[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: EDITORIAL August 08, 2007, "Another Kosovo Crisis?" by Matthew
Kaminski.
According to the report by Centre for Peace and Tolerance in Pristina
Albanian terrorism in Kosovo culminated after arrival of KFOR troops in
1999. Albanians have set on fire numerous Serbian settlements, cleansed
towns of Serbs and other non-Albanians and expelled or killed two third of
Serbian population after the arrival of international forces. In his
testimony before the US House of Representatives Committee on Foreign
Relations in 2005, Vuk Jeremic current Serbian foreign minister had said:
"For Serbs and non-Albanian communities of Kosovo and Metohija, the period
beginning from June 1999 to the present has been catastrophic: 228,741 Serbs
ethnically cleansed, more than 3,000 murdered or missing, over 150 Serbian
Orthodox churches and monasteries burned and looted or destroyed [by
Albanians]."
The New York Times reported in “Kosovo Smolders After Mob Violence” on
March 23, 2004 that there was not much left of the village of Svinjare, "
Every Serbian house has been burned [by Albanians] - all 136 of them.
Graffiti left on the scorched walls suggests the Albanians intended to
rebuild the village for themselves. "Taken by Qerkim," "Taken by Safeti,"
and other Albanian names.”
One can see yellow crosses on a number of Serbian houses in Kosovo. “Old
habits die hard: A yellow cross fixed by German NATO to the door of a
Serbian house to show that Christians live there,” writes a current member
of the international mission in Kosovo, Iseult Henry in his book "Hiding
Genocide in Kosovo: A Crime against God and Humanity.”
As for "a million displaced Albanians “ that Kaminski claims was a cause
for NATO’s 78 day bombing of Serbia, Rollie Keith said that it was false.
Rollie Keith a retired Canadian military officer who served as an OSCE
Kosovo Verification Mission observer in Kosovo in the 1990s had testified
before the court in The Hague that he never saw any evidence of genocide or
ethnic cleansing involving Slobodan Milosevic and Serbian forces in Kosovo .
Mr. Keith also said: ". In my area, based what I was witnessing and what I
was hearing, the majority of troubles were initiated by KLA (Kosovo
Liberation Army). It appeared to me, and it proved to be true, that they
were purposely trying to initiate a state crackdown that would justify in
their opinion an international intervention by the NATO forces or the
others."
Today, the remaining Serbs in Kosovo live in ghettos surrounded by barb
wires and safeguarded by KFOR troops. These are living conditions that
resemble those of World War Two and bring shame not only to the EU but also
to the entire democratic world.
Boba Borojevic
Canada
========
www.wsj.com
WALL STREET JOURNAL (USA)
EDITORIAL
August 08, 2007
Another Kosovo Crisis?
By Matthew Kaminski
Pristina, Kosovo -- Remember Kosovo? "Madeleine's war," Slobodan Milosevic's
ethnic cleansers, a million displaced Albanians and NATO's 78 days of
bombing? So much history in the eight summers since has pushed this dusty
Balkan plot off the map. But a relic of 1990s geopolitics is back in the
headlines.
Caught between a pushy Kremlin, weak-kneed Europe and otherwise-occupied
Washington, the Kosovars are being denied their happy ending. Unless the
U.S. forcefully steps in to usher this province of two million to
independence without any messy compromises, Southeast Europe could fall off
track again, with nasty repercussions for everyone.
The Kosovo matter should've been closed by now. In the spring, U.N. mediator
Martti Ahtisaari proposed internationally "supervised" independence -- the
fervent desire of over nine in 10 Kosovars -- and protections for the
remaining 100,000 or so Serbs. A year plus of diplomatic efforts went for
naught when Russia last month threatened to veto the plan at the Security
Council. The Europeans fast got Washington to sign off on 120 days of
further talks. This empty concession punted the problem into autumn,
encouraging Moscow and its Slavic mini-me cousins in Serbia to dig their
heels in.
The U.S. and its allies have put billions in aid, political capital and
boots on the ground to bring the former Yugoslav states to the doorstep of
the West's elite clubs. Now comes the hitch. When NATO agreed to put its
status in limbo at the end of the 1999 war and sent in a U.N. government, no
one could know that a future President Vladimir Putin would turn Kosovo into
a proxy for his larger fight with the West, along with missile defense and
Iran.
Well-laid plans are in jeopardy. "Further progress depends on status. And if
we don't get the status issue resolved now," says the U.N. administrator in
Kosovo, Joachim Rucker, "there is actually a fair chance that the
achievements we've made will start to unravel." Kosovo's Albanian leaders,
who have popular legitimacy but limited powers, are sitting tight. This
patience may not hold long. Fresh elections are due in November, coinciding
with the end of the latest negotiation period. Pressure is on them to
declare independence unilaterally.
Among the consequences could be that barely dormant ethnic nationalisms
flare up. Kosovo's Serbs may try to cut away the northern sliver of the
province, while Albanians feel emboldened to press anew for a "Greater
Albania" uniting in a single state a nation currently scattered among four.
Violence is a good bet. If it sounds like a recipe for another Cyprus, a
33-year-old frozen conflict to the south, then Moscow envoys have mooted the
island as their model for Kosovo's future. The Balkans would then be harder
to digest for the West. Which, naturally, suits Russia fine.
A different Europe might unite in response to the Kremlin's provocation.
This one is splintering, as in the early 1990s also over the Balkans.
Britain wants to push ahead on independence, while the Germans fear
antagonizing Moscow. In between, the French claimed the diplomatic lead and
pushed the three-month delay. Bernard Kouchner, the French foreign minister
and the U.N.'s first "governor" of Kosovo after the 1999 war, stunned his
hosts during a recent visit here by pointedly refusing to rule out a
partition of Kosovo. Maps showing what an ethnically divided province might
look like have been passed around for years. The Kouchner omission made
people wonder how far the EU is willing to go to get a Security Council
resolution in order to cover up its own divisions -- divisions that
President Putin ably exploits.
Kosovo's Albanian leaders claim to put their faith in America. Prime
Minister Agim Ceku tells me that Washington shares his commitment to
eventual independence ("Serbs in Kosovo, yes," says Mr. Ceku, "Kosovo in
Serbia, never") and no partition of the province. "From my point of view,"
he says, "nothing has been left to negotiate." But this former military man,
who fought for Croatia against the Serbs and then returned home to lead the
Kosovo Liberation Army in 1999, isn't naive enough to think the final
decisions have been made. Or that his little province has great control over
the outcome.
"Russian resistance blocked the process," Mr. Ceku says. "They're just using
Kosovo to prove they are a superpower again." Partition is so sensitive
that, at first, Mr. Ceku refuses to talk about it. Pressed, he says, "If we
start redrawing borders in the Balkans, the big question is where do we
stop? . . . The Europeans have to be more careful."
Kosovo's Albanians aren't the only community held hostage to big power
politics. Over the Iber River, around 50,000 Serbs live in their own limbo.
In the seven years since I last visited the divided city of Mitrovica,
little has changed. Over a bridge from the Albanian quarter, the Serbian
dinar is used instead of the euro and all the cars have Serbian license
plates. Belgrade insists these Kosovars boycott government institutions in
Pristina, and calls all the shots in the U.N. negotiations, with little
input from ethnic kin in Kosovo itself.
Kosovo Serbs are the Palestinians of the Balkans -- useful pawns who could
soon, if Western will flags, get their own Gaza strip. Oliver Ivanovic, a
community leader who right after the war organized special teams to guard
the main bridge linking the town, says no Serb can accept independence for
Kosovo. But tensions are less visible. What happened to the bridge watchers?
"No need anymore." He acknowledges that the promised devolution is a good
deal for the Serbs. "We oppose the Ahtisaari plan, but we're not going to
say it would be worse. If it is implemented, it would be better than it is
now," he says.
Any move to split off the region north of the Iber would be costly for the
Kosovo Serbs, too. Just over half the Serbs live in the Albanian-majority
regions. Without the Ahtisaari protections, another exodus to refugee camps
in Serbia would be likely -- not an image that anyone, save perhaps for
Moscow, should welcome.
Such an ending would be uglier still were Albanian separatists in Macedonia
and Serb separatists in Bosnia -- two of the most uneasy multi-ethnic
constructs in the Balkans -- encouraged to follow Kosovo's lead. Far better,
says analyst Dukaghin Gorani in Pristina, to bury "Greater Albania" and
other nationalist dreams for good and anchor the southern Balkans in the EU.
"Boring Occidental politics" would then take the place of "the old joy of
Balkan politics of ethnic cleansings and murders."
International shuttle diplomacy between Belgrade and Pristina planned for
the coming weeks is pointless. Absent a sudden regime change in Moscow,
America and Europe ought to see the writing on the wall and plan for an
orderly, unilateral Kosovar declaration. Giving up hope of a U.N. blessing
for independence, Mr. Ceku wants to set a date for "a coordinated
declaration with the U.S. and EU, if possible, and key countries in the EU
or" -- now bringing his expectations closer in line with reality -- "a
significant number of countries in the EU." NATO troops and funds must stay,
along with minority protections. Kosovars would, however, be better off with
less "supervision" and greater leeway to, in the words of opposition leader
Hashim Thaci, "build a new state." After all, the stress in
self-determination ought to be on self.
At stake isn't Serbian national sovereignty but liberty for the Kosovars.
This province was part of Yugoslavia, a state that no longer exists; Serbia
effectively lost its claim in the 1990s. The EU plays softly-softly with
Belgrade, even recently restarting talks toward eventual membership.
Instead, Belgrade should be given a stark choice: a future in league with
Russia, or the EU and NATO. Kosovo is the test.
>From the moment Madeleine Albright pushed for military intervention, Kosovo
became an American-led nation-building project. Of the ones currently on the
docket, it ought to be the easiest, too. At the command of 2,500
peacekeeping troops in the southeast, Gen. Douglas Earhart says Kosovo is
"where we'll like to be in Iraq and Afghanistan. " Accepted by both Serbs
and
Albanians, America's advantage is not to be European. "We don't have a
history in the Balkans," he says.
Calm now, Kosovo can blow up unexpectedly. Three years ago in March,
Albanian-led riots left 19 dead and forced hundreds of Serbs to flee. The
job isn't finished. "This is one of the places," says Gen. Earhart, "you
have to see through to the end."
Mr. Kaminski is editorial page editor of The Wall Street Journal Europe.
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Boba Borojevic
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http://serbianna.com/columns/borojevic/
http://f2.pg.briefcase.yahoo.com/pertep
(613) 852-1971
Serbian News Network - SNN
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