Serbia: U.S. to blame for violence

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/02/23/serbia.kosovo/

CNN (USA)

updated 23 minutes ago

Serbia: U.S. to blame for violence

* Serbia hunting rioters behind deadly violence in Belgrade
* Authorities say 200 people are under arrest
* Senior minister blames U.S. for violence against Kosovo independence

(CNN) -- Serbian prosecutors said Saturday they were hunting rioters who
targeted the U.S. Embassy in Belgrade leaving one person dead while a senior
Serbian minister blamed Washington for the violence triggered by Kosovo's
breakaway.

Authorities said they had arrested nearly 200 rioters who took part in the
violence on Thursday that prompted the United States to evacuate
non-essential embassy staff and warn Serbia it would be held responsible.

"We are collecting evidence and are identifying the culprits," Slobodan
Radovanovic said in a statement, according to The Associated Press.

Serbia's Kosovo minister Slobodan Samardzic said Saturday that the U.S. --
which backed Kosovo's breakaway and was among the first countries to
recognize its seccession -- was the "main culprit" for the violence, AP
reported.

Thursday's violence, some of the worst unrest in Serbia since the removal of
strongman Slobodan Milosevic in 2000, was followed by further unrest Friday
in Kosovo as Serbs attacked U.N. police in an ethnically divided city.

Some 5,000 protesters hurled bottles and stones as they tried to cross a key
bridge in the northern town of Mitrovica, divided between Serbs and the
ethnic Albanians who have driven last Sunday's independence declaration.

Speaking to CNN on Friday, a top U.S. diplomat said Serbia had a
"fundamental responsibility" to protect U.S. diplomats and citizens, adding
that Washington would hold Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica and his
government "personally responsible" for assaults on U.S. interests.

"What happened yesterday in Belgrade was absolutely reprehensible,"
Undersecretary for Political Affairs R. Nicholas Burns said. "This kind of
thing should not happen in a civilized country."

Thursday's violence was part of a much bigger, peaceful demonstration where
up to 150,000 people chanted "Kosovo is Serbia," and vowed to never accept
the province's independence.

The U.S. Embassy's consular section remained closed on Friday as officials
were advised to stay at home amid continuing fears over anti-Western
protests, according to a statement on the embassy Web site.

The Embassy warned American citizens to avoid areas of demonstration and to
exercise "extreme caution."

Also Friday, Russia -- which has not recognized Kosovo's sovereignty -- said
it has not ruled out using force to resolve the dispute over the territory
if NATO forces breach the terms of their U.N. mandate.

Rewarding separatists will haunt the West

http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=e89f6b8d-6e99-4afa-bbac-7fe2826c1287

OTTAWA CITIZEN (CANADA)

OPINION

Rewarding separatists will haunt the West
David Warren
The Ottawa Citizen

Saturday, February 23, 2008

Readers with exceptionally tenacious memories will recall that this pundit
was opposed to the NATO intervention in Kosovo nine years ago. This may come
as a surprise to readers without tenacious memories, since it is widely
believed that I never saw a war I didn't like. Yet, believe it or not, I was
opposed not only to the wanton bombing of Serbia, but also to the whole
"inevitable" project of carving a new European Muslim state out of the flesh
of that Orthodox Christian country.

I was not without sympathy for the "plight of the Kosovars," however. Like
virtually all journalists at that time, not of Serbian ethnicity, I fell for
a great deal of typically Balkan propagandist rubbish that has since been
quietly withdrawn.

My rule of thumb, on wars, is to fight them with your enemies, when
absolutely necessary; but never with your friends, and in particular, never
in order to create new enemies. True, as we all know from personal
experience, sometimes your friends are more irritating than your enemies,
and the temptation to bomb them is always there. It is a temptation that
must be resisted, however.

This temptation was surely in play with the Serbians, under the late
Slobodan Milosevic, who seemed determined to inspire loathing and distrust,
and suspicion that he was doing in Kosovo precisely what his nationalist
allies had done in Bosnia: "ethnic cleansing," also known as the massacre of
innocents. Although not nearly as monstrous as, say, Saddam Hussein, nor
anything like Saddam's threat to the West, Milosevic missed as many
opportunities to come clean with his diplomatic interrogators. The Serbs,
who allowed this vicious old Communist, turned nationalist demagogue, to
remain in power, showed very poor judgment.

But the fact that Kosovo had a significant ethnic majority of Albanian
Muslims over Serbian Christians was not, in itself, sufficient argument to
detach it from Serbia by main force. For if that is the argument, the state
system which provides the only order the planet currently enjoys will tend
to disintegrate.

Strange to say, I am with Vladimir Putin on this one, and against George W.
Bush. Mr. Putin's remarks on the inspiration that Kosovo's independence has
given to violent separatists in Chechnya, Abkhazia, South Ossetia, and
elsewhere, are entirely to the point.

Indeed, driving the Serbian government and Serbian people into the
protective embrace of ex-Soviet Russia, and ultimately her ex-KGB strongman,
was among several counter-productive dimensions in the war that Madeleine
Albright organized, along with other ruinous Clinton interventions in areas
of peripheral interest to the U.S. (Haiti, Somalia, Bosnia).

The NATO action in Kosovo brought Mr. Putin -- the hammer of the Chechens --
to power, by demonstrating that force and force alone will decide secession
struggles, East or West. It restored anti-Americanism to its place in the
Russian national security consensus, indirectly bringing an end to the
Yeltsin reform era.

It was an incredibly stupid war to wage, and the product was on display in
Brussels yesterday where the Russian ambassador to NATO, Dmitry Rogovin,
actually threatened the use of force to prevent Kosovo's declaration of
independence from going any farther.

President Bush, who was prompted to recognize the self-declared Kosovar
state (together with most European powers), feels obliged to accept the fait
accompli he inherited from the preceding administration. He, or his
successor, will then try to resist the next stage of demands, for a Greater
Albania in which Kosovo attempts to merge with Albania, and the Muslim
majorities in adjoining districts of Serbia, Montenegro, Macedonia, and
Greece begin insurrections to join them. By recognizing Kosovo, Bush et al.
have validated exactly that: a deadly new round of Balkan troubles, ripe for
Islamicization.

We cannot afford to validate the principle of armed insurrection, whether in
Kosovo or Chechnya or Palestine or Kashmir or northern Sri Lanka or southern
Thailand or the southern Philippines or in any of the many other places
where terrorism demands to be rewarded with an independent state. And,
within Europe, a coupleof thousand EU policemen (about to be installed
without United Nations cover, and in defiance of agreements with Serbia)
cannot guarantee order in a territory that is already a European refuge for
radical Islamist cells, and threatens to become Europe's terrorist safe
house.

There is a deeper history here, for the understanding of which we would have
to review the rest of the legacy of Ottoman imperialism in the Balkans. But
that is, alas, something the Serbs understand a lot better than we do.

David Warren's column appears Sunday, Wednesday and Saturday.

Kosovo`s Independence Shakes Fragile Bosnia

http://www.javno.com/en/world/clanak.php?id=126129

JAVNO (CROATIA)

Kosovo`s Independence Shakes Fragile Bosnia

The Bosnian Serb parliament said their entity had the right to break away if
a significant number of countries recognise Kosovo.

AFP illustrative photo A move by Bosnian Serb leaders to secede like Kosovo
reflects the fragility of a country whose unity depends on the international
community, observers said.

The Bosnian Serb parliament said Friday their entity had the right to break
away if a significant number of United Nations and European Union countries
recognise Kosovo's independence.

"In that case, the Republika Srpska assembly believes it has the right to
launch a referendum to reconsider its statehood status," a resolution
adopted by an overwhelming majority in the parliament said. Such a move
would put into question the Dayton peace agreement which ended Bosnia's
1992-1995 war and split the country into two semi-independent entities.

The two entities -- the Muslim-Croat Federation and Republika Srpska --
share weak central institutions while each has its own government,
parliament and police.

Many Bosnian Serbs feel their entity should follow Kosovo's lead and be
allowed to secede from Bosnia and eventually attach itself to Serbia, which
they see as their "motherland".

Analysts estimate an overwhelming majority of the entity's population which
accounts for 31 percent of Bosnia's 3.8 million would opt for independence
at a referendum.

Washington was the first to condemn such an initiative by Bosnian Serbs.

"Bosnia-Hercegovina is a sovereign and independent state and its territorial
integrity and sovereignty are an undeniable fact," US ambassador to Bosnia
Charles English told the Oslobodjenje daily. "The three-and-a-half-year long
war was expected to provide an answer to the question if someone had a right
to secede from Bosnia-Hercegovina. Dayton (peace deal) solved the issue.
"There is no right to secession."

Meanwhile, political analyst Tanja Topic warned that Bosnia is "unstable and
fragile." But she stressed the Balkan country's "borders will be inviolable"
due to the "clear position of the international community."

Other analysts share similar views, stressing the international community
should, despite opposite calls by some local politicians, maintain its
presence in the country.

"The international community will have to stay for a longer period of time
in Bosnia," political analyst Ivan Sijakovic told AFP.

However, he added its role should change so that it is not perceived as a
"threat, an institution imposing conditions and punishing," but rather as an
advisor.

The RS parliament resolution should be seen as a serious threat, Sijakovic
said. "It is not a matter for politicians any more, but on the contrary now
the citizens are putting pressure on politicians" to consider RS'
independence, he said.

In Sarajevo, political analyst Srecko Latal welcomed more moderate views of
Bosnian Serb Prime Minister Milorad Dodik, but did not hide his concerns.
"If they really proceeded with organising a referendum, that would
destabilise Bosnia further because the international community would clearly
not allow it," Latal told AFP. "It would be a no-win situation for
everyone."

For Emil Habul, another Sarajevo-based analyst, the Bosnian Serb parliament
tried to "take up positions for the future."

"RS secession is an idea that has been smoldering since 1992, but Dodik and
his government understand that it is impossible to achieve," Habul said.

"Bosnia is an international protectorate ... and as long as there is a
strong presence of the international community ... a referendum in RS is a
big political illusion," Topic said.

"It could happen within a decade or two, or maybe never," she concluded.

Published: February 23, 2008 09:29h

Kosovo's declaration spells Balkan trouble

http://www.wellandtribune.ca/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=914223

Kosovo's declaration spells Balkan trouble

Posted By scott taylor

Posted -43 sec ago

Last weekend the streets of Kosovo were flooded with citizens celebrating a
unilateral declaration of independence by ethnic Albanian Prime Minister
Hashim Thaci.

This much-anticipated announcement formally severed all official ties
between the disputed province and the rest of Serbia, thereby creating
Europe's newest state.

The United States was the first to recognize Kosovo's independence, with
George Bush sending his congratulations to Thaci from a stop in Tanzania.
The United Kingdom, Germany and France were quick to follow suit, and with
these big powers on board, the Albanian Kosovars popped the champagne corks
and throughout the capital city of Pristina throngs of people waved a sea of
red and black flags in celebration.

For people only paying casual attention to this long-simmering Balkan hot
spot, Thaci's declaration of independence may indeed be viewed as a joyous
occasion.

In fact, most Canadians may be forgiven if they thought this whole matter
was resolved back in the summer of 1999.

After a 78-day bombing campaign, NATO had negotiated a ceasefire agreement
with the Serbian government. Under the terms of UN Resolution 1244, Serbian
security forces would withdraw from Kosovo, and under NATO military
supervision, the 800,000 Albanian Kosovar refugees who had fled the fighting
would be repatriated.

The Albanian guerrillas - known as the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) - were
to be disarmed and demobilized by NATO troops, who would also ensure the
safety of Kosovo's 200,000 ethnic Serb civilians.

Resolution 1244 made it very clear that under the UN Charter, Kosovo would
remain the sovereign territory of Serbia.

Over the past nine years, NATO has failed to uphold its part of the bargain.

The KLA was never disarmed; they were simply formalized into the Kosovo
Protection Corps. Serb civilians suffered widespread violent reprisals from
Albanian extremists resulting in a mass exodus with fewer than 40,000 ethnic
Serbs still residing in protected enclaves. There was also no progress made
towards a negotiated settlement of Kosovo's status between Belgrade and
Pristina authorities.

With Serbia unwilling to relinquish the sovereignty of this province - the
religious heartland of the Serbian people - there was no legal way to push
independence through the UN Security Council. That impasse is what led to
last Sunday's unilateral declaration, and the deep divide within the
international community over this clear violation of the rule of law and the
UN Charter.

Advertisement

The Canadian Foreign Affairs Department understands that any rapid
recognition of a disputed province's declaration of independence from
another country could create a dangerous precedent, which might come back to
haunt us.

So while Canada looks at what diplomatic options are available, let's review
some of the background.

Up until 1998, the U.S. State Department regarded the KLA as a terrorist
organization. The KLA's assassinations and bomb attacks against government
officials led to a heavy-handed Serbian military crackdown.

At this point the Americans changed horses and decried the Serb reprisals
rather than the terror provocations of the KLA. Under U.S. pressure an
ultimatum was issued by NATO to Serbia in February 1999, and the KLA was
suddenly legitimized as freedom fighters.

By March 24 of that year, when the deadline expired without Serbia's
compliance, NATO began bombing Kosovo and Serbia.

Within days a trickle of refugees became a flood as some 800,000 Albanians
fled the renewed fighting and the NATO bombing.

Once this whole incident had ballooned into a humanitarian crisis of epic
proportion, NATO used the suffering of the Albanians to further justify
their intervention.

Putting recent history aside, the fact remains that Kosovo is simply not
viable as an independent country. It is a landlocked, mountainous province,
not quite twice the size of Prince Edward Island, with a population of two
million.

The unemployment rate stands at 50 per cent; for those working the average
annual income ranges around $2,400 CDN a year. Prostitution and illegal
drugs form the major pillar of Kosovo's economy, with the other main
infusion coming from the annual foreign donations of approximately $600
million.

The red and black flag they wave is the Albanian flag, not Kosovar. And as a
result of the ongoing violent attacks against non-Albanians in the province,
this is now one of the most ethnically-cleansed territories in all of
Europe.

Prime Minister Thaci is a former ruthless KLA warlord who called himself
"Snake" and the commander of the Kosovo Protection Corps is Agim Ceku, who
made a notorious name for himself as a war criminal in Croatia.

Given the rotten foundation upon which Kosovo intends to build its own
independent state, I think Canada would be well advised to uphold the UN
Charter in this instance, and to respect the rule of international law.

Scott Taylor reported from inside Serbia and Kosovo during the 1999 bombing
campaign and has made more than 20 subsequent visits to the region.

Serbia grapples with Kosovo move

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-kosovo23feb23,1,6059490.story

LOS ANGELES TIMES (USA)

Serbia grapples with Kosovo move

Srdjan Ilic / Associated Press
FURY: A Serbian nationalist faces off with a U.S. soldier from the NATO
force at a checkpoint between Serbia and Kosovo. Some fear the Balkan
region's
delicate postwar balance will unravel.

Few observers expect war, but fear that years of pro-Western, democratic
shift in Serbia have come undone and that radicals allied with Moscow may be
ascendant.

By Tracy Wilkinson, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

February 23, 2008

ROME -- Kosovo's declaration of independence has touched off an
all-too-predictable spasm of violence and hostility in a region that emerged
from devastating war scarcely a decade ago.

From setting fire to the U.S. Embassy in the Serbian capital of Belgrade to
stone-throwing at NATO troops along the new unsteady border between Serbia
and Kosovo, the anger of Serbs over the loss of a region they consider their
cultural heartland is intense and dangerous.

And the United States, which backed Kosovo's separation from Serbia and was
among the first countries to recognize it as a new nation, will receive the
brunt of Serbian fury.

Far from stabilizing the region, as the Bush administration had forecast,
the move by Kosovo has launched a period of volatile uncertainty.

Riots in Belgrade on Thursday night, which left one person dead, 150 injured
and more than 200 arrested, were the largest outburst of anti-Western rage
there since before the fall of dictator Slobodan Milosevic in October 2000.

Ljiljana Smajlovic, editor of Serbia's influential Politika daily newspaper,
said the unrest represents a "tectonic shift" in Serbian public opinion, one
that will carry far-reaching and unpredictable consequences.

Still, she and other Serbian analysts said in interviews Friday, an all-out
war is unlikely to be among those consequences, for several reasons.

First, Serbia's military capacity today is far diminished from the days when
a unified Yugoslavia fielded Europe's fourth-largest army. Many of its
generals and commanders ended up at the international tribunal at The Hague,
charged with war crimes related to the bloody campaigns they led to suppress
the breakaway states of Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina.

And the ethnic Albanians who dominate Kosovo and who deployed a ferocious
guerrilla army to fight for independence are on their best behavior while
receiving favorable treatment from Western powers.

Second: There are 16,000 North Atlantic Treaty Organization troops deployed
in Kosovo as well as a United Nations police force to give pause to any
military challenges. The presence of international forces stands in marked
contrast to Bosnia in 1992, for example, when civilians were left largely at
the mercy of Serb paramilitaries, resulting in three years of bloodletting
before NATO stepped in to help stop the killing.

Perhaps most important, Serbia today is a changed place. Milosevic, the
architect of most of the warfare of the 1990s, is dead and buried. The last
eight years have seen the rise of pro-Western, democratic leaders in Serbia
who have fostered political change.

Many of them now feel betrayed.

They spent the last few years extolling the virtues of Western international
law and justice, which included, they point out, the 1999 U.N. resolution
that established self-rule for Kosovo, but as part of Serbia. They see as
the epitome of hypocrisy that Washington went around the U.N., sidestepping
the Security Council because of Russian opposition, to approve Kosovo
independence.

"This is a total disaster for people who are pro-Western and pro-European,"
said editor Smajlovic. "This helps radicals who say it was never about
democracy and right or wrong, but all along about taking away from Serbia,
about humiliating the Serbs."

Many of the fiercest demonstrators torching buildings Thursday night and
shouting, "Stop U.S. terror!" were young protesters who may have little
memory of Milosevic but who came of age as NATO was bombing Belgrade in 1999
to force Serbia to end attacks in Kosovo.

Cedomir Antic, a historian with the Institute for Balkan Studies, noted that
in elections this month, the ultranationalist Serbian Radical Party, though
it lost narrowly, had managed to quadruple its vote over balloting in 2001,
in part because of Kosovo.

"People are very frustrated," Antic said. "The Serbian government is very
united on the issue of Kosovo, but very divided on where to go from here."

The division weakens the ruling democratic coalition and makes it possible
the government will fall and the pro-Moscow Radical Party, whose president
is also on trial for war crimes at The Hague, will take over.

What seems most likely, however, is that low-intensity skirmishes along the
Serbia-Kosovo border will continue. On Friday, for the fifth consecutive
day, Serbian protesters chanting, "Kosovo is ours!" hurled stones and
bottles at U.N. police who were blocking a bridge in the volatile Kosovo
town of Mitrovica that divides the Serbian north from the Albanian south.
This week, similar gangs torched customs and police posts at other crossings
between the two entities.

The debilitating divisions within the Serbian government were accentuated
Friday in exchanges over who was to blame for Thursday night's violence,
which came at the fringes of an otherwise peaceful demonstration. The
"Kosovo is Serbia" rally was sponsored by the government and drew about
200,000 people.

President Boris Tadic, the most pro-Western of Serbia's top officials, who
arranged to be away for the day, condemned the violence and said Friday the
riots "must never happen again." Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica, a
nationalist, said the violence was wrong, but praised the demonstrators for
showing the U.S. government that it was wrong too.

Though the two men are leaders in the ruling coalition, they are often at
odds. Tadic wants Serbia to join the European Union regardless of the Kosovo
decision, whereas Kostunica maintains that Serbia cannot be part of an EU
that recognizes an independent Kosovo. Kostunica's championing of the
Thursday rally was his attempt to allow Serbs to vent their anger, even
though a small number took it to extremes.

Meanwhile, the EU, some of whose members have recognized Kosovo, warned
Serbia on Friday that it was in danger of losing its chance to join the
27-nation bloc if such rioting persisted.

"These acts of violence lead nowhere and they cannot help anybody," EU
foreign policy chief Javier Solana said. Initial talks aimed at prepping
Serbia for membership would be frozen until peace was restored in Belgrade,
he said.

Russia, Serbia's closest ally, threatened its own measures. If NATO exceeds
its mandate in Kosovo, Russia's ambassador to NATO, Dmitri Rogozin, said,
"then I think we will also begin operating under the assumption that in
order to be respected, one needs to use force."

Another potential consequence of Kosovo's declaration is the unraveling of
the region's delicate postwar balance, analysts say. Republika Srpska, the
Serb portion of Bosnia-Herzegovina, threatened to follow Kosovo's lead and
secede. That could destroy the U.S.-negotiated country that emerged from the
1992-95 war, which is divided into a Serb portion and a Muslim-Croat half.

And a sizable ethnic Albanian minority in Macedonia, another former Yugoslav
republic, may find similar inspiration. There could be a tumultuous domino
of secessions.

"I can't imagine anyone having the stomach for war now," Smajlovic said.

"But independence for Kosovo will not stabilize the region. It will stir
things up. Nationalism is on the rise. It is not going to be a happier, more
stable Balkans."

wilkinson@latimes.com

Don't recognize Kosovo

http://winnipegsun.com/News/Columnists/Quesnel_Joseph/2008/02/23/4870162-sun.html

WINNIPEG SUN (CANADA)

OPINION

February 23, 2008

Don't recognize Kosovo

By JOSEPH QUESNEL

Canada should not recognize the breakaway Serbian province of Kosovo as an
independent country.

Kosovo made a unilateral declaration of independence last week and the
United States and the European Union moved to recognize it.

Canada's role as a middle power should be in promoting regional autonomy for
Albanian Kosovars who make up the overwhelming majority of the territory,
but it would be wrong to interfere in a domestic Serbian issue in such a
blatant way. As Canadians, we cannot preach the virtues of federalism as a
solution to ethnic differences around the world while encouraging states to
separate over those same differences. Kosovo is about 90% Albanian and
Muslim, but it is also historically a part of Serbia. Why are people looking
to separation rather than cultural accommodation within the Serbian state as
a solution? International troops in Kosovo could ensure ethnic Albanians
have strong rights within a Kosovo under Serbian control.

Critics of independence have pointed to the precedent separation would set
in emboldening other secessionist movements, including Quebec, but this
misses the point. Separation for Kosovo is wrong because it is harmful to
Serbia's national identity and territory.

Kosovar independence is misguided because it ignores the central role Kosovo
plays in Serbia's religious and cultural heritage. Historically, it had a
large Serbian population, but this declined under the Yugoslavian dictator
Tito.

While the United States and the European Union have a right to be concerned
about the human rights of Albanian Kosovars, they do not have any right to
assist in dismembering a country because it serves their strategic interests
in the region.

This is fundamentally where NATO and the UN got it wrong. Back in 1999,
Western countries -- including Canada -- sent armed assistance to Albanian
Kosovars who were complaining of human rights abuses at the hands of the
Serbian central government. While assisting them was right, our job should
not have been to stay permanently and determine the course of its future,
particularly in encouraging separation. Protecting civilians is one thing,
but assisting a violent, drug-funded secessionist force like the Kosovo
Liberation Army is another.

The problem is part of the American and European approach towards Kosovo is
fueled by unfair perceptions of Serbia. They are always painted as the bad
guys in the Yugoslav Civil War. The late Slobodan Milosevic is depicted as
the Serbian equivalent of Adolf Hitler. Don't get me wrong, Serbian
paramilitaries were involved in ethnic cleansing after the collapse of
Yugoslavia and there should be accountability. Moreover, Milosevic is no
saint.

But all sides committed atrocities. After Croatia declared independence from
Yugoslavia in 1990, the Croatian government encouraged attacks against
Serbian civilians who lived in Croatia. Ethnic Serbs in Bosnia were also
attacked as Bosnia tried to secede from Yugoslavia.

Perpetrators from all sides should be tried for war crimes, not just from
Serbia. The show trial of Milosevic by an international criminal court goes
to show how titled the Western community was against Serbs.

It is time to correct this historic wrong by allowing Serbs to protect their
territorial integrity

Kosovo powder keg

http://savannahnow.com/node/452085

SAVANNAH MORNING NEWS (USA)

Kosovo powder keg

Saturday, February 23, 2008 at 12:30 am

Kosovo's bid for independence could be complicated by low productivity, high
unemployment, and half its population being under 16.

NINE YEARS ago, the United Nations made a deal with Serbia: Hand over
Slobodan Milosevic, stop the persecution of ethnic Albanian Kosovars and
institute certain reforms, and Serbia would be able to maintain its
territorial integrity, including the province of Kosovo.

But by granting immediate recognition of the breakaway Kosovo region after
it announced its independence Sunday, both the U.N. and the United States
have reneged on that deal - even after Serbia held up its end of the
bargain.

In this instance, religion seems to have colored U.S. policy, and most
likely to ill effect.

Kosovo is about half the size of metro Atlanta in both population and
geographic area. The majority of its 2 million people are Muslim. In the
Bush administration's zeal to show the world it supports Muslim democracies,
it too quickly turned its back on Serbia in favor of Kosovo.

Angry Serbs responded Thursday by breaking into the U.S. embassy, burning an
office and an American flag. The attack merits condemnation, and the fact
that Serbian authorities seemed to look the other way while the mob
assembled suggests that officials wanted to send Washington a message.

Although some tiny nations do make a go of it, backing Kosovo's independence
is a decision the United States may regret, considering the region's
internal instability and potential for disaster.

Industry in Kosovo is virtually nonexistent. The gross domestic product per
capita is only $250 a year. Unemployment is at a dreadful 50 percent, and
half the population is under 16. That's a million youths, half of whom are
not likely to find work, and so become discontent.

An angry, young, destitute Muslim populace has too often proved a fertile
recruiting ground for radical Islam. Kosovo's independence should therefore
be met with a healthy dose of unease.

News reports quote former U.S. envoy to the U.N. John Bolton warning, "Its
instability risks attracting Islamic extremists from around the world."

The move could also destabilize Macedonia and Montenegro. Both nations have
regions with significant ethnic Albanian populations that, like Kosovo,
border on Albania.

Besides granting approval of a possible magnet for terrorists within Europe,
recognizing Kosovo also puts the U.S. at odds with allies such as Poland,
Hungary, Romania, Greece, Spain and Israel. It could also mean a further
cooling of relations between the United States and Russia, which opposed the
break-up of Serbia.

Congressman Dan Burton, R-Ind., founding chairman of the Congressional
Serbian Caucus, has urged the Bush administration - as well as Serbia and
Kosovo - to remain at the negotiating table to work toward a mutual
agreement.

"I was deeply disappointed to learn today that Kosovo has decided to walk
away from peaceful efforts to resolve the status of the province by
unilaterally declaring its independence from Serbia," Rep. Burton said in a
statement Sunday.

"This separation has occurred despite concerted efforts on behalf of Serbia
to engage in negotiations to determine a mutually agreed upon solution that
would ensure a peaceful, prosperous future for Serbs and Kosovo Albanians
alike. It is my fear that this unilateral action could spark another round
of violence."

Unfortunately, it seems the powder keg that set off World War I is all too
likely to explode again.

In the Bush administration's zeal to show the world it supports Muslim
democracies, it too quickly turned its back on Serbia in favor of Kosovo.

EDMONTON JOURNAL More Letters

http://www.canada.com/edmontonjournal/news/story.html?id=17d5e2cd-3718-49e5-bab0-96e6127e61e7&k=25630

EDMONTON JOURNAL (CANADA)

More Letters

Saturday, February 23, 2008

Kosovo will undoubtedly become a dependant independent state recognized by a
good number of the western worlds power brokers. The Albanian president is
already predicting his nation along with Kosovo will join the EU at the same
time. Bamir Topi's comments may be wishful thinking considering how many
nations have refused to recognize Kosovo as free from Serbia proper.

Listening to diplomats from the U.S., France, or Great Britain, or even the
world's media, one could come to the conclusion that Kosovo is more than
deserving of independence from Serbia. In reality, this is so far from the
truth. Of all the independence movements around the world, Kosovo is
probably the least qualified to join the group of free and democratic
nations. The media has done a poor job in presenting a balanced view of the
region, and a good job at further demonizing the Serbs of the area. Albeit,
the Serbian government has set the stage for the negative characterization
of their people.

This being said, one rarely reads or hears about the ethnic cleansing that
took place after the 1999 NATO bombing campaign. Since NATO peacekeepers
arrived in Kosovo, more than 200,000 citizens of the area have been forced
to flee. This total includes Serbs, Roma, Gorani, Bosnians, Turks, and other
minorities. The ethnic Albanian population, lead by the KLA, has made it
policy to remove all non-Albanians. Pristina is the only ethnically cleansed
capital in all of Europe.

How can the west have faith that the KLA-dominated Kosovo government will
secure its remaining minority population when the KLA is

known by European governments to have far reaching criminal activities? The
KLA, which was on the U.S. terrorist list before they decided to arm and
train them as proxy combatants in their battle against the milosevic regime,
is involved in heroin trafficking from Afghanistan, weapons smuggling, oil
and cigarette smuggling, as well as human trafficking of prostitutes from
Eastern Europe into western Europe. Kosovo's current leader (an ex-KLA
fighter himself), founded and organized the Drenica-Group. The Drenica-Group
is a criminal organization that has ties with other organized crime rings
throughout Europe and Albania. In fact, Thaci's sister is married to one of
the most infamous leaders of the Albanian mafia.

The U.S. push for Kosovo independence is perplexing when removing the idea
that this recognition will somehow appease the Muslim world. Considering the
ramifications of past American meddling and support of shady political
players(Bin Laden in Afghanistan), one would think the U.S. would have
learned by past failures when recognizing governments built on the avails of
criminal and terrorist activity.

Dawid Hurowitz, Edmonton

Police in standoff with Serb demonstrators over Kosovo

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/feb/22/kosovo.serbia

GUARDIAN (UK)

5pm GMT update

Police in standoff with Serb demonstrators over Kosovo
Mark Tran and agencies

Friday February 22 2008

Serb protesters engage in a standoff with UN riot police on the main bridge
in the ethnically divided town of Mitrovica in Kosovo. Photograph: Damir
Sagolj/Reuters

UN police faced off today with about 5,000 Serb demonstrators trying to
cross a bridge in the divided city of Kosovska Mitrovica, as protests at
Kosovo's declaration of independence continued.

In a brief skirmish, protesters lobbed stones, empty glass bottles and
firecrackers. No one appeared to be injured, and no tear gas was fired as
earlier reported, on the fifth day of public unrest since Kosovo's Albanian
leaders declared independence on Sunday.

"Kosovo is Serbia and we will never surrender, despite blackmail by the
European Union," a Serbian government official, Dragan Deletic, told the
crowd, which responded by chanting: "Kosovo is Serbia."

The Kosovska Mitrovica bridge over the Ibar river - dividing Kosovo Serbs
from ethnic Albanians - has long been a flash point of tensions in northern
Kosovo.

The show of Serbian disgruntlement came despite appeals by Kosovo's prime
minister, Hashim Thaçi, for Serbs to play a constructive role in Europe's
fledgling state.

"My message to Serbs of Kosovo is to continue to be part of the institutions
of Kosovo," Thaçi told the Associated Press. "I call them to join us in our
vision for a new Kosovo, and for Kosovo to be a part of the EU and Nato.
Kosovo is a country of everybody."

He expressed hope that the daily violence that has broken out at border
posts since Sunday's declaration will ease as peacekeepers step up patrols
and the EU deploys a 1,800-member police and justice mission.

In Belgrade, the nationalist prime minister appealed for calm after rioting
in the Serb capital left one person dead and damaged US and western
embassies.

"This directly damages our ... national interests," said Vojislav Kostunica.
"All those who support the fake state of Kosovo are rejoicing at the sight
of violence in Belgrade."

Kostunica's appeal for calm came as Serbia's pro-western politicians warned
the violence could be a prelude for a crackdown against moderates.

The defence minister, Dragan Sutanovac, of the EU-friendly Democratic party,
described the violence that followed Kosovo's declaration of independence at
the weekend as "one of Belgrade's saddest days".

He said rioters were encouraged by the support of some nationalist
politicians for smaller attacks against western embassies and commercial
interests in the city earlier in the week.

Several ministers and other top officials in nationalist prime minister
Vojislav Kostunica's government, and leaders of the ultra-nationalist
Radical party, had dismissed those attacks as "minor incidents".

Some 200,000 people attended yesterday's state-backed rally and officials
said police were overwhelmed by the biggest march since protesters stormed
the old Yugoslav parliament building in 2000 to oust nationalist leader
Slobodan Milosevic.

But police were nowhere to be seen when scores of rioters - many wearing
balaclavas - attacked the US embassy for the second time in a week. A
charred body, apparently that of a rioter, was later found in the embassy.

EU officials issued a veiled threat to Kostunica that Serb actions could
imperil closer ties with the 27-member bloc.

"The embassies have to be protected, and that is the obligation of the
country," the EU's foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, told reporters at an
EU event in Slovenia.

"Things will have to calm down before we can recuperate the climate that
would allow for any contact to move on the SAA [stabilisation and
association agreement]," he said of a preliminary deal on ties with the EU.

The pact was agreed last year but the EU has said it will not sign it until
Belgrade fully cooperates with the UN war crimes tribunal for the former
Yugoslavia. The EU was ready to sign an interim trade deal but Kostunica
blocked the move earlier this month in protest over Kosovo, which seceded
from Serbia on Sunday.

Kosovo had been under UN administration since 1999 when Nato bombing drove
out Milosevic's troops to halt a crackdown against Kosovo Albanians.

Thaçi said the violence raging across Belgrade yesterday was reminiscent of
the Milosevic era. "The pictures of yesterday in Belgrade were pictures of
Milosevic's time," said Thaçi, a former guerrilla leader of the
now-disbanded Kosovo Liberation Army who is reviled by Kosovo Serbs.

More than a dozen countries have recognised Kosovo's declaration of
independence, including the US, Britain, France and Germany. But the
declaration by Kosovo's ethnic Albanian leadership has been rejected by
Serbia's government and the Serbs who live in northern Kosovo.

In Bosnia, which is made up of the Serb Republic and the Muslim-Croat
federation, Bosnian Serb MPs threatened to hold a referendum on secession if
a majority of UN member states and the EU recognised Kosovo's independence.

The parliament of the Serb Republic yesterday adopted a resolution attacking
Kosovo's declaration of independence as an illegal act that violated
Serbia's territorial integrity.

But Bosnian Serb prime minister Milorad Dodik told parliament there was no
rush to break up the country. "We are not adventurers," he said, "and we do
not plan to broach a decision about independence now. The referendum can be
used only once, if we decide and when we decide it. It is no game."

Serbs protesting Kosovo's independence attacked UN police guarding a key
bridge in northern Kosovo with stones and empty glass bottles Friday.

Some 5,000 Serbs rallied in this tense town, waving Serbian flags and
chanting "Kosovo is ours!" in a fifth day of protests since Kosovo's ethnic
Albanian leaders declared independence last weekend.

letters@guardian.co.uk

Canada should uphold international law and not recognize Kosovo

BEXAMINER Canada should uphold international law and not recognize KOSOVO
Fri Feb 22, 2008 9:56 am (PST)
http://www.thebarrieexaminer.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=912781

BARRIE EXAMINER (CANADA)

EDITORIAL

Canada should uphold international law and not recognize Kosovo

Posted By SCOTT TAYLOR

Posted 5 hours ago

Last weekend, the streets of Kosovo were flooded with citizens celebrating a
unilateral declaration of independence by ethnic Albanian Prime Minister
Hashim Thaci. This much-anticipated announcement formally severed all
official ties between the disputed province and the rest of Serbia, thereby
creating Europe's newest state.

The United States was the first to recognize Kosovo's independence, with
U.S. President George W. Bush sending his congratulations to Thaci from a
stop in Tanzania. The United Kingdom, Germany and France were quick to
follow suit, and with these big powers on board, the Albanian Kosovars
popped the champagne corks.

For people only paying casual attention to this long-simmering Balkan hot
spot, Thaci's declaration of independence may indeed be viewed as a joyous
occasion. In fact, most Canadians may be forgiven if they thought this whole
matter was resolved back in the summer of 1999.

After a 78-day bombing campaign, NATO had negotiated a ceasefire agreement
with the Serbian government. Under the terms of UN Resolution 1244, Serbian
security forces would withdraw from Kosovo, and under NATO military
supervision, the 800,000 Albanian Kosovar refugees who had fled the fighting
would be repatriated. The Albanian guerrillas - known as the Kosovo
Liberation Army (KLA) - were to be disarmed and demobilized by NATO troops,
who would also ensure the safety of Kosovo's 200,000 ethnic Serb civilians.

Resolution 1244 made it very clear that under the UN Charter, Kosovo would
remain the sovereign territory of Serbia. Over the past nine years, NATO has
failed to uphold its part of the bargain. The KLA was never disarmed; they
were simply formalized into the Kosovo Protection Corps.

With Serbia unwilling to relinquish the sovereignty of this province - the
religious heartland of the Serbian people - there was no legal way to push
independence through the UN Security Council.

Up until 1998, the U.S. State Department regarded the KLA as a terrorist
organization. The KLA's assassinations and bomb attacks against government
officials led to a heavy-handed Serbian military crackdown. At this point
the Americans changed horses and decried the Serb reprisals rather than the
terror provocations of the KLA. Under U.S. pressure, an ultimatum was issued
by NATO to Serbia in February 1999, and the KLA was suddenly legitimized as
freedom fighters.

By March 24 of that year, when the deadline expired without Serbia's
compliance, NATO began bombing Kosovo and Serbia.

Putting recent history aside, the fact remains that Kosovo is simply not
viable as an independent country. It is a landlocked, mountainous province,
not quite twice the size of Prince Edward Island, with a population of two
million. The unemployment rate stands at 50 per cent; for those working the
average annual income ranges around $2,400 CDN a year. Prostitution and
illegal drugs form the major pillar of Kosovo's economy, with the other main
infusion coming from the annual foreign donations of approximately $600
million.

The red and black flag they wave is the Albanian flag, not Kosovar. And as a
result of the ongoing violent attacks against non-Albanians in the province,
this is now one of the most ethnically-cleansed territories in all of
Europe.

Prime Minister Thaci is a former ruthless KLA warlord who called himself
"Snake" and the commander of the Kosovo Protection Corps is Agim Ceku, who
made a notorious name for himself as a war criminal in Croatia.

Given the rotten foundation upon which Kosovo intends to build its own
independent state, I think Canada would be well advised to uphold the UN
Charter in this instance, and to respect the rule of international law.

Scott Taylor reported from inside Serbia and Kosovo during the 1999 bombing
campaign and has made more than 20 subsequent visits to the region.

JPOST Kosovo's stark warning

JPOST Kosovo's stark warning
Fri Feb 22, 2008 8:52 am (PST)
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1203605149058&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

JERUSALEM POST (ISRAEL)

Column One: Kosovo's stark warning

Caroline Glick , THE JERUSALEM POST Feb. 21, 2008

Kosovo's US-backed declaration of independence is deeply troubling. By
setting a precedent of legitimizing the secession of disaffected minorities,
it weakens the long-term viability of multi-ethnic states. In so doing, it
destabilizes the already stressed state-based international system.

States as diverse as Canada, Morocco, Spain, Georgia, Russia and China
currently suffer problems with politicized minorities. They are deeply
concerned by the Kosovo precedent. Even the US has latent sovereignty issues
with its increasingly politicized Hispanic minority along its border with
Mexico. It may one day experience a domestic backlash from its support for
Kosovar independence from Serbia.

Setting aside the global implications, it is hard to see how Kosovo
constitutes a viable state. Its 40 percent unemployment is a function of the
absence of proper economic and governing infrastructures.

In November, a European Commission report detailed the Kosovo Liberation
Army's failure to build functioning governing apparatuses. The report noted
that "due to a lack of clear political will to fight corruption, and to
insufficient legislative and implementing measures, corruption is still
widespread... Civil servants are still vulnerable to political interference,
corrupt practices and nepotism." Moreover, "Kosovo's public administration
remains weak and inefficient."

The report continued, "The composition of the government anti-corruption
council does not sufficiently guarantee its impartiality," and "little
progress can be reported in the area of organized crime and combating of
trafficking in human beings."

Additionally, the prosecution of Albanian war criminals is "hampered by the
unwillingness of the local population to testify" against them. This is in
part due to the fact that "there is still no specific legislation on witness
protection in place."

The fledgling failed-state of Kosovo is a great boon for the global jihad.
It is true that Kosovar Muslims by and large do not subscribe to radical
Islam. But it is also true that they have allowed their territory to be used
as bases for al-Qaida operations; that members of the ruling Kosovo
Liberation Army have direct links to al-Qaida; and that the Islamic world as
a whole perceived Kosovo's fight for independence from Serbia as a jihad for
Islamic domination of the disputed province.

According to a 2002 Wall Street Journal report, al-Qaida began operating
actively in Kosovo, and in the rest of the Balkans, in 1992. Osama bin Laden
visited Albania in 1996 and 1997. He received a Bosnian passport from the
Bosnian Embassy in Austria in 1993. Acting on bin Laden's orders, in 1994
his deputy, Ayman Zawahiri set up training bases throughout the Balkans
including one in Mitrovica, Kosovo. The Taliban and al-Qaida set up drug
trafficking operations in Kosovo to finance their operations in Afghanistan
and beyond.

In 2006, John Gizzi reported in Human Events that the German intelligence
service BND had confirmed that the 2005 terrorist bombings in Britain and
the 2004 bombings in Spain were organized in Kosovo. Furthermore, "The man
at the center of the provision of the explosives in both instances was an
Albanian, operating mostly out of Kosovo... who is the second ranking leader
of the Kosovo Liberation Army, Niam Behzloulzi."

Then, too, at its 1998 meeting in Pakistan, the Organization of the Islamic
Conference declared that the Albanian separatists in Kosovo were fighting a
jihad. The OIC called on the Muslim world to help "this fight for freedom on
the occupied Muslim territories."

Supporters of Kosovo claim that as victims of "genocide," Kosovar Muslims
deserve independence. But if the Muslims in Kosovo have been targeted for
annihilation by the Serbs, then how is it that they have increased from 48%
of the population in 1948 to 92% today? Indeed, Muslims comprised only 78%
of the population in 1991, the year before Yugoslavia broke apart.

In recent years particularly, it is Kosovo's Serbian Christians, not its
Albanian Muslims, who are targeted for ethnic cleansing. Since 1999,
two-thirds of Kosovo's Serbs - some 250,000 people - have fled the area.

The emergence of a potentially destabilizing state in Kosovo is clearly an
instance of political interests trumping law. Under international law,
Kosovo has no right to be considered a sovereign state. Even UN Security
Council Resolution 1244 from 1999, which the KLA claims provides the legal
basis for Kosovar sovereignty, explicitly recognizes Serbian sovereignty
over Kosovo.

For Israel, Kosovo's US-backed declaration of independence should be a
source of alarm great enough to require a rethinking of foreign policy.
Unfortunately, rather than understand and implement the lessons of Kosovo,
the Olmert-Livni-Barak government is working actively to ensure that they
are reenacted in the international community's treatment of Israel and the
Palestinians. Today, Israel is enabling the Palestinians to set the
political and legal conditions for the establishment of an internationally
recognized state of Palestine that will be at war with Israel.

By accepting the "Road Map Plan to a Two-State Solution" in 2004, Israel
empowered the US, the EU, Russia and the UN, who comprise the international
Quartet, to serve as judges of Palestinian and Israeli actions toward one
another. In November 2007, at the Annapolis conference, the
Olmert-Livni-Barak government explicitly empowered the US to "monitor and
judge the fulfillment of the commitment of both sides of the road map."

That these moves have made Israel dependent on the kindness of strangers was
made clear this week when Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni instructed Israel's
ambassadors to launch a campaign to convince the international community
that Israel and the Palestinians are making great strides in their
negotiations toward the establishment of a Palestinian state. Livni's move
was precipitated by growing European and US dissatisfaction with the pace of
those negotiations and by reports from the meeting of Quartet members in
Berlin on February 11. There all members voiced anger at the slow pace of
negotiations and opposition to Israel's military actions in Gaza, which are
aimed at protecting the western Negev from rocket and mortar attacks.

The US representative at the Quartet's meeting, Assistant Secretary of State
David Welch, reportedly told his colleagues, "First, we must not allow the
suicide bombing in Dimona and the shooting on Sderot to affect the
negotiations."

Welch reportedly added, "It is also important to us that neither the
Palestinians in Gaza nor the Israelis in Sderot are hurt. Also, we must
continue to strengthen Mahmoud Abbas and Salaam Fayad."

Moreover, Ran Koriel, Israel's ambassador to the EU, reportedly warned Livni
that the Russians are pushing for the re-establishment of a Fatah-Hamas
government. Several EU states, including France, are reconsidering their
refusal to recognize Hamas.

If Israel had not empowered the Quartet generally and the US specifically to
determine whether the PA and Israel are behaving properly, a European or
Russian decision to recognize Hamas would have little impact. But given
their role as arbiters, Quartet members can take punitive action against
Israel if it fails to comply with their wishes. The Quartet can replace
international law in determining who can assert sovereignty over Gaza, Judea
and Samaria and how Israel can exercise its own sovereignty. And so, Livni
is reduced to begging them not to recognize Hamas.

Once the US decided in 1999 to commit its own forces to NATO's bombing of
Serbia and subsequent occupation of Kosovo, the jig was up for Serbian
sovereignty over the area. The fact is, NATO forces in Kosovo were deployed
for the express purpose of blocking Serbia from exercising its sovereignty
over Kosovo, not to prevent violence between the Kosovars and the Serbs or
among the Muslims and Christians in Kosovo. That is, NATO deployed in Kosovo
to enable it to gain independence.

And if US or NATO forces are deployed to Gaza or Judea and Samaria, they
will not be there to protect Israelis from Palestinian terror or to prevent
the areas from acting as global terror bases. They will be there to
establish a Palestinian state.

Failing to understand the meaning of Kosovo, the Olmert-Livni-Barak
government refuses to understand this point. Indeed, the government is
actively lobbying NATO to deploy forces in Gaza. Just as it wrongly hoped
that UNIFIL forces in south Lebanon would fight Hizbullah for it, so today,
the Olmert-Livni-Barak government insists that NATO forces in Gaza will
fight Hamas for it.

If applying the lessons of UNIFIL to Gaza is too abstract for the
Olmert-Livni-Barak government, Israel has experience with EU monitors in
Gaza itself to learn from. Wrongly assuming that the Europeans shared
Israel's interest in preventing terrorists and weapons from entering Gaza,
Israel requested that EU monitors set up shop at the Rafah terminal linking
Gaza to Egypt after Israel withdrew from the border in 2005. Yet whenever
confronted by Fatah and Hamas terrorists, rather than fight the EU monitors
flee to Israel for protection. And its monitors' experience with Palestinian
terrorists taking over the border has never caused the EU to question its
support for Palestinian statehood.

Then, too, since the US, EU, UN and Russia all consider Gaza, Judea, Samaria
and Jerusalem to be one territorial unit, it is not surprising that Israel's
request for NATO forces in Gaza has been greeted by a US plan to deploy NATO
forces in Judea and Samaria. If NATO forces in Gaza would do nothing to
secure the border with Egypt or to fight terrorists and would scuttle
Israeli operations in the area, NATO forces in Judea and Samaria would not
simply prevent Israel from protecting its citizens who live there. They
would also prevent Israel from taking action to prevent the Palestinians
from attacking central Israel and asserting control over the border with
Jordan. And yet, as The Jerusalem Post reported this week, Israel is
conducting talks with the US regarding just such a NATO deployment.

What the Serbs made NATO fight its way in to achieve, Israel is offering
NATO on a silver platter.

Not surprisingly, Abbas's adviser and PA propaganda chief Yasser Abd Rabbo
reacted to Kosovo's declaration of independence by recommending that the
Palestinians follow the example. Abd Rabbo said, "Kosovo is not better than
us. We deserve independence even before Kosovo, and we ask for the backing
of the United States and the European Union for our independence."

For its part, the Olmert-Livni-Barak government has responded to Kosovo's
declaration of independence with customary confusion. But the lessons of
Kosovo are clear. Not only should Israel join Russia, Canada, China, Spain,
Romania and many others in refusing to recognize Kosovo. It should also
state that as a consequence of Kosovo's independence, Israel rejects the
deployment of any international forces to Gaza or Judea and Samaria, and
refuses to cede its legal right to sovereignty in Judea, Samaria, Gaza and
Jerusalem to international arbitration.

A postmodern declaration

Kosovo's sovereignty is a fiction: real power lies with EU officials backed by western firepower

• 
  John Laughland
  
• 
  The Guardian,
  
• Tuesday February 19 2008

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This article appeared in the Guardian
on Tuesday February 19 2008 on p30 of the Comment & debate section. It was last updated at 00:04 on February 19 2008.

There seemed to be no immediate
consequences when, in 1908, Austria annexed Bosnia-Herzegovina. Vienna
was in clear violation of the 1878 Treaty of Berlin, which it had
signed and kept Bosnia in Turkey, yet the protests of Russia and Serbia
were in vain. The following year, the fait accompli was written into an
amended treaty. Six years later, however, a Russian-backed Serbian
gunman exacted revenge by assassinating the heir to the Austrian throne
in Sarajevo in June 1914. The rest is history.

Parallels between
Kosovo in 2008 and Bosnia in 1908 are relevant, but not only because,
whatever legal trickery the west uses to override UN security council
resolution 1244 - which kept Kosovo in Serbia - the proclamation of the
new state will have incalculable long-term consequences: on
secessionist movements from Belgium to the Black Sea via Bosnia, on
relations with China and Russia, and on the international system as a
whole. They are also relevant because the last thing the new state
proclaimed in Pristina on Sunday will be is independent. Instead, what
has now emerged south of the Ibar river is a postmodern state, an
entity that may be sovereign in name but is a US-EU protectorate in
practice.

The European Union plans to send some 2,000 officials
to Kosovo to take over from the United Nations, which has governed the
province since 1999. It wants to appoint an International Civilian
Representative who - according to the plan drawn up last year by Martti
Ahtisaari, the UN envoy - will be the "final authority" in Kosovo with
the power to "correct or annul decisions by the Kosovo public
authorities". Kosovo would have had more real independence under the
terms Belgrade offered it than it will now.

Those who support the
sort of "polyvalent sovereignty" and "postnational statehood" that we
already have in the EU welcome such arrangements as a respite from the
harsh decisionism of post-Westphalian statehood. But such fictions are
in fact always underpinned by the timeless realities of brute power.
There are 16,000 Nato troops in Kosovo and they have no intention of
coming home: indeed, they are even now being reinforced with 1,000
extra troops from Britain. They, not the Kosovo army, are responsible
for the province's internal and external security.

Kosovo is also
home to the vast US military base Camp Bondsteel, near Urosevac - a
mini-Guantánamo that is only one in an archipelago of new US bases in
eastern Europe, the Balkans and central Asia. This is why the Serbian
prime minister, Vojislav Kostunica, speaking on Sunday, specifically
attacked Washington for the Kosovo proclamation, saying that it showed
that the US was "ready to unscrupulously and violently jeopardise
international order for the sake of its own military interests".

In
order to symbolise its status as the newest Euro-Atlantic colony,
Kosovo has chosen a flag modelled on that of Bosnia-Herzegovina - the
same EU gold, the same arrangement of stars on a blue background. For
Bosnia, too, is governed by a foreign high representative, who has the
power to sack elected politicians and annul laws, all in the name of
preparing the country for EU integration.

As in Bosnia, billions
have been poured into Kosovo to pay for the international
administration but not to improve the lives of ordinary people. Kosovo
is a sump of poverty and corruption, both of which have exploded since
1999, and its inhabitants have eked out their lives for nine years now
in a mafia state where there are no jobs and not even a proper
electricity supply: every few hours there are power cuts, and the
streets of Kosovo's towns explode in a whirring din as every shop and
home switches on its generator.

This tragic situation is made
possible only because there is a fatal disconnect in all
interventionism between power and responsibility. The international
community has micro-managed every aspect of the break-up of Yugoslavia
since the EU brokered the Brioni agreement within days of the war in
Slovenia in July 1991. Yet it has always blamed the locals for the
results. Today, the new official government of Kosovo will be
controlled by its international patrons, but they will similarly never
accept accountability for its failings. They prefer instead to govern
behind the scenes, in the dangerous - and no doubt deliberate - gap
between appearance and reality.

· John Laughland is the author of Travesty: the Trial of Slobodan Milosevic and the Corruption of International Justice

jlaughland@btinternet.com

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/feb/19/kosovo.eu

Serbs Press Their Drive to Control Northern Kosovo

---

February
21, 2008

Serbs Press Their Drive to Control
Northern Kosovo

By
DAN BILEFSKY

CABRA, Kosovo
— Serbs in northern Kosovo on Wednesday continued what appeared to be a drive
to force a partition three days after the ethnic Albanian majority declared the
province’s independence from Serbia.

A mob of 300 Serbs wielding
clubs and tools gathered on a road near this small village of ethnic Albanians
in northern Kosovo, prompting NATO to send armored vehicles and tanks to head
them off.

Earlier, ethnic Albanian
police officers, part of Kosovo’s multiethnic police force, were forced out of
the neighboring Serb village, where they were patrolling with fellow Serbs. It
was the latest sign that Serbs in Kosovo, incensed by the declaration of
independence, are trying to assert control over the northern part of Kosovo,
the majority of whose residents are ethnic Serbs.

NATO peacekeeping troops
closed off roads between Serbia and northern Kosovo, and United
Nations police officers guarded checkpoints still smoldering after
they were burned down Tuesday by several hundred Serbs in what the police said
appeared to be an organized operation, The Associated Press reported.

Indicating that the violence
could be a prelude to an effort to force a partition of northern Kosovo, the
Serbian minister for Kosovo, Metohija Slobodan Samardzic, said the destruction
of the United Nations checkpoints was in line with Serbia’s policies. “It might
not be pleasant, but it is legitimate,” he said, adding that Serbia would be
seeking to enlarge its operations in northern Kosovo, where it provides
education, culture and health services to the ethnic Serb population.

In Mitrovica, a northern
Kosovo city that is divided between Serbs in the north and ethnic Albanians in
the south, 3,000 demonstrators marched to the bridge dividing the communities,
chanting, “We won’t give up Kosovo!” The daily protest, begun this week, starts
precisely at 12:44 p.m., in reference to United
Nations Security Council Resolution 1244, under which Serbia insists
that it still has sovereignty over Kosovo under international law.

Capt. Bertrand Bonneau, a
spokesman for NATO’s 16,000-member peacekeeping force in Kosovo, said the
peacekeepers were under orders to maintain security in all of Kosovo, including
the north, and would not tolerate any action by either side that undermined
this goal.

The European
Union on Wednesday formally began a program that will bring 1,800
police officers and judges to Kosovo to help administer its affairs. The move
provoked criticism from Russia, which has supported the Serbs in opposing an
independent Kosovo. Pieter Feith, the European Union’s special envoy, appealed
to Serbs, who consider the mission an occupying force, to stop demonstrating.

But European diplomats,
speaking on the condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to
discuss the subject for attribution, expressed worries that Kosovo’s Serbs
could provoke ethnic Albanians, undermining whatever collective Serbian and
Albanian authority remained in northern Kosovo, and entrenching Serbian control
so that de facto partition became a political reality.

“The Serbs appear intent on
provoking an Albanian reaction and to make the international community’s
mission here impossible, but we will not allow legal partition,” said one
senior European Union diplomat.

But another European diplomat
said that if Serbs pursued de facto division, “there is not a lot that could be
done.”

The political temperature in
Cabra, an agricultural village of about 70 ethnic Albanian families, has
particular resonance because it was here in March 2004 that three ethnic
Albanian boys drowned under mysterious circumstances, prompting Albanians to
riot across Kosovo.

As the Serb protesters
gathered on the road outside the village Wednesday, local ethnic Albanians
vowed they would stay to ensure that northern Kosovo remained in ethnic
Albanian hands. Children wearing T-shirts with Albanian flags gathered to
observe the peacekeepers’ tanks parked at the edge of the town.

“This is my land, and we must
stay here to show Serbia that this is Kosovo,” said Zuka Ilir, an unemployed
28-year-old. “But we are afraid. We don’t know what will happen.”

Xhevadet Beka, a 26-year-old
engineer, added: “I will stay here and fight if I have to. For now we put our
faith in NATO, the E.U. and the United States. But we are very, very afraid
that the Serbs will try and take over northern Kosovo, and it is impossible. We
will not allow it.”

Kosovo was placed under
United Nations administration in 1999, after NATO intervened to halt repression
by the Serbian leader, Slobodan
Milosevic, of ethnic Albanians, who make up 95 percent of the
population. Yet the northern part of Kosovo — 15 percent of its territory —
remains under de facto Serbian control.

The Serbian leader of Kosovo,
Nebojsa Radulovic, demanded Wednesday that the border between Serbia and
Kosovo, sealed on Tuesday by NATO troops to keep militants from crossing into
Kosovo, be reopened or “the Serbs will continue with the protests, with
consequences we cannot predict.”

Germany, meanwhile, joined
the United States, France, Britain and seven other countries in recognizing
Kosovo, calling Kosovo’s independence a necessary measure to stabilize the
Balkans. Austria and Norway said they also were planning to recognize Kosovo’s
sovereignty.

The Serbian foreign minister,
Vuk Jeremic, addressed the European
Parliament in Strasbourg, France, warning that diplomatic relations
with countries that recognized Kosovo would be damaged. “This is going to have
an impact on our future progress to European Union membership,” he said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/21/world/europe/21kosovo.html?ex=1204174800&en=6b7a9a517e416f9e&ei=5040

'Independent' Kosovo: A threat, not a country

'Independent' Kosovo: A threat, not a country

________________________________________
Posted: February 20, 2008
1:00 am Eastern

© 2008
By James George Jatras
Abraham Lincoln was fond of asking the rhetorical question: "If you call a tail a leg, how many legs does a dog have? Five? No, calling a tail a leg don't make it a leg."
That pretty much sums up the recent unilateral declaration of independence by Albanian Muslims in the Serbian province of Kosovo. Several countries, disgracefully led by the United States, have recognized Kosovo. Major media have hailed creation of the "world's newest country." But calling Kosovo a country doesn't make it one.
Serbia has denounced the move as the illegal creation of a "separatist entity" on its sovereign territory and has handed down criminal indictments against several of the top Albanian Muslim leaders. Now under way is a sharp global competition to see which governments will recognize Kosovo and which will not. Under heavy pressure from the U.S. State Department, most European countries will meekly comply. Some, like Cyprus with its Turkish-occupied north and Spain with its Basque separatist movement, will not.
In short, an action State Department bureaucrats touted as "settling Kosovo's status" has resulted in anything but. Outside of Europe, the picture is even fuzzier. Russia will reject Kosovo's independence, and expected to take the same line are China, India, Indonesia, Nigeria, South Africa, Brazil and many others. Russia will veto any effort to extend Kosovo membership in the United Nations.
Any sovereign state with restive ethnic or religious minorities would recognize Kosovo at its own peril. What Washington seeks to inflict on Serbia today could be the fate of the American southwest tomorrow. Israel, in particular, is closely pondering its next move. While loath to anger Washington, Jerusalem must consider that a Kosovo precedent could, absent any negotiated agreement, prompt proclamation of a Palestinian state, to be recognized by Arab and Muslim regimes. The same precedent could apply to heavily Muslim areas such as Galilee and the Negev within Israel's formal borders.
At a special press briefing, outgoing Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Nicholas Burns – who is often mentioned as a possible secretary of state under a Democratic administration – hailed support for Kosovo from the Organization of the Islamic Conference and Muslim governments. Happily claiming that a "vastly majority Muslim state" has been carved out of Serbia, a European Christian country, Burns said: "We think it is a very positive step that this Muslim state, Muslim majority state, has been created today."
Burns' remarks reflect a desperate hope by the Bush administration that displays of American pro-Islamic favoritism in the Balkans and support for a Palestinian state (its domination by Hamas notwithstanding) will buy the good will of hostile devotees of the "religion of peace and tolerance." Their gratitude is manifest in the jihad terror plot to attack Fort Dix, N.J., where four of the six defendants are Albanian Muslims from the Kosovo region. The offenders' presence in the United States – three of them illegal aliens and one brought to the U.S. by the Clinton administration as a refugee, another example of "gratitude" – stems from the fact that a broadly based support network for the terrorist "Kosovo Liberation Army," KLA, has been allowed to operate with impunity in the New York-New Jersey-Pennsylvania area, raising funds and collecting weapons, not to mention peddling influence with American politicians.
Meanwhile, Christian Serbs in Kosovo are bracing for the worst. "We are all expecting something difficult and horrible," said Bishop Artemije, pastor of Kosovo's Orthodox Christians. "Our message to you, all Serbs in Kosovo, is to remain in your homes and around your monasteries, regardless of what God allows or our enemies do."
The bishop's flock has good reason to fear. Far from the usual claims that NATO stopped a humanitarian catastrophe in Kosovo in 1999, the past nine years have seen a slow-motion genocide in progress against the province's Christian Serbian population under the nose of the U.N. and NATO, and at times with their facilitation. Two-thirds of the Serbian population already has been expelled and have not been able to return safely to their homes, along with similar proportions of other groups (Roma, Gorani, Croats and all the Jews). Over 150 churches and monasteries have been destroyed, with crosses and icons of Christ attracting particular vandalistic rage, a testament to Kosovo Albanians' supposed secularism and pro-Western orientation.
Hundreds of new Saudi-funded mosques fomenting the extreme Wahhabi doctrine have sprung up. Kosovo is visibly morphing from part of Europe into part of the Middle East. In contrast to Under Secretary Burns' cheerleading, former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. John Bolton has warned: "Kosovo will be a weak state susceptible to radical Islamist influence from outside the region, with the support from some Albanians, in other words, a potential gate for radicalism to enter Europe." If allowed to consolidate, an independent Kosovo would become a way station toward an anti-American, anti-Israel, anti-Christian "Eurabia."
Around the world, jihad terror usually goes hand-in-hand with organized crime. Kosovo is the perfect case in point. The supposed authorities of the would-be state are themselves kingpins in the Albanians Mafia, whose network extends throughout Europe and has a significant presence in New York City. Besides all the international aid dumped down the Kosovo rat hole, or carted off by corrupt officials, the only real "industry" is crime: drugs (heroin from Afghan opium), slaves (kidnapped women and children from Moldova, Ukraine and other countries brought in for local "service" – there are lot of lonely international bureaucrats in Kosovo – or shipped off into Europe), and weapons (the missile that hit the U.S. Embassy in Athens in 2006 and the explosives used in the London and Madrid train bombings came through Kosovo).
What will happen now in Kosovo? It would be up to the KLA and their supporters to decide whether to kick off a new cycle of violence by attacking Serbs who refuse to submit to their "authority." Serbia in fact has been beefing up its legitimate state institutions in areas where Serbs are concentrated, which the Albanians have threatened to shut down as – believe it or not – illegal separatist structures. We will see if the political violence unleashed by the act of recognition will be matched by physical violence on the ground. Meanwhile, Serbia will undertake undisclosed countermeasures to undermine the illegally declared KLA- and Mafia-ruled entity and force resumption of negotiations to achieve a valid settlement. Let us hope they succeed.
With a stoke of his pen, President Bush, by heeding the State Department's bad advice to recognize a supposedly independent Kosovo, has triggered the perfect international storm: shattering the principle of the territorial integrity of sovereign nations, encouraging violent separatists worldwide, provoking a needless confrontation with Russia and other countries, boosting the jihad terrorist and organized crime threat to Europe and America, and creating conditions for a human rights and religious freedom nightmare. In terms of far-reaching consequences, it may the worst blunder of his presidency. Which is saying a lot

http://www.pressonline.co.yu/vest.jsp?id=30322&sectionId=37

A postmodern declaration

Kosovo's sovereignty is a fiction: real power lies with EU
officials backed by western firepower

• John Laughland
  
• The Guardian,
  
• Tuesday February 19 2008

There seemed to be no immediate consequences when, in 1908,
Austria annexed Bosnia-Herzegovina. Vienna was in clear violation of the 1878
Treaty of Berlin, which it had signed and kept Bosnia in Turkey, yet the
protests of Russia and Serbia were in vain. The following year, the fait
accompli was written into an amended treaty. Six years later, however, a
Russian-backed Serbian gunman exacted revenge by assassinating the heir to the
Austrian throne in Sarajevo in June 1914. The rest is history.

Parallels between Kosovo in 2008 and Bosnia in 1908 are relevant, but not
only because, whatever legal trickery the west uses to override UN security
council resolution 1244 - which kept Kosovo in Serbia - the proclamation of the
new state will have incalculable long-term consequences: on secessionist
movements from Belgium to the Black Sea via Bosnia, on relations with China and
Russia, and on the international system as a whole. They are also relevant
because the last thing the new state proclaimed in Pristina on Sunday will be
is independent. Instead, what has now emerged south of the Ibar river is a
postmodern state, an entity that may be sovereign in name but is a US-EU
protectorate in practice.

The European Union plans to send some 2,000 officials to Kosovo to take over
from the United Nations, which has governed the province since 1999. It wants
to appoint an International Civilian Representative who - according to the plan
drawn up last year by Martti Ahtisaari, the UN envoy - will be the "final
authority" in Kosovo with the power to "correct or annul decisions by
the Kosovo public authorities". Kosovo would have had more real independence
under the terms Belgrade offered it than it will now.

Those who support the sort of "polyvalent sovereignty" and
"postnational statehood" that we already have in the EU welcome such
arrangements as a respite from the harsh decisionism of post-Westphalian
statehood. But such fictions are in fact always underpinned by the timeless
realities of brute power. There are 16,000 Nato troops in Kosovo and they have
no intention of coming home: indeed, they are even now being reinforced with
1,000 extra troops from Britain. They, not the Kosovo army, are responsible for
the province's internal and external security.

Kosovo is also home to the vast US military base Camp Bondsteel, near
Urosevac - a mini-Guantánamo that is only one in an archipelago of new US bases
in eastern Europe, the Balkans and central Asia. This is why the Serbian prime
minister, Vojislav Kostunica, speaking on Sunday, specifically attacked
Washington for the Kosovo proclamation, saying that it showed that the US was
"ready to unscrupulously and violently jeopardise international order for
the sake of its own military interests".

In order to symbolise its status as the newest Euro-Atlantic colony, Kosovo
has chosen a flag modelled on that of Bosnia-Herzegovina - the same EU gold,
the same arrangement of stars on a blue background. For Bosnia, too, is
governed by a foreign high representative, who has the power to sack elected
politicians and annul laws, all in the name of preparing the country for EU
integration.

As in Bosnia, billions have been poured into Kosovo to pay for the
international administration but not to improve the lives of ordinary people.
Kosovo is a sump of poverty and corruption, both of which have exploded since
1999, and its inhabitants have eked out their lives for nine years now in a
mafia state where there are no jobs and not even a proper electricity supply:
every few hours there are power cuts, and the streets of Kosovo's towns explode
in a whirring din as every shop and home switches on its generator.

This tragic situation is made possible only because there is a fatal
disconnect in all interventionism between power and responsibility. The
international community has micro-managed every aspect of the break-up of
Yugoslavia since the EU brokered the Brioni agreement within days of the war in
Slovenia in July 1991. Yet it has always blamed the locals for the results.
Today, the new official government of Kosovo will be controlled by its
international patrons, but they will similarly never accept accountability for
its failings. They prefer instead to govern behind the scenes, in the dangerous
- and no doubt deliberate - gap between appearance and reality.

· John Laughland is the author of Travesty: the Trial of
Slobodan Milosevic and the Corruption of International Justice

jlaughland@btinternet.com

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/feb/19/kosovo.eu

Play it again, Adolf -- Danke, Deutschland

"Thank
You Germany!"

2008/02/18

PRISTINA/BELGRADE/BERLIN

(Own
report) - Sunday, after Berlin's years of preparations, the South-Serbian
province, Kosovo, declared its secession in violation of international law.
Kosovo is "independent" of Serbia, declared Hashim Thaci, the Prime
Minister of the Provincial Administration in Pristina. The German government
intends to recognize the secession soon. Berlin will thereby be participating
in the violation of the UN Charter and other valid legal norms, just as the
German police and judicial officers, who will be dispatched to Kosovo within
the framework of a so-called EU mission. Their deployment will be without a
valid, internationally recognized legal basis and will therefore constitute an
illegal occupation. The objective is to establish an informal protectorate,
while keeping its nationalist forces in check. Kosovo's secession is the
preliminary finale of a policy seeking the parcelization of the Balkan states
along the lines of allegiance, which began with Berlin's recognition of the
Croatian secession. Each of the EU states, after brief hesitation, joined this
policy and along with Washington, militarily attacked what was left of
Yugoslavia in 1999. Since that time, Berlin has been fostering the Kosovo
nationalists, whose representatives in Pristina are designated as the bosses of
organized crime. One of them is the current Prime Minister Thaci. On the murals
celebrating Thaci's proclamation of secession, one reads "Thank You
Germany!"

With
yesterday's proclaimed secession the provincial administration in Pristina has
concluded what Berlin has been preparing for years - at first with covert
secret service support for the KLA, then with participation in the military
aggression against Yugoslavia in March 1999 and finally within the framework of
the UN Administration in Pristina (UNMIK) (german-foreign-policy.com reported
[1]). The secession of Serbia's southern province was carried out in violation
of the UN Charter - guaranteeing all UN member states the sovereignty and
territorial integrity - and in disregard of the decisions taken by the UN
Security Council. Most significant is the Resolution 1244 explicitly
reconfirming to Belgrade the integrity of its sovereign territory. The German
government intends to recognize the secession soon and demands that all EU
member states do the same. Berlin thereby proves once again that it is the
driving force behind a growing degeneration of international law, blatantly exalting
the despotism of power to the highest principle of foreign policy.

Fantasy

With
the aid of fantasy the foreign ministry seeks to cover up the German
government's renewed breach of international law. In its statement before the
Foreign Relations Committee of the German Parliament, the ministry alleged that
the guarantees of Serbia's sovereignty and integrity, laid down in UN
Resolution 1244, refer merely to a "transitional government" in
Kosovo and does not preclude secession. A reading of the text proves this
audacious fabrication to be groundless. According to the Foreign Ministry, the
UN Resolution - except for the guarantees for Serbia's sovereignty and
territorial integrity - is still in force, so as not to jeopardize the
legitimacy of NATO's and the EU's deployment, because if the resolution were no
longer valid, it would mean that the western countries' occupation of Serbian
territory would be dependant upon the "invitation" of their Kosovo
vassals in Pristina, an embarrassing dependency that Berlin and Washington
would like to avoid.[2]

Precedence

This
ludicrous approach that degrades UN Resolutions to non-binding suggestion
lists, from which one can pick and choose to apply clauses at preference, meets
open contradiction even within the entourage of the Foreign Ministry. Warnings
of incalculable counter-measures are being heard. "Unilateral
interpretations of Security Council Resolutions constitute (...) cases of
precedence that, under other circumstances, can be turned against the western nations,"[3]
a member of the Foreign Ministry's Council of International Jurists wrote in a
newspaper article.

Decree

German
legal arbitrariness can also be seen by the way the decision was taken to
dispatch a so-called police and judicial mission to Kosovo. In spite of massive
pressure from Berlin, six EU member states are still rejecting the secession,
because their own sovereignty is threatened by separatists. With the refusals
of Spain, Slovakia, Romania, Bulgaria, Greece and Cyprus to actively support
the new "EU-mission", the modalities for decision making were changed
without further ado and the dispatching of 2000 police and judicial officers
was virtually taken by decree. In Brussels one could hear concerning the
decision-making, that the dispatching had been proposed and "formally
adopted" when the time-limit for lodging an objection - at midnight on
Saturday - had expired without a veto from an EU member state. With this new
voting technique, final approval becomes superfluous. Berlin had made it clear
that it would accept a veto under no circumstances. To demonstrate its
determination, Germany had already chosen its first 63 police officers for the
"mission" before the time-limit had expired.[4]

Impunity

Amnesty
International has recently published a report on its research concerning the
"police and justice mission" being conducted in the name of the
United Nations, but also under western control. The conclusions are devastating
for the numerous -among them also German - police and judicial officers who have
been deployed in Kosovo since 1999. According to Sian Jones, Amnesty
International's researcher on Kosovo, "hundreds of cases including
murders, rapes and enforced disappearances have been closed, for want of
evidence that was neither promptly nor effectively gathered" by the UN
Mission. There is persistent "impunity" for war crimes and crimes
against humanity in the southern Serbian province claiming to be an independent
state and about to be recognized by Germany.[5] According to Amnesty „no
progress is ever made", quite the contrary, the situation has worsened in
recent months. Amnesty International "urges the UN not to undertake any
similar international justice missions in the future until effective steps have
been taken to ensure that none of the extensive flaws identified in this report
are repeated."[6]

Networks

The
current Kosovo Prime Minister Hashim Thaci is among those persons whose past
could shed light on what Amnesty considers "extensive flaws".
Washington and Berlin's close ally proclaimed the southern Serbian province's
"independence" in Pristina yesterday. If the UN police and judicial
officers would have accomplished their mission, Thaci would have been brought
to trial long ago. Already in 1997, Serbian judges had sentenced him to ten years
in prison - for several murders. "Thaci had ordered liquidations within
his own ranks," two former KLA fighters report about their former
leader.[7] In the eyes of the German Foreign Intelligence Service
(Bundesnachrichtendienst), the current Prime Minister is one of the heads of
the Kosovo Mafia and a sponsor of a "professional killer".[8] A
survey commissioned by the German Bundeswehr asserts that "in intelligence
circles" Thaci "is considered to be 'far more dangerous'" than
Ramush Haradinaj, who is indicted for war crimes [9], "because the former
KLA leader has an extensive international criminal network at his
disposal."[10]

Last
Question

With
the Kosovo declaration of secession, that, in violation of international law,
has granted criminals their own state, German efforts to achieve the
disempowerment of its traditional opponent, Serbia, has attained its objective.
Belgrade has lost the control over most of the territory of what had formerly
been Yugoslavia, has been deprived its access to the sea and is surrounded by
hostile states. On the other hand, through a new war against Belgrade and the
break-up of Serbian territory, Berlin was able to successfully reassert its
claim as hegemonic power in Southeast Europe. With yesterday's declaration of
secession, according to the German government, the "last remaining open
question concerning the disintegration process of Yugoslavia (...) has been
resolved."[11]

[1]
see also Neuer
Vasall, Imperial
Consummation, Teil
der Verwaltung, A
Sort of Resurrection for Yugoslavia, Die
Herren des Rechts, Paketlösung,
Abmontiert,
Sieger
im Kalten Krieg, Selbstbestimmung,
Die
zweite Welle, Dayton
II, Mit
kreativen Tricks, Angelpunkt,
Countdown
and Kooperationsraum.

[2] Die Argumentationen entstammen einem Papier des Auswärtigen Amts mit dem
Titel "Kosovo. Resolution des Sicherheitsrates 1244 (1999) und eine evtl.
Unabhängigkeitserklärung des Kosovo".

[3] Kein Recht auf Abspaltung; Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 14.02.2008

[4] EU entsendet Polizisten und Juristen in das Kosovo; Reuters 16.02.2008

[5] amnesty international legt neuen Kosovo-Bericht vor; www.amnesty.de

[6] Kosovo (Serbia): The challenge to fix a failed UN justice mission;
www.amnesty.org

[7] "Die Schlange" greift nach der Macht im Kosovo; Die Welt
28.01.2006

[8] Jürgen Roth: Rechtsstaat? Lieber nicht!; Die Weltwoche 43/2005

[9] see also Political
Friendships and Heldenfigur

[10] Operationalisierung von Security Sector Reform (SSR) auf dem Westlichen
Balkan; Institut für Europäische Politik 09.01.2007. See also Aufs
engste verflochten

[11] Erklärung zur Entscheidung des Parlaments im Kosovo; Presse- und
Informationsamt der Bundesregierung 17.02.2008

 http://www.german-foreign-policy.com/en/fulltext/56134