy of actively supporting the secession of Kosovo, while merely pretending that it seeks Serbia’s cooperation on a non-commital basis or that it is ready to seriously consider the process that would lead to Serbia’s eventual integration into the Union.
The debate in Serbia on the EU has been highly ideological. The DS simply does not allow the possibility of any serious critical examination of the policies pursued from Brussels. It keeps repeating that “European integrations have no alternative” and that the continuation of those integrations is the highest priority for Serbia – that those integrations per se constitute the country’s national interest as important as the preservation of territorial integrity itself.
The Democratic Party of Serbia and the Radical Party respond that any eventual integration into the EU can only be a means to an end, and not the end in itself. Indeed, it is incongruous to equate a technical and legal issue, such as a country’s entry into a regional association, with a core national interest, such as the preservation of that country’s territorial integrity and sovereignty.
Any future government in Belgrade will need to make a frank and open statement to the EU that Serbia is prepared to continue its process of integration, but that any such process has to be based on the clear acknowledgement from the EU that it accepts Serbia in its entirety, i.e. with Kosovo included as its integral part. That, of course, will not happen. It is no longer possible for the EU to make any such declaration, in view of the fact that its leading countries have already recognized the self-proclaimed regime in Pristina.
Western influence
Before Kosov’s UDI on February 17 and subsequent recognition by the leading Western powers, those powers had exercised some considerable influence on successive governments in Belgrade. For seven years following the fall of Milosevic, Serbia’s policies had been guided by the perceived need to develop cooperation and trust with Brussels, Washington, and other Western capitals. The authorities in Belgrade had hoped that Serbia’s proven cooperativeness – vis-à-vis the Hague Tribunal, and with its market-oriented reforms, sale of state assets, legislation that would bring the country into line with EU standards in various areas, etc. – would yield some benevolence towards Serbia from those Western powers, and specifically their readiness to adopt a more even-handed approach to Kosovo problem.
That has not happened. In spite of seven years of sustained cooperativeness the Western powers have treated Serbia with unprecedented brutality. The recognition was hastily effected in clear violation of international law and of the EU’s self-proclaimed standards of legality. Therefore, the ability of the Western powers to influence political events in Belgrade has diminished. Their clout is very rapidly declining, as Serbia is beginning to realize that cooperativeness has not yielded any positive results. Quite the contrary: cooperativeness has only created the impression in some quarters that no matter what the west does to Serbia, Serbia will come back wagging its tail and begging for more. We have reason to believe, on the basis of the most recent opinion polls conducted in Serbia, that this will no longer be accepted by the electorate.
In substance it is clear that there are countries within the EU that do not want Serbia in the Union, now or at any future date, and they will keep imposing ever higher goal posts which will be impossible for Serbia to cross for many years, or even decades. Former German Ambassador in Belgrade, Zobel, openly said that even if they give up Kosovo now, the Serbs could only hope for the EU membership in some 20-25 years.
Russia’s impact
On the other hand the Russians have been playing a cautious game in the aftermath of Kosovo’s independence. While continuing to oppose the recognition of the self-proclaimed entity in Pristina, and while continuing to appear diplomatically determined to put obstacles to Kosovo’s recognition, the Russians have been reluctant to enter into closer arrangements with the Serbian government for the simple reason that they did not trust the coalition such as had existed before March 11. It was clear that within that coalition the majority partner, the DS of Boris Tadic, was committed not only to “European integrations” but also to Serbia’s eventual membership in NATO.
It would have been incongruous for the Russians to seek closer partnership with a government that was deeply split from within, the one whose minister for foreign affairs and minister of defense were unreservedly pro-Western come what may. The same ambivalence of the Serbian government – including even outright hostility to Russia – was evident in the economic sphere. A key minister in the former coalition, Mladjan Dinkic, tried to sabotage the agreement with Moscow on the South Stream gas pipeline that will run across the Black Sea via Bulgaria and Serbia into Central and Southern Europe. The Russians are waiting, in my opinion, for the outcome of the forthcoming general elections to decide what they’ll do next.
Serbia’s options
It is highly desirable for Serbia to diversify its foreign policy and external economic options. It is obvious that Serbia is not made welcome by the European club and that the EU would like to have Serbia not as partner but as a subservient client. It is therefore both rationally advisable and in the long term more profitable to seek alternative options. This is not a matter of “choosing between the East and the West” but seeking good comprehensive relations with both while avoiding subservience to either.

The E.U.'s Double Game in the Balkans

http://www.chroniclesmagazine.org/?p=574#more-574
Chronicles Online, Saturday, April 26, 2008
The E.U.'s Double Game in the Balkans
by Srdja Trifkovic

In theory the European Union is horrified at the prospect of the Serbian Radical Party (Srpska radikalna stranka, SRS) becoming not only the strongest party in the country's parliament—which it already is—but also the majority partner in a new ruling coalition after the general election on May 11. In practice, the EU officials in Brussels and in Kosovo are acting as if this is the outcome they earnestly desire.

The claim that it is possible for Serbia to continue her "process of European integrations" regardless of the status of Kosovo, or of the leading EU member-states' position on this issue, is the pillar of the election campaign by the Democratic Party (Demokratska stranka, DS) of President Boris Tadic and his "pro-European" coalition. They claim that it is possible for Belgrade to conduct a dual-track policy, whereby the refusal of Serbia to accept Kosovo's independence would not influence—and therefore would not hinder—the process of getting closer to EU.

That this claim is false is evident from the fact that all key EU countries except Spain have recognized Kosovo's unilateral declaration of independence. With the EU heavyweights, Britain, France, Germany, and Italy, opening their embassies and trade missions in "the Republic of Kosovo," it is unthinkable that they would accept Serbia as a fully-fledged member of the Union unless Belgrade first "normalizes relations with all its neighbors"—Eurospeak for accepting the finality of Kosovo's independence and opening an embassy in Pristina.

More importantly in the short term, the European Union—acting under an entirely self-created mandate—is attempting to insert its own "Rule of Law mission," EULEX, into the province, to replace the one authorized by United Nations Security Council Resolution 1244 in 1999. The EU mission composed of two thousand police, customs officers and judicial personnel is based on the provisions of the failed Ahtisaari Plan, which was rejected by Serbia and never formally considered, let alone authorized, by the UNSC. The situation is legally and politically unprecedented: Imagine the United States deploying peacekeepers in the West Bank and Gaza in accordance with Bill Clinton's proposed 2000 Camp David agreement . . . after that agreement was rejected by one of the parties.

If the European Union had wanted to help its friends in Serbia, who nevertheless keep swearing by their country's "European perspective," it would have refrained—until May 11, at least—from doing or saying anything contrary to their wishful thinking and surreal rhetoric. This would be cynical, of course, but not unprecedented: the final decision on Eulex was initially supposed to be taken on January 28, but the EU decided to postpone it in order not to undermine Boris Tadic's chances of re-election in the second of Serbia's presidential election on February 3. Literally hours after the election was over, on February 4, a Council Joint Action was approved, paving the way for the deployment process.

Far from helping Tadic and his Europhile coalition in the current campaign, the Brussels machine is driving them to exasperation with statements and acts that appear almost calculated to help their rivals – those political forces that have been warning of the EU's double game in the Balkans:
• On April 7 Dutch diplomat Pieter Feith, who represents the European Union in Pristina, declared that Kosovo is "an independent, sovereign state, recognized by more than 30 of the most important democracies and economies in the world." This was remarkable for three reasons: (1) Feith had no authority to make this statement since he represents the EU as a whole, and the Union has not adopted a formal, consensual decision to recognize Kosovo; in fact, a number of EU member-countries still refuse to do so (Spain, Romania, Slovakia, Greece, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Portugal, Malta). (2) Nevertheless, Feith's statement elicited no comment from Brussels — no denial, rebuke — thus implying the Commission's back-door approval of his position. (3) The President of Serbia and his protégé, foreign minister Jeremic, far from lodging a protest with the EU or seeking clarification, studiously avoided acknowledging Feith's outburst in any manner.
• On April 8 the EU foreign policy supremo Javier Solana told the European Parliament, "We have to do everything to create the impression with the people in Serbia that we want them as close as possible to us." [emphasis added] Sr. Solana went on to say that if the Radical Party wins the election general Mladić would not be extradited to The Hague Tribunal (ICTY), and for that reason the EU should help the pro-European forces by offering the Stabilization and Association Agreement (SAA) for signature before May 11. The EU high representative—who is best known to the Serbs for the fact that, as Secretary-General of NATO, he formally authorized the beginning of the bombing campaign against Serbia in March 1999—went on to say that he "loved Serbia, even though it was prone to looking backwards instead of forwards." He concluded by reiterating that EULEX will be deployed all over Kosovo, regardless of Serbian objections, and repeated the old mantra that this does not set a precedent: "The European Union has said it a thousand times that Kosovo is a unique case and that is why Kosovo will remain an exception and not a rule in international relations."
• On April 17 the EU Enlargement Commissioner Ollie Rehn declared that Serbia "faces a crucial choice in the parliamentary elections on 11 May, turning either to the European future or risking self- isolation." Addressing a conference in Brussels on civil society in South Eastern Europe that he opened together with George Soros, Rehn went on to praise "Kosovo's commitment to a democratic and multi-ethnic society [which] is enshrined in the recent Constitution. The EU supports Kosovo to stand on its own feet and wants to help Kosovo to help itself."
• From April 17 to 19 an EU parliamentary delegation visited Kosovo. Its leader, German Christian Democrat Doris Pack, said matter-of-factly, after meeting the Albanian leaders of Kosovo's self-proclaimed state (president, prime minister and the speaker of the assembly), that she discussed with them "the situation after the declaration of independence." She repeated as fact their claims that the unrest in the Serb-inhabited northern part of Mitrovica on March 17 was instigated by "outsiders," and expressed hope that the Serbs will become reconciled to the new reality after May 11.
• On April 23 the International Crisis Group—a pro-independence, quasi-independent institution partly financed by Mr. Soros and formerly headed by none other than Mr. Ahtisaari of the Kosovo Plan fame—published a briefing paper which argues that the EU should not offer a Stabilization and Association Agreement or any other similar inducement to Belgrade without Serbia's prior full co-operation with the ICTY, because "appeasement has failed in the Balkans for over a decade and a half".
• And finally, on April 24 Ollie Rehn gave an interview to the Belgrade daily "Politika" in which he stated that "Kosovo, like the rest of the western Balkans, has an European perspective." Asked specifically if Serbia would have to recognize Kosovo's independence in order to join the EU, he replied: "All potential member-countries have to respect good-neighborly relations."
All of the above indicates that Brussels is following a sustained, deliberate, and more or less open policy of actively supporting Kosovo's independent statehood, even in the absence of any formal EU document declaring this to be the case. That is exactly what Prime Minister Kostunica and his allies have been saying for months, and this is what finally caused the collapse of the coalition government in early March.

There is still no real debate in Serbia on the EU, however; and what discussion there is remains highly ideological. No matter what Messrs Feith, Solana, Rehn and others do or say, Tadic and the DS-led bloc refuse to discuss the problem. Any attempt at critical examination of the policies pursued from Brussels elicits an instantaneous "anti-European" label from their camp, just as any attempt at critical examination of the policies pursued by the communist regime two or three decades ago invited the accusation of "anti-socialist enemy propaganda." Ironically but not surprisingly, today's most enthusiastic pro-EU neoliberals are often the same people as yesterday's zealous Titoists, or else their spiritual or biological heirs.

The immediate bone of contention is whether Serbia should sign the SAA, if and when it is finally offered from Brussels. Tadic and his allies insist that Article 135 of the draft agreement, initialled last fall, guarantees Serbia's sovereignty and territorial integrity. Under that article Kosovo is excluded from the application of the SAA for as long as the UNSC Resolution 1244 remains in force.

The problem is that since the SAA was initialled five months ago, the EU has taken specific political measures which contravene the letter, and especially the spirit, of that article. The Union has done this by creating Eulex and by expecting Serbia to start treating Kosovo as an independent state. As Serbia's Minister for Kosovo Slobodan Samardzic, a Kostunica ally, explained in an interview to the daily Politika, "it remains to be seen whether the Union will initiate the process of association and stabilization with Kosovo as an independent state. Serbia needs to know this in advance, before it signs the agreement, because such political acts would invalidate upfront th contents of Article 135."

Prime Minister Kostunica for his part has warned that anyone signing the SAA on behalf of Serbia "would become an accomplice in realizing this document's objective – which is dismemberment of Serbia and recognition of Kosovo's independence." Serbian citizens see that "things are covered up," he added, and that something is seriously wrong with "Solana's agreement" which is on offer: "Statements by Olli Rehn and other EU officials show that the true goal of . . . Solana's agreement is only one – to enable them to make the subsequent claim that Serbia has recognized the fraudulent state of Kosovo."

Tadic responds by claiming that the EU is the only framework for all Serbs to be under a single political authority. Nevertheless, the mantra that "European integrations have no alternative" is wearing thin. It has been repeated too often, and it is beginning to irritate even many "inside-the-number-two-tramline" Belgraders – urbane and by no means nationalist Serbs who had previously supported the "European course" for the country, but who look upon Sr. Solana's professions of affection and his thinly veiled political inducements, as insulting and shameful. Over the past few weeks the results of opinion surveys in Serbia have been fairly consistent: faced with the dilemma "the EU or Kosovo," some 70 percent of respondents opt for their country's territorial integrity. According to the latest opinion poll by the Belgrade-based Centre for Free Elections and Democracy, CESID, the Radicals, together with the "popular block" of Prime Minister Kostunica and his junior coalition partner, Nova Srbija, may get enough votes on May 11 for a simple combined majority in the next parliament.

On current form that is exactly what Brussels and Washington want. They hope to see their "pro-European" friends defeated and their "nationalist" opponents enthroned, in order to justify, however retroactively, their illegal and self-defeating Kosovo policies. If the Radicals enter government in Belgrade in late spring or early summer 2008, it will be the explanation for encourganing Albanians not to negotiate with Belgrade in 2007, the reason for prodding them to declare independence on February 17, 2008, and the justification for recognizing their separatist entity after that date.

The precedent exists, of course. It is the manner in which Sr. Solana's splendid little NATO war against Serbia in '99 came to be retroactively justified by the "humanitarian disaster" in Kosovo that started after the bombing, and was caused by the bombing.

The problem Borist Tadic and his "pro-Western" allies face today in relation to the European Union is identical to the one faced by Serbia's tiny collaborationist movement during World War II occupation (1941-1944) vis-à-vis the "New European Order."
• In both cases Serbia was treated with vindictive disdain, as an untrustworthy, disruptive and fundamentally illegitimate entity;
• In both cases, large tracts of Serbian-inhabited lands were carved up and given to their marauding neighbors, such as Albanians, who were regarded as far more reliable partners of the "European" powers-that-be.
• In both cases, gross mistreatment of Serbs in those lands and their mass expulsion was tolerated by "Europe," and some of the worst offenders (Pavelic then, Haradinaj now) were treated as allies.
• In both cases the supporters of the "European" project in Serbia claimed that integration was possible, and in fact inevitable, but that the main problem was with Serbia herself.
• In both cases the conditions for any such future integration were left vague by "Europe" (Berlin in 1941, Brussels today) and predicated upon the Serbs constantly proving themselves worthy of such honor.
• Finally, in both cases the leaders of "Europe" did little to help their self-avowed allies in Serbia, treating them with condescension or studied contempt.
The good news is that the final outcome is no more cast in stone today than it was in 1941. Yes, the "Republic of Kosova" will linger on for a few years, as an extravagant experiment costing West European taxpayers a few billion a year. Yes, it will continue developing—not as a functional economy, of course, but as a black hole of criminality and terrorism. In the end, this experiment will prove as enduring as the earlier attempt by "Europe" to create a Greater Albania, 67 years ago.
__._,_.___

The E.U.’s Double Game in the Balkans

The problem Boris Tadic and his allies face today in relation to the EU is identical to the one faced in 1941 by the Zbor movement vis-à-vis the "New European Order"

http://www.chroniclesmagazine.org/?p=574

The E.U.’s Double Game in the Balkans

by Srdja Trifkovic
In theory the European Union is horrified at the prospect of the Radical Party of Serbia (Srpska radikalna stranka, SRS) becoming not only the strongest party in the country’s parliament—which it already is—but also the majority partner in a new ruling coalition after the general election on May 11. In practice, the EU officials in Brussels and in Kosovo are acting as if this is the outcome they earnestly desire.
The claim that it is possible for Serbia to continue her “process of European integrations,” regardless of the status of Kosovo or of the leading EU member-states’ position on this issue—is the pillar of the election campaign by the Democratic Party (Demokratska stranka, DS) of President Boris Tadic and his “pro-Western” allies. They claim that it is possible for Belgrade to conduct a dual-track policy, whereby the refusal of Serbia to accept Kosovo’s independence would not influence—and therefore would not hinder—the process of getting closer to EU.
That this claim is false is evident from the fact that all key EU countries except Spain have recognized Kosovo’s unilateral declaration of independence. With the EU heavyweights, Britain, France, Germany, and Italy, opening their embassies and trade missions in “the Republic of Kosovo,” it is unthinkable that they would accept Serbia as a fully-fledged member of the Union unless Belgrade first “normalizes relations with all its neighbors”—Eurospeak for accepting the finality of Kosovo’s independence and opening an embassy in Pristina.
More importantly in the short term, the European Union—acting under an entirely self-created mandate—is attempting to insert its own “Rule of Law mission,” Eulex, into the province to replace the one authorized by United Nations Security Council in 1999. The EU mission composed of two thousand police, customs officers and judicial personnel is based on the provisions of the failed Ahtissari Plan, which was rejected by Serbia and never formally considered, let alone authorized, by the UNSC. The situation is legally and politically unprecedented. Imagine the United States deploying peacekeepers in the West Bank and Gaza in accordance with Bill Clinton’s proposed Camp David agreement . . . after that agreement was rejected by one of the parties.
If the European Union had wanted to help its friends in Serbia who nevertheless keep swearing by their country’s “European perspective,” it would have refrained—until May 11, at least—from doing or saying anything contrary to their wishful thinking and surreal rhetoric. This would be cynical, of course, but not unprecedented: the final decision on Eulex was initially supposed to be taken on January 28, but the EU decided to postpone it in order not to undermine Boris Tadic’s chances of reelection in the second of Serbia’s presidential election on February 3. Literally hours after the election was over, a Council Joint Action was approved, paving the way for the deployment process.
Far from helping Tadic and his Europhile coalition in the current campaign, the Brussels machine is driving them to exasperation with statements and acts that appear almost calculated to help their those political forces that have been warning of the EU double game in the Balkans:
• On April 7, Dutch diplomat Pieter Feith who represents the European Union in Kosovo, thus declared that Kosovo is “an independent, sovereign state, recognized by more than 30 of the most important democracies and economies in the world.” This was remarkable for three reasons. First of all, the authority for Feith’s statement is unclear since the European Union has not adopted a formal, consensual decision to recognize Kosovo and a number of EU member countries still refuse to do so (Spain, Romania, Slovakia, Greece, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Portugal, Malta). Secondly, Feith’s statement elicited no comment from Brussels, let alone a denial, rebuke, or clarification. Thirdly, the President of Serbia and his protégé, the foreign minister, far from lodging a protest with the EU, studiously avoided acknowledging Feith’s outbursts in any manner.
• On April 8 the EU foreign policy supremo Javier Solana told the European Parliament, “We have to do everything to create the impression with the people in Serbia that we want them as close as possible to us.” [emphasis added] Sr. Solana went on to say that if the Radical Party win the elections general Mladić would not be extradited to The Hague Tribunal (ICTY), and for that reason the EU should help the pro-European forces by offering the Stabilization and Association Agreement (SAA) for signature before May 11. The EU high representative—who is best known to the Serbs for the fact that, as Secretary-General of NATO, he formally authorized the beginning of the bombing campaign against Serbia in March 1999—went on to say that he “loved Serbia, even though it was prone to looking backwards instead of forwards.” He concluded by reiterating that EULEX will be deployed all over Kosovo regardless of Serbian objections, and repeating the old mantra that it does not set a precedent: “The European Union has said it a thousand times that Kosovo is a unique case and that is why Kosovo will remain an exception and not a rule in international relations.”
• On April 17 the EU Enlargement Commissioner Ollie Rehn declared that Serbia “faces a crucial choice in the parliamentary elections on 11 May, turning either to the European future or risking self- isolation.” Addressing a conference in Brussels on civil society in South Eastern Europe that he opened together with George Soros, Rehn went on to praise “Kosovo’s commitment to a democratic and multi-ethnic society [which] is enshrined in the recent Constitution. The EU supports Kosovo to stand on its own feet and wants to help Kosovo to help itself.”
• From April 17 to 19 an EU parliamentary delegation visited Kosovo. Its leader, German Christian Democrat Doris Pack, said matter-of-factly, after meeting the Albanian leaders of Kosovo’s self-proclaimed state (president, prime minister and the speaker of the assembly), that she discussed with them “the situation after the declaration of independence.” She repeated as fact their claims that the unrest in the Serb-inhabited northern part of Mitrovica on March 17 was instigated by “outsiders,” and expressed hope that the Serbs will become reconciled to the new reality after May 11.
• And finally, on April 23 the International Crisis Group—a pro-independence, quasi-independent institution partly financed by Mr. Soros and formerly headed by none other than Mr. Ahtisaari of the Kosovo Plan fame—published a briefing paper which argues that the EU should not offer a Stabilization and Association Agreement or any other similar inducement to Belgrade without Serbia’s prior full co-operation with the ICTY, because “appeasement has failed in the Balkans for over a decade and a half”.
All of the above indicates that Brussels is following a sustained, deliberate, and more or less open policy of actively supporting Kosovo’s independent statehood, even in the absence of any formal EU document declaring this to be the case. That is exactly what Prime Minister Kostunica and his allies have been saying for months, and this is what finally caused the collapse of the coalition government in early March.
There is still no real debate in Serbia on the EU, however; and what discussion there is remains highly ideological. No matter what Messrs Feith, Solana, Rehn and others do or say, Tadic and the DS will refuse to discuss the problem. Any attempt at critical examination of the policies pursued from Brussels elicits a quick “anti-European” label from their camp, just as any attempt at critical examination of the policies pursued by the communist regime two or three decades ago invited the accusation of “anti-socialist enemy propaganda.” Ironically but unsurprisingly, today’s most enthusiastic pro-EU neoliberals are often the same people as yesterday’s zealous Titoists, or else their spiritual or biological heirs.
By now the mantra that “European integrations have no alternative” is wearing thin, however. It is beginning to irritate many urbane and by no means nationalist Serbs who had previously supported the “European course” for the country, but who look upon Sr. Solana’s professions of affection and thinly veiled political inducements, as insulting and shameful. According to the latest opinion poll by the Belgrade-based Centre for Free Elections and Democracy, CESID, the Radicals, together with the “popular block” of Prime Minister Kostunica and his junior coalition partner, Nova Srbija, may get enough votes on May 11 for a simple combined majority in the next parliament.
On current form that is exactly what Brussels and Washington want. They hope to see their “pro-European” friends defeated and their “nationalist” opponents enthroned, in order to justify, however retroactively, their illegal and self-defeating Kosovo policies. If the Radicals enter government in Belgrade in late spring or early summer 2008, it will be the explanation for encourganing Albanians not to negotiate with Belgrade in 2007, the reason for prodding them to declare independence on February 17, 2008, and the justification for recognizing their separatist entity after that date.
The precedent exists, of course. It is the manner in which Sr. Solana’s splendid little NATO war against Serbia in ’99 came to be retroactively justified by the “humanitarian disaster” in Kosovo that started after the bombing, and was caused by the bombing.
The problem Boris Tadic and his “pro-Western” allies face today in relation to the European Union is identical to the one faced by Serbia’s tiny collaborationist movement during World War II occupation (1941-1944) vis-à-vis the “New European Order.”
• In both cases Serbia was treated with vindictive disdain, as an untrustworthy, disruptive and fundamentally illegitimate entity;
• In both cases, large tracts of Serbian-inhabited lands were carved up and given to their marauding neighbors, such as Albanians, who were regarded as far more reliable partners of the “European” powers-that-be.
• In both cases, gross mistreatment of Serbs in those lands and their mass expulsion was tolerated by “Europe,” and some of the worst offenders (Pavelic then, Haradinaj now) were treated as allies.
• In both cases the supporters of the “European” project in Serbia claimed that integration was possible, and in fact inevitable, but that the main problem was with Serbia herself.
• In both cases the conditions for any such future integration were left vague by “Europe” (Berlin in 1941, Brussels today) and predicated upon the Serbs constantly proving themselves worthy of such honor.
• Finally, in both cases the leaders of “Europe” did little to help their self-avowed allies in Serbia, treating them with condescension or studied contempt.
The good news is that the final outcome is no more cast in stone today than it was in 1941. Yes, the “Republic of Kosova” will linger on for a few years, as an extravagant experiment costing West European taxpayers a few billion a year. Yes, it will continue developing—not as a functional economy, of course, but as a black hole of criminality and terrorism. In the end the experiment will prove as enduring as that earlier Greater Albania, 67 years ago.

Dr. S. Trifkovic, Foreign Affairs Editor
CHRONICLES: A Magazine of American Culture
http://www.chroniclesmagazine.org/?cat=4
www.trifkovic.mysite.com

I was right to oppose NATO intervention in Kosovo By Robert Skidelsky

http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=5&article_id=91432

LEBANON DAILY STAR

COMMENT

I was right to oppose NATO intervention in Kosovo
By Robert Skidelsky

Friday, April 25, 2008

Kosovo's recent unilateral declaration of independence brought back
memories. I publicly opposed NATO's attack on Serbia - carried out in the
name of protecting the Kosovars from Serb atrocities - in March 1999. At
that time, I was a member of the Opposition Front Bench - or Shadow
Government - in Britain's House of Lords. The then Conservative leader,
William Hague, immediately expelled me to the "back benches." Thus ended my
(minor) political career. Ever since, I have wondered whether I was right or
wrong.

I opposed military intervention for two reasons. First, I argued that while
it might do local good, it would damage the rules of international relations
as they were then understood. The United Nations charter was designed to
prevent the use of force across national lines except for self-defense and
enforcement measures ordered by the Security Council. Human rights,
democracy and self-determination are not acceptable legal grounds for waging
war.

Secondly, I argued that while there might be occasions when, regardless of
international law, human rights abuses are so severe that one is morally
obliged to act, Kosovo was not such a case. I considered the "imminent
humanitarian disaster" that the intervention was ostensibly aimed at
preventing, to be largely an invention. I further argued that non-military
means to resolve the humanitarian issue in Kosovo were far from being
exhausted, and that the failed Rambouillet negotiation with Serbia in
February-March 1999 was, in Henry Kissinger's words, "merely an excuse to
start the bombing."

This view was vindicated by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in
Europe's Report on Human Rights Violations in Kosovo, published in December
1999. The report showed that the level of violence fell markedly when OSCE
monitors were placed in Kosovo following the Holbrooke-Milosevic agreement
of September 23, 1998; and that it was only after the monitors were
withdrawn on March 20, 1999, in preparation for the bombing, that general
and systematic violation of human rights began.

Between March and June 1999 - the period of NATO bombing - the number of
deaths and expulsions in Kosovo shot up. The "humanitarian disaster" was in
fact precipitated by the war itself. Despite this, the term "genocide,"
freely bandied about by Western interventionists, was grotesquely
inappropriate at any time.

Without doubt, NATO air strikes and the subsequent administration of Kosovo
as a protectorate improved the political situation for Albanian Kosovars.
Without NATO intervention, they probably would have remained second-class
citizens within Serbia. Against this must be set the large-scale
deterioration in the economic situation of all Kosovars, Albanian and
Serbian (44 percent unemployment), widespread criminalization, and the fact
that under NATO rule, Kosovo was ethnically cleansed of half its Serb
minority.

Kosovo remains in political limbo to this day. Two thousand European Union
officials run the country, and 16,000 NATO troops guard its security. Its
"independence" is rejected by Serbia, unrecognized by the Security Council,
and opposed by Russia, China, and most multi-national states in Europe and
Asia, which fear setting a precedent for their own dismemberment. Indeed,
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov was quick to blame the disturbances
in Tibet on Kosovo's declaration of independence.

A Serbian insurgency and de facto partition of Kosovo remain possible, and
we have yet to face the destabilizing effects of Kosovo's claim to
independence on other divided Balkan states such as Bosnia and Macedonia But
the balance sheet is even worse in terms of international relations. Kosovo
was a stalking horse for Iraq, as the doctrine of humanitarian intervention
morphed into President George W. Bush's doctrine of "pre-emptive war," by
which the US claimed the right to attack any state that it deemed a threat
to its national security. As then-UN Secretary General Kofi Annan rightly
argued, this opened the door to the proliferation of unilateral, lawless use
of force.

Not the least damaging consequence of the Bush doctrine is that it dispenses
with the need for public proof of aggressive intent. The Iraq invasion was
justified by the same use of fraudulent evidence as was displayed in Kosovo.

On balance, I believe that I was right to oppose the Kosovo war. It was a
regressive answer to a genuine international problem: how to hold together
multi-ethnic-religious states in a reasonably civilized way. Since 1999,
Kosovars have rejected Serbian offers of autonomy, because they were
confident of American support for independence.

Western countries must consider more seriously how far they should press
their human rights agenda on states with both the power and the will to
defend their territorial integrity. Under American leadership, it is the
West that has emerged as the restless, disturbing force in international
affairs. China should certainly grant Tibet more autonomy; but is pumping up
the Dalai Lama into a world leader or threatening to boycott the Beijing
Olympics the best way to secure a better deal for Tibetans, or to obtain
Chinese cooperation on matters that are far more important than Tibet's
status?

Activists, impassioned by the justice of their cause, will not consider
these questions. But world leaders should take them seriously.

Robert Skidelsky, a member of the British House of Lords, is professor
emeritus of political economy at Warwick University, author of a
prize-winning biography of the economist John Maynard Keynes, and a board
member of the Moscow School of Political Studies.

Julia Gorin: Silence is golden

http://washingtontimes.com/article/20080425/EDITORIAL/15078464/1013/EDITORIAL

WASHINGTON TIMES (USA)

OPINION

FORUM: Silence is golden

April 25, 2008

By Julia Gorin - Penn State's student newspaper The Daily Collegian reported
on Ann Coulter's hour-long speech there this month: For possibly the first
time in her career the conservative commentator, had nothing to say about a
political issue. "I have no opinion," she told a student who asked her about
Kosovo and Ukraine. That may be the first time those words have passed my
lips.

During her hour-long speech to a crowd of more than a thousand in HUB Alumni
Hall last week, though, Ms. Coulter spoke candidly about her opinions on a
variety of controversial subjects ranging from the war in Iraq to global
warming to terrorism. The usual, in other words. The easy stuff. And on the
easy, day-to-day stuff, every conservative loudmouth in America has a strong
and ready opinion. But on the fact that in the Kosovo giveaway of 2008 weve
just repeated the Munich surrender of 1938 nothing.

While Americans can't be expected to have strong opinions on whether the
Ukraine gets an invitation to NATO or not, the Kosovo question is a
different story. So let me see if I have this non-opinion on Kosovo
straight: The U.S. is aggressively creating another Muslim state in Europe,
openly calling for a heightened Islamic presence on the continent, and Ms.
Coulter has no opinion.

In the case of Kosovo, it's a Muslim state whose leaders and inhabitants
have killed or cleansed most of the Christians (and Muslims who didn't mind
being part of a larger Christian nation) from its borders. But Ms. Coulter
has no opinion.

In the immediate aftermath of 9/11, investigators flew to Albania after
discovering a cell there that was connected to the hijackers and she has no
opinion.

In the weeks before 9/11, six Albanian-American fundamentalists arrived in
the Kosovo village of Skenderaj, telling locals that the U.S. would soon be
attacked, and Ms. Coulter has nothing to say about it. (Not coincidentally,
Skenderaj was a stronghold during the 1998-99 war of Americas past and
present ally, the KLA.) Less than a year ago, 4 out of 6 jihadists arrested
for planning to massacre American soldiers at Ft. Dix were Albanian; the
weapons provider among them (Agron Abdullahu) having been sheltered at Ft.
Dix during the 1999 resettlement process. And still Ms. Coulter has no
opinion on whether this kind of behavior deserves American-enforced
independence for Abdullahus horde. That we fought alongside this former
Kosovo sniper in Bill Clinton's war of aggression is for some reason
insignificant to this and all other pundits.

We're well post-9/11, and President Bush has been replicating and completing
a strong-arm war of might-makes-right started by Mr. Clinton whom Ms.
Coulter distrusts and despises and it elicits a shrug from this opinionist.

After we helped the ultranationalist Albanians with the Kosovo leg of their
jihad, they moved on like clockwork to de-stabilize Macedonia and southern
Serbia using the same terrorist provocations they employed in Kosovo, in
Macedonia winning U.S. support but Ann has no opinion.

Osama Bin Laden set his sights on, and traveled throughout, the Balkans in
the 90s, meeting with Albanian leaders (as he did with Bosnian ones), and
assigning al Qaeda capos to different areas there including Ayman
al-Zawahiris brother Mohammed. Today, America solidifies this radical base
for bin Laden, while presiding over the construction of 400 new Saudi and
UAE-financed mosques amid systematic church destruction. But this isnt
significant enough for Ms. Coulter to have an opinion on.

The U.S. is redefining the concept of the nation-state along ethnic
boundaries, with implications for every region of the globe including
Southern California and every other state of the Union that has majority
ethnic enclaves, but don't look to Ms. Coulter to have an opinion on that.

The U.S. is dismantling principles of the international order that have
guided and protected statecraft for sixty years, which is CURRENTLY being
used as a precedent from India to Sri Lanka to Catalonia in Spain to the
Galilee in Israel to Quebec to Vermont, but this isn't opinion-worthy,
apparently.

The American-backed prime minister of Kosovo oversaw the butchering of
civilians for their organs during this war for independence and against
genocide among countless other creatively brutal exploits by the
U.S.-anointed KLA but Ms. Coulter doesn't have an opinion on that either.

Of course, I have no opinion on that sums up the negligence of the whole of
American punditry, and explains why we have arrived at this staggering but
ignored precipice in history. If even the intelligentsia both right and left
has no opinion on a matter of such grave consequence to the free world, on
issues as vital as the sovereignty of countries with minority populations
and the challenges to a basic principle of international law, what hope is
there for the rest of the country? Busy trying to out-clever one another on
the election-oriented petty issue du jour, the commentators haven't noticed
that the bottom has just fallen out from under Western civilization before
their very eyes, as the international order is dismantled under their noses.

Once again, as in 2001 when we decided to back Albanian rebels against the
Westward-facing, multi-ethnic nation of Macedonia which took in 400,000
Albanian refugees from Kosovo we see that it's possible for America to be at
war without its public or the public's hard-nosed messengers noticing.
Indeed, if our war on behalf of Muslims is against the expendable Slavs,
it's more than possible. It's applauded.

Never do our thinkers stop to ask: Why all the sweating by world powers
foremost by the U.S. over such a small, seemingly insignificant Balkan
province? Why the absolutist approach (e.g. Condi Rice: Kosovo must be
independent; Nicholas Burns: Independence is the only solution)? After all,
everyone seemed to get the joke last June when President Bush found his only
friend on the planet in Albania. The answer is that the United States of
America is being blackmailed in Kosovo. The U.S., bitten by the Balkan bug,
today serves as a mafia enforcer for the criminal gang that is Greater
Albania. Such is the position we have allowed ourselves to be placed in.

Whether you like her or not, Ms. Coulter is considered an informed American.
Her no opinion on Kosovo speaks volumes about how much the rest of our
populace knows or cares about this underappreciated catalyst for the demise
of Western values and civilization. I'm reminded of the time I pitched a
book project to a conservative imprint at a major publishing house, about
the fallout and implications of Americas taking all the wrong sides in the
Yugoslav wars. The editor replied, Try a European publisher. Americans
aren't interested in other countries.

Julia Gorin, a contributing editor to JewishWorldReview.com and is an
advisory board member of the American Council for Kosovo.

letters@washingtontimes.com

How Many Kosovo Albanians Are There Really?

http://byzantinesacredart.com/blog/2008/04/numbers-game.html

BYZANTINE SACRED ART (CANADA)

The Numbers Game

How Many Kosovo Albanians Are There Really?

One would be hard pressed to find a single Western media article about
Serbian province of Kosovo and Metohija without the brief passage stating,
in one way or the other, that there are some 2 million ethnic Albanians in
the province. This most commonly repeated falsity has been so firmly
ingrained in the minds of the Western politicians and public, that no one
even thinks of questioning the veracity of the claim.

Playing with numbers to boost one side's quasi arguments in the absence of
real ones is the all-times' favorite game of the propagandists. It is
virtually impossible to verify in most cases, it is almost undetectable and
the easiest type of manipulation-you simply state and keep repeating that
Serbs have "executed" 7,000 "Muslim men and boys" in Srebrenica and killed
10,000 Albanians in Kosovo-Metohija province, that 500,000 Muslim women were
raped in Bosnia, that Serbs just killed 100,000 Albanians in a football
stadium in Pristina, that 500,000 Muslims were killed during the Bosnian
civil war... that there are 2 million, or 90 percent of Albanians in Kosovo
province.

Since no one is expected to go there after reading about it in NY Times,
Washington Post, London Times et al and count those who were allegedly
executed, killed, raped and stuffed in mysterious mass graves no one has
been able to find after ten and 18 years of digging, or count the actual
number of ethnic Albanians in southern Serbian province, such outright lies
remain the most stubbornly repeated, unquestioned Western mainstream media
staples.

In November 2007, after the UNMIK-organized elections, viewed as a form of
referendum where Kosovo Albanians were expected to vote in droves to confirm
their dedication to Kosovo independence, Western MSM reported a "record-low
turnout", citing the OSCE observers and UNMIK chief administrator Joachim
Ruecker, who said that "only between 40-45 percent of ethnic Albanians
voted". That would mean that only some 800,000 Albanians out of 2 million
took part in the elections they considered crucial.

However, adviser of the Serbia's prime minister Aleksandar Simic pointed
this was clearly not the case of a "low turnout", but the case of the
exposed number rigging, since there are no more than 1,1 - 1,2 million of
ethnic Albanians in the Serbian province, including the illegal immigrants
who are continually freely crossing the non-existent border between Albania
and Kosovo-Metohija province, which NATO was supposed to guard. Therefore,
the actual turnout in these elections was as high as expected, with more
than 70 percent of ethnic Albanians taking part. Of real ethnic Albanians,
not the imaginary ones.

No More Than 1,2 Million of Ethnic Albanians in Kosovo-Metohija Province
Responding to a recent article in Serbian media which cited the same
disinformation about the number of ethnic Albanians in Serbian province,
Zvonimir Trajkovic, a political commentator, reporter and adviser to several
Yugoslav and Serbian presidents wrote:

"There has never been, nor is there today more than 1,2 million Shiptars
[ethnic Albanians] in Kosovo and Metohija province, so please be careful not
to naively adopt Shiptar propaganda that there are 2, or even 2,5 million of
them.

"There are six cities in Kosovo and Metohija, or rather small towns:
Pristina with 180,000 residents, Mitrovica with 75,000 residents, Pec -
60,000, Prizren - 55,000, Gnjilane - 45,000 and Urosevac - 40,000. Each of
these includes the suburbs and surrounding municipalities, because the data
covers the total number of municipal residents. Those are the estimates from
1998, since Shiptars boycotted and obstructed every census in
Kosovo-Metohija from 1971 till present, precisely in order to be able to
continuously exaggerate their ethnic presence in the province.

"Before the mass ethnic cleansing in 1999, there were 320,000 Serbs in
Kosovo-Metohija, 45,000 Roma, 17,000 Gorani (Slavic Muslims, loyal to
Serbia)... At the same time [right before NATO marched in allowing massive
pogroms and expulsion of non-Albanians], 38 percent of the residents of
province's capital Pristina were Serbs.

"If we add to this the fact that Kosovo and Metohija is an area almost twice
smaller than Vojvodina [northern Serbian region with population of 2
million], where have those 1,9 million Shiptars you are talking about
squeezed in? If their electoral lists contains 1,08 million voters,
including the deceased Shiptars and the illegal immigrants who came from
Albania alongside NATO, then it follows that there are 820,000 Shiptar
children. Then calculate how many schools should there be for so many
children, and there is a total of 6 of them in Pristina, with classes
consisting not of 200 children each, but around 30, like in Belgrade.

Roaming "Residents": Using Old Yugoslav IDs to Rig the Numbers in the Region
"In order to gain the right to become a constitutive nation in Macedonia,
they needed to cross the 25 percent of the population threshold. There are
between 17 and 19 percent of Shiptars in Macedonia, but they managed to rig
that number up to 26,3% through the Western-orchestrated census.

"So, how are they doing it? Being that they have the old [Yugoslav] ID
cards, whenever there is a census or elections in Macedonia, half of the
Kosovo-Metohija and Presevo Albanians surge to Macedonia to be counted or to
vote. When there is a similar thing happening in Kosovo-Metohija, all the
Shiptars from surrounding areas of former Yugoslavia [Montenegro, Macedonia,
Presevo region in Serbia] go to Kosovo province to cast their votes.

"In conclusion, don't buy the Shiptar propaganda which aims to present its
population as numerically absolutely dominant, with the purpose of
justifying their claims upon others' territories. Listed as Shiptars in the
books of Yugoslav citizens in Kosovo-Metohija are 830,000 ethnic Albanians
and that is the realistic number, perhaps with additional 50-100,000. But
talking about millions is entirely incorrect and a pure propaganda which can
serve only the Shiptars, who wish to send a totally distorted picture into
the world.

"Therefore, I appeal to all to refrain from publishing completely false data
which is harmful to Serbia. This is written by a man who was born in
Pristina and who lived there until 1982. I was also an adviser to several
presidents, in a position from which I had access to all the data state has
to make public. This is not being done today, because a number of the
politicians in power have failed to realize the importance of making this
sort of information publicly available in regular, orderly fashion. Our
current leadership is not publishing this data at present, because it does
not suit the Western agenda, so even our own-let alone the foreign-public is
unaware of the real figures and facts."

Cartoon by Aleksandar Klas (Serbia)

Posted by BBlog Staff on April 10, 2008 10:20 PM

Bridging the great divide

http://torontosun.com/News/World/2008/04/12/5265631-sun.html

TORONTO SUN (CANADA)

April 12, 2008

Bridging the great divide

Contested Kosovo span is a symbol of international failure

By SCOTT TAYLOR

MITROVICA, Kosovo -- All seems quiet at the north end of the bridge. A pair
of NATO patrol vehicles, a handful of French soldiers, a couple of UN
policemen and several rolls of barbed wire block access to the roadway.

I take some photographs and start walking back into the Serbian sector of
the city.

It is only then that I spot a group of young Serbs lingering in the shade of
a kiosk.

These young men are known as the "bridgewatchers," and since the Kosovo
conflict began in June 1999, they have maintained a 24-hour vigil on the
Serbian side of this contested span across the Ibar River.

In the summer of 1999, as NATO forces deployed into Kosovo and Serbian
security forces withdrew, nearly 800,000 Albanian Kosovars came flooding
back into the province after they were displaced during the 78-day NATO
bombing campaign.

This in turn generated an exodus from Kosovo of approximately 200,000 Serb
and non-Albanian minorities who fled in fear of Albanian reprisals.

It was here in Mitrovica that the flood of Serb refugees halted at the Ibar
River and defiantly laid claim to the northern portion of Kosovo, which is
an entirely ethnic Serbian enclave connected to the Republic of Serbia.

Numerous violent encounters have taken place across the Mitrovica bridge
between Albanians, Serbs and NATO troops. Located next to the Republic of
Serbia, this entirely ethnic Serbian enclave has come to symbolize the
failure of the international community to overcome the divide of ethnic
hatred in Kosovo.

Following the Albanians' unilateral declaration of independence on Feb. 17,
the Serbs of the Mitrovica pocket and other protected enclaves have refused
to accept the authority of the newly proclaimed state of "Kosava."

To demonstrate their resolve, the Serbs took control of the Mitrovica
courthouse and installed their own officials. It was this occupation of
regional offices by the Serbs that led to a bloody confrontation with NATO
troops on March 17.

When UN police and NATO vehicles rolled in to arrest the violators, the
bridgewatchers sounded an air raid siren to summon other Serbs to the scene.
The angry crowds clashed with the international security forces and vehicles
were set ablaze, shots were fired.

One Ukrainian soldier died, 63 NATO soldiers were injured, and an
undetermined number of Serbs were seriously wounded.

In a scathing internal memo to his superiors, UN regional representative
Jerry Gallucci described the debacle as an "ill-conceived operation (that)
has led to the disappearance of law and order in the north (of Kosovo)."

Gallucci was particularly incensed that the international community chose
March 17 to launch their operation, as this date coincided with the
anniversary of the 2004 pogrom in which three dozen people were killed and
Albanians torched more than 800 Serbian homes.

In Gallucci's opinion, this timing coupled with the heavy-handed tactic of
arresting and transporting the courthouse squatters "seemed almost designed
to inflame Serbian sentiments."

In the leadup to, and in the immediate aftermath of Kosovo's declared
independence, a large number of UN field officers voiced their concerns
about the international community turning a blind eye to the reality of the
situation on the ground.

Last year, a number of UN observers took the unprecedented step of compiling
an independent analysis, which they published and circulated without
filtering it through the chain of command.

The stated intention of the anonymous authors was to illustrate "the divide
that exists between (their) first-hand knowledge ... and the rosy picture of
the overall situation that is officially presented by top UN officials."

The facts presented in the report show that over the past nine years, the UN
has failed to achieve its stated objectives in virtually every category.

To illustrate the international community's failure to provide a secure
environment for non-Albanians in Kosovo, they point to the fact that there
have been more than 1,000 abductions of Serbs and other minorities since
1999.

Of that number, only 253 bodies have been discovered, and yet not a single
person has been found guilty for these crimes.

Under the terms of UN Resolution 1244, which facilitated the entry of NATO
into Kosovo, the international community was to take full responsibility for
the protection of Serbian heritage religious sites.

Despite the presence of more than 20,000 security personnel over the past
nine years, Albanian extremists have managed to destroy more than 150
Serbian churches and monasteries -- many dating back to the 11th century.

One of the most alarming assessments in the UN field officers' report is
that the criminal leadership of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) guerrilla
force, which was supposed to be disbanded, has instead assumed positions of
power at all levels of Kosovo society. According to their summary, the KLA
has simply "transformed into criminal structures, carrying out organized
crime activities of drugs and weapons trafficking and prostitution."

As one field officer stated, those guerrillas "are the real power in Kosovo
and many of their leaders are now politicians at all levels -- including
Prime Minister (Hashim Thaci)."

The Kosovo police service is described as "poorly competent" and that, in
turn, has resulted in a "culture that promotes intolerance with little or no
moral obligation to non-Albanians."

The assessment of life in Kosovo for ethnic minorities is one of limited
freedom of movement and constant fear. Also cited in the report is the fact
that the international community has failed to protect non-Albanian language
rights and that they have allowed the flag of the Republic of Albania to fly
on most public institutions since 1999.

In their report's conclusion, the UN officers point out that the Pristina
sports stadium is emblazoned with "an enormous picture of an armed, bearded,
combat-uniformed KLA leader."

Such an image, they argue, runs counter to the UN's original mission of
making Kosovo a secure environment for all residents.

Failure to remove the provocative poster demonstrates that the international
community is in fact "bowing to the dictates of extremists and warlords."

Although this blunt assessment of the Kosovo situation was presented as a
briefing note to the fact-finding delegation of the UN security council, the
recommendation that the granting of independence would be an "irresponsible
act" has now been superseded by the Albanians' Feb. 17 unilateral
declaration.

Senior officials working with the UN in Kosovo confirmed that the analysis
of this report was accurate, and they are frustrated and disappointed with
the sudden elimination of their mandate.

"The original role for the (NATO-led Kosovo troops, or KFOR) was to enforce
UN Resolution 1244 -- which clearly recognized the Serbian sovereignty over
Kosovo," explained Edward Tawii, a Canadian adviser to the UN interim
administration police, who has spent the past eight years based there.

"Now they say that KFOR will be responsible to provide a secure environment
in support of the independence declaration."

While the UN mission continues to function in this interim period, the
administrative oversight in Kosovo is slowly being assumed by the European
Union.

The EU will monitor and assist the newly proclaimed independent Kosovar
government and oversee the operation of the Kosovo police service.

KFOR troops will remain in place for the foreseeable future, and NATO will
continue to train and equip the Kosovo defence forces.

Since Serbia refuses to recognize Kosovo's independence, the government
continues to administer services such as the issuing of pension cheques to
those residing in non-Albanian enclaves.

Despite the presence of so many foreign troops and police officers -- 20,000
in a region of only two million inhabitants -- this overlapping of
responsibility has generated a lot of confusion.

In many cases, the various and diverse national interests of the
contributing NATO and non-NATO security forces have been exploited by the
criminal elements of the Albanian population.

In the village of Orcusa, in the southern Kosovo mountainous region known as
Gora, Norbert, a German master warrant officer, pointed out that the border
to Albania here is wide open.

"Between us and the Albanian towns across the valley there is not even a
checkpoint, let alone any barriers." According to the German officer, NATO
soldiers in this sector refer to the Kosovo border police as the traffic
police, since their purpose seems to be in assisting the flow of contraband,
rather than impeding it.

In addition to the drugs and weapons smuggled across this border, there are
vast tracts of deforested hillside where the Albanians crossed into Kosovo
to cut down trees.

According to the German, this uncontested exploitation of Kosovo's resources
and the open conduit for illegal trade could easily be curtailed.

"We have reconnaissance vehicles with incredible surveillance capability,"
he said. "Our cameras would be able to pick up the colour of the
woodcutter's eyes -- right across the valley. And one platoon of troops
would suffice to close the border."

Asked why, over the past nine years, this has never been done, Norbert
shrugged and said, "because somebody higher than my rank level wants it to
remain open."

While international observers on the ground may be highly critical of the
way events are unfolding in Kosovo and remain hard-pressed to explain the
often contradictory policies and mandates they are asked to enforce, the one
thing that is quite clear is that another confrontation is imminent and
unavoidable.

A second showdown with the Serbs in Mitrovica is likely to erupt when NATO
attempts to make good on their public promise to arrest the Serbian
ringleaders of the March 17 incident.

Such a policy would ignore the recommendations of UN regional representative
Jerry Gallucci. In his report, Gallucci urged his colleagues to offer the
Serbs some "contrition or recognition of the mistake (the international
community) made."

Instead, it seems that NATO wants to force submission on the Mitrovica Serbs
as quickly as possible.

One reason for this is that the Serbian parliament has been suspended and an
election is scheduled for May 11.

The primary battle cry in that campaign for both the Serbian Democratic
Party and the nationalist Radical Party is "Kosovo is Serbia."

A solution imposed on Mitrovica while the Serbian leadership is in limbo
would encounter far less opposition than after the next government is
formed -- especially if they're elected with a pro-Kosovo mandate.

The clock is also ticking towards the next general assembly meeting at the
UN in September.

So far, 34 countries, including Canada, have recognized Kosovo's
independence. However, it is Serbia's intention to gain a consensus at the
UN assembly that will declare Kosovo's unilateral independence illegal.

"We will be seeking a solution which will accommodate everyone and still
uphold the UN Charter," said Serbian ambassador to Canada Dusan Batakovic
from Belgrade.

Following Canada's recognition of Kosovo, Batakovic was recalled to the
Serbian capital.

"While we are firm on Serbian sovereignty over Kosovo, we are willing to
discuss a power-sharing arrangement," he said, "and we want a renewal of
multilateral discussions under UN auspices."

As for Canada's position on Kosovo, Batakovic was disappointed there was no
parliamentary debate before Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced the
decision.

"What exactly is independent about Kosovo? The UN resolution covering its
status remains valid, there are thousands of international troops deployed
to provide security, and significant numbers of non-Albanian Kosovo
minorities are defying this decision."

As the international community engages in a war of words and diplomatic
manoeuvring, the bridgewatchers in Mitrovica continue to monitor NATO
activity on the far river bank.

According to a senior NATO intelligence officer, the next confrontation is
expected to occur within a matter of "days or weeks -- not months."

Advance warning of 'final solution' in Kosovo

Scott Taylor will be known by many who have followed the Balkan wars and so this report has to be taken seriously.
The more people who hear about this in advance the more difficult it will be to bring it off...

Glas Javnosti (“The Public Voice”) is a Belgrade daily.

Scott Taylor Interview from Glas Javnosti, 03 April 2008, translated into English
http://www.glas-javnosti.co.yu/clanak/glas-javnosti-03-04-2008/nato-sprema-blic-krig

INTERVIEW: Scott Taylor, Regarding a Secret Plan by the Western Alliance for Kosovo

NATO IS PREPARING A “BLITZKRIEG”

During the next few weeks there will be an artificially provoked attack, bigger than 17 March [2008], the borders around Kosovska Mitrovica will be closed, Serbian leaders arrested, the Serbs disarmed, the city handed over to the Albanians in the KPS, claims a well-known Canadian reporter and author of a number of books about the Balkans.

- NATO is preparing a blitzkrieg on Kosovo which will enable them to tear down the Serbian resistance in the whole area and as early as the next few weeks will artificially provoke another attack, bigger than 17 March [2004], will close the borders around Kosovska Mitrovica, arrest the Serbian leaders, disarm the Serbs and then hand over the city to the Albanians in the KPS. Since the border between Kosovo and Albania doesn’t exist, after this plan the northern part of “Greater Albania” will definitely be secured. American and Albanian leaders have come to a “deal” that NATO secures new borders and everything that I have seen in this, my most recent, visit to Kosovo proves that such an agreement, about which we found out from secret UNMIK papers, really exists – says Scott Taylor during his interview with Glas, a reporter from Canada who has followed the Kosovo crisis for years and who, based on more than twenty visits to the province, claims that nothing quite like this has happened before. UNMIK and NATO know the truth about the suffering of the Serbs and the creation of a Greater Albania, but they intend to listen to the dictate of America, says Taylor and he adds:

- This time I met a number of people in UNMIK who know the truth and who have evaluated the situation, who pass on their advice, but their suggestions are ignored. They know what really happened on 17 March [2004] and they were critical about it, and now they are seeing that a new plan exists, which will give rise to even more violence and they are impatient to let others know what is ahead – maybe to soothe their own consciences. This is what they are saying…

- They were expelled, and the customs buildings were burned. Now they have come back, and the American and French troops are in place and preparing to close the customs borders. They intend to use UNMIK’s police with the consent of KFOR to arrest the Serbian leadership, so that the Serbs will be provoked. Their aim is a response, a reaction – we can recall how it was the last time, but now they want to respond with more force. For this action they will use Polish and Ukrainian troops who will move in an aggressive military attack on Mitrovica. The goal is to eliminate the Serbian leadership, to elicit a provocation in order to pronounce what is called “martial law” when they close the Serbian part of Mitrovica and disarm the Serbs while the borders are closed. And then, under those conditions, to hand over Mitrovica to the KPS.

THE TAKEOVER PLAN

The Galluci document (UNMIK’s head for the Mitrovica sector) states that there are not even attempts to enable the return of the Serbian KPS police; that was an open and later forgotten issue. They know that the Serbs will fight against this and they want just that kind of provocation, which will give them the excuse to use additional force. But they came to this idea of using the Poles and Ukrainians because they have shown sympathy to the Serbs. If the Serbs fight back, which is the idea, then this will blacken the image of Serbs in the Ukraine and Poland. Therefore, they have come up with a plan which brings them gains from every perspective – and will leave the Serbs without leadership as well as undermine international support for Serbia, says Taylor.

Serbian Elections are going the way they want.

- The elections are coming and Kosovo is an important question for all sides. If they close that question by closing the borders, deploy the Albanians and maintain KFOR reinforcements at customs, there is no Serbian politician who can win with a campaign of fighting NATO. Serbs might be self-destructive, but not to that extent. That’s why they want to finish this quickly. Going into the enclaves, one by one, is a long process, and if they eliminate Mitrovica, the enclaves are finished, because they will shrivel up and die.

“Wild West”

- In Kosovo the situation is such that nobody knows who is in charge. UNMIK is practically finished, it has no mission any more because its assignment is to enforce Resolution 1244, and that no longer exists. KFOR having entered with the task of protecting the UN and Resolution 1244 has converted into the protection of independent Kosovo. The German NATO soldier with whom I spoke, and who is in his third tour in Kosovo, says that NATO will securely remove itself from Kosovo only after a minimum of another ten years because there is still no progress. Eulex has the manpower, but wants the area cleaned up before they take over.

May Elections are Kosovo Elections

- The reason for these elections is that Kosovo should remain part of Serbia. The Americans know that, if the Serbian electorate shows that nationalism is alive and well, taking away something from somebody will only make that person even more determined. Therefore, they are counting on the window they have from Election Day until June or September, that is, until a strong enough government has been formed to take over this action in the UN. They have the whole summer to take care of such cleansing. Russia is an unknown to them, because if she commits again the same kind of thing as at Pristina airport, it could take them out of the equation. Even now we have countries that recognize, those who do not recognize and those that are undecided about Kosovo. That, to Americans, Germans and the British, is a problem because they are in the minority in a big world. The Muslim world has not accepted their embroilment in Kosovo. Next to every Kosovo flag is the American flag. How would the Arabs, who so hate the “great Satan,” like the creation of this American satellite? Even the Albanians won’t disassociate themselves from the U.S. On the hotel in the middle of Pristina is a replica of the Statue of Liberty.

The brain behind this operation is the same man who planned 17 March. The goal of that attack was to test the Serbs, in order to better plan strategy for the final takeover of Mitrovica and crushing of the Serbian struggle in the whole of Kosovo and Metohija?

- Everyone now looks toward the battlefield of Mitrovica, what the Serbs can do, whether they will offer a fight and how far they will go, what are their chances? NATO, that is, the Americans lead the project, but Larry Wilson of UNMIK’s police is the ringleader. He was an assistant, then head of the operation, and now he is the “boss.” Seventeen March was his plan, and now he’s come up with a new one. To support my words, I have a Galluci document, which describes the old tactics of counting arms: you commit a small attack and you see where the guns are. Then you make a plan. That is how they provoked the Serbs, tested them, and now they know how long it will take you to react, how many people you can get out into the streets, what you are prepared to do and they know what to expect. But the attack is likely during the next few days or weeks.

Do you have evidence that UNMIK and NATO are actively and consciously creating a Greater Albania?

- We hear about it, but every official in the world will cover his ears and say that he knows nothing about a Greater Albania. However, when you look around in Kosovo, you can see that every flag is Albanian. Very few represent Kosovo, and even then, next to them are much bigger Albanian ones. It is very clear what is going on and the Albanians, themselves, have never lied about their intentions, just as they now proclaim their plans for southern Serbia and Macedonia. Their leaders have made agreements with the Americans, and our sources have confirmed to us that Hashim Thaci, together with the regional leadership, including Alija Ahmatija in Macedonia, was convinced at a meeting with the Americans to give NATO a chance. That is how they came to agree that the Albanians should keep a low profile, and that NATO would take over control of the borders. Everything that I have now seen in Kosovo supports this story and the work that NATO has done as its part of the bargain.

Essentially, Mitrovica is the main test for the creation of a Greater Albania, that is, the fall of the whole province?

- I hope that there won’t be any fatalities, but there will certainly be a big attack, because they cannot throw the Serbs out of Mitrovica unless they conquer them. A big test is coming – if Mitrovica falls, the enclaves fall with it.

That would then be the northern border of Kosovo, and the southern border would, in fact, no longer exist as such, because the way would already be opened to a Greater Albania?

- I have seen that the southern border does not exist, that it’s completely open, I went down to the place where one should be able to see it, but KFOR, who should be acting as border police, behave like traffic conductors, just as one of them, a German, joked, himself. He says that every vehicle goes through freely, and their only concern is to avoid traffic congestion. The roads are open wide, drugs pass through freely. We were in Gorani villages, in Orchusa, for example, where we were unsuccessful in trying to find any kind of border limit. There is nothing, no line, no fence, nothing, just one German soldier who went to the place where there should be a border, gestured in plain air where the border should be.

The Creation of a Greater Albania

What did the Gorani say, are they loyal citizen of the southernmost tip of Serbia or are they in the middle part of a Greater Albania? How does UNMIK treat them?

- Yes, loyal to Serbia and they get their pensions from Belgrade, but it is obvious that Kosovo and Albania are one country, Albanians, from Albania, mind you, not only steal their stock from Kosovo, cows, horses, and what is very significant, they freely cut forests. If Kosovo regarded Albania as an adjoining country, not the same country, they would protect their resources, but I saw for myself that the Albanians have no problem freely taking the Gorani’s forests and in destroying the region, and it tells me that this is Greater Albania. NATO knows what is happening and they said that they have vehicles that can go up hills where they can see those that steal well enough to see the color of their eyes. We could stop this, but nobody will – that’s what they told me. NATO, if it wanted, could, but cannot act independently of Kosovo’s parliament, that is, the Albanian leadership. Everybody knows there are no borders, but nobody will close them. We have the same information in secret documents we have received from our sources in UNMIK.

Are there Russian volunteers such as the Albanian media writes about? Are there Albanian “volunteers?” How do these fit into the plan for Mitrovica?

- There are no Russian volunteers, but NATO needs provocations in order to create an attack and that is why on the Albanian side we have the coming together of “undesirables.” In the past there were extremists on both sides, and I believe that the Albanian paramilitary formations were started in opposition to the enclaves, should the Serbs in Mitrovica form a resistance. But I think that that would work against NATO’s strategy and that the world would see through this – if the media showed the truth. But NATO will renew its principle with which it succeeded on 17 March when one Ukrainian died, and another 63 from NATO were injured. That was shown immediately, but the violence against Serbs was not shown. Even now the focus will stay on Mitrovica and the Serbs who throw stones.

The international community has easily accepted what UNMIK and NATO did to the Serbs on the 17th of March [2004], will the same deceit succeed in the case of a larger attack?

- That day they tested the world community. Attacking Serbs did not touch many and the sympathy was entirely with the wounded NATO soldiers. They now know that they can do it again.

You say that NATO is in a hurry to seal the “blitzkrieg” on Mitrovica. If they run into unexpected problems, it could become prolonged? You, yourself, say that the Russians are inclined to spoil their plans.
- Well, Russia maintains the strong position that only 34 countries have recognized Kosovo, and the rest have not. The general meeting of the UN is in September, and if NATO doesn’t succeed now with its plans, there is a chance for Serbia that the talks will resume about the partitioning of Kosovo. It will hurt the U.S. position – if Serbia brings up a cooperative resolution and shows that she still pays pensions to people in Kosovo…

Author:
Diana Miloševic