It should not be forgotten!
http://www.iacenter.org/warcrime/staylor.htm
June 10, 2000 International Tribunal for U.S./NATO warcrimes in Yugoslavia
THE ROLE OF THE CANADIAN GOVERNMENT IN THE INTERVENTION IN YUGOSLAVIA
by Scott Taylor
Scott Taylor is a former Canadian soldier who now publishes the Ottawa-based
magazine Esprit de Corps, celebrated for its unflinching scrutiny of the
Canadian military. He also appears regularly in the Canadian media as a
military analyst.
After the Rambouillet peace plan went into effect and Yugoslavian troops
began to withdraw from Kosovo, the Western media proclaimed victory over the
Serbs. Beneath the jingoism and jubilant headlines, the truth was far more
sobering. Throughout the hostilities, NATO’s stated objective had been to
drive Milosevic from office. As the war wound down, the Alliance said it did
not wish to be a co-signatory to a peace plan with a "war criminal." In the
end NATO had been forced to negotiate with the Serb leader. Despite the
massive 78-day air campaign, the presidency and powers of Slobodan Milosevic
remained intact.
The second objective of NATO’s air campaign had been the prevention of a
humanitarian crisis in Kosovo. In fact, the bombing had triggered a Serbian
offensive and a massive exodus of Albanians.
In a deft maneuver, NATO spin-doctors then proclaimed that their air attacks
were now necessary to halt a humanitarian crisis. To justify escalating
bombardments, NATO spoke of "genocide" and a death toll reaching 100,000.
When NATO forces finally deployed into Kosovo, the cost of their victory
became apparent. Contrary to Jamie Shea’s assertions, the Yugoslav Army had
not been "seriously downgraded." As witnessed by the incoming NATO troops,
the Serbs withdrew virtually intact. Since Kosovo remained sovereign Serbian
territory, the positioning of NATO troops could hardly be called a
"liberation." As for bringing peace and stability to Kosovo, that illusion
was shattered when the KLA began a terror campaign of murder and looting
against the Serb Kosovars. Hundreds of thousands of Serbs were forced from
their homes.
Although the Albanian Kosovars had, with NATO’s help, achieved their goal of
throwing off the Serbian yoke, their colourful celebrations were premature.
There remains the bitter internal fight for political control of an
inevitably independent Kosovo. Extremists in the Albanian camp talk not only
of "displacing" the remaining 90,000 Serbs, but of a "Greater Albania." This
conceptual territory consists of approximately 90,000 square kilometres
which, the hardliners say, historically belong to Albanians. At the moment,
the landmass of Kosovo and Albania combined does not amount to 50,000 square
kilometres. The fact that the remainder of "Greater Albania" lies in
Macedonia, Greece, Serbia, Bosnia and Montenegro is not a deterrent.
Having failed to achieve any of their primary objectives, NATO desperately
needed to validate their claims of Serbian genocide.
>From the moment that NATO-led peacekeepers entered Kosovo, war crimes
investigators were dispatched to dig up suspected mass grave sites.
When the first reports were released in November 1999, the forensic teams
had probed 40 per cent of the sites. Only 670 bodies had been found. It was
proof of ethnic hatred and local acts of terrorism, but it could not be
labelled genocide or likened to the Holocaust. Spokespersons for the U.N.
War Crimes Tribunal hastened to point out that there were still 60 per cent
of the graves to be exhumed, but conceded that the largest and most likely
sites had already been examined.
The Trepca mines had been one of the most reported-on sites of alleged
genocide. Eyewitnesses in refugee camps had told Western reporters harrowing
tales of Serbs bussing Albanians to the mine, slaughtering them and throwing
their bodies down the shafts. It was said that these mine pits alone
contained more than 700 corpses.
After an extensive search, the U.N. forensic team failed to find a single
body. The largest mass grave, uncovered at Ljubenic, revealed only seven
corpses – not the 350 initially reported.
When a Canadian journalist questioned Defence Minister Art Eggleton on the
discrepancy between the U.N.’s body count and NATO’s earlier claims, he had
a ready response. With only a slight rewrite from the original air sortie
retort prepared for General Henault, Eggleton looked the reporter in the eye
and said sternly, "This is about human tragedy – it shouldn’t be turned into
a numbers game."
During the war, Eggleton’s air force generals had been quick to point out
the important role Canadian pilots played in the air campaign. With a bevy
of charts and figures, these commanders had proudly demonstrated that Canada
carried out ten per cent of the bombing sorties. However, when the numbers
of Yugoslav civilian casualties caused by "illegitimate targeting" were
released by the independent Human Rights Watch, no one in the Department of
National Defense stepped forward to accept Canada’s ten per cent of the
responsibility.
By Yugoslavian estimates, our share of that responsibility would amount to
120 dead and 700 permanently disabled civilians. (The lower Human Rights
Watch figures would still put Canada’s bombing liabilities at 50 killed and
450 seriously injured civilians.) Apparently, what distinguishes NATO’s
killing and maiming of innocents from Serbian war crimes is that NATO acts
in the name of humanity.
As the fog of war lifted, the Canadian Broadcast Corporation aired what
amounted to a retraction of one of their Kosovar war stories. During the
conflict, a CBC newsmagazine had produced a moving piece on a female
guerrilla fighter. Through tears, the young Albanian had explained Serbs had
raped and killed her younger sister. Forced to witness the atrocity, she had
then enlisted in the KLA.
After the "liberation" of Kosovo, the CBC producer decided to do a follow-up
on the young guerrilla fighter. When the television crew arrived, they were
shocked to find the "dead" sister very much alive. Asked about the
fabrication, the Albanians were unrepentant. "We did what we had to do. We
could not beat the Serbs ourselves," they explained.
The CBC was able to admit that they had been tricked into broadcasting
pro-Albanian propaganda. Unfortunately, the Canadian government had not been
so willing to re-examine its own record on Kosovo. In the turbulent
post-conflict period, Canada has continued to demonstrate an anti-Serb bias
while simultaneously establishing closer ties with the Albanians. In
November 1999, Foreign Affairs Minister Lloyd Axworthy made a visit to
Pristina to open a Canadian diplomatic mission in the Kosovo capital.
Although Kosovo remains Serbian territory, Axworthy did not advise the
Yugoslav authorities of his visit. The snub was compounded in January 2000,
when Canada’s former ambassador to Yugoslavia was turned away from our
embassy in Belgrade on Axworthy’s order. Since Ambassador James Bisset had
been a vocal opponent of the NATO air attacks, Axworthy apparently thought
the Serbs might use the visit for propaganda purposes. As it turned out, the
Belgrade press had a field day with Canada’s inability to tolerate divergent
opinion.
One of the clearest examples of how little the Canadian government
understands the complex Kosovo situations can be found in a letter Gerard
Proteau received after he wrote to Jean Chrétien. It began: "The Prime
Minister has forwarded to me your e-mail message concerning "the increase of
Albanian revenge killings in Kosovo." Canada has condemned the terrorist
activities of the Kosovo Liberation Army, and the use of violence to achieve
a political means. We have urged Kosovar leader Ibrahim Rugova to denounce
terrorism and the use of force in the struggle for greater autonomy for
Kosovo…." The letter, dated October 22, 1999, was signed by Lloyd Axworthy.
>From the outset, Rugova has been the moderate, pacifist voice of the
Albanian Kosovar movement. He is vehemently opposed to KLA terrorism and
violence. During the bombing campaign, NATO erroneously claimed (and never
renounced) that Milosevic had executed him. Hashim Thaci, the leader of the
militant KLA faction known as UCK, has pronounced Rugova a traitor and has
put him on the list of enemies. Canadian soldiers on patrol in Kosovo are
fully aware of the bitter and often violent dispute between Rugova’s
Democratic League and the UCK. Even the name of the KLA had been changed to
the Kosovo Protection Corps (KPC), as the KLA, in theory, had been disbanded
and disarmed.
Although we have 1200 soldiers on the ground and a diplomatic mission in
Pristina, our political leaders appear to be dangerously ignorant of the
major players in the Balkan crisis.
The person Axworthy and Chrétien should be dealing with on the subject of
Kosovar violence is none other than the new KPC commander, the infamous
Medak-Krajina war criminal, General Agim Ceku.
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