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Letters to the Editor for Friday
February 22, 2008
A ‘Greater Albania’
The comments made by Col. Richard Hayes (“U.S.
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forces getting set for events in Kosovo,” article, Feb. 14), recalling one
incident of youths throwing Molotov cocktails at a Serbian church as a case
of either ethnic violence or “kids just being stupid … We’ve had a couple of
instances like that” can only be described as insensitive and offensive.
His words are indicative of either gross ignorance of the true situation in
Kosovo or his unwillingness to speak out against the failed policies put in
place by the Clinton administration and being perpetuated by the Bush
administration.
In a Washington Times interview with Bishop Artemije of Kosovo, the bishop
stated that more than 200,000 Kosovo Serbs — two-thirds of his flock — had
been forced to flee the province since the war because of ethnic and
religious intimidation and violence. Under KFOR (Kosovo Forces), more than
200 Christian churches and monasteries have been destroyed, and the
remaining Orthodox Serbs live in small, often isolated, ghetto pockets
surrounded by hostile Muslim neighbors.
The question that should seriously be asked is, if the Serbs ethnically
cleansed Kosovo Albanians as has been claimed, then why are the Kosovo
Albanians over 90 percent of the population, and the Serbs, who were once
the majority in their Jerusalem, fewer than 10 percent?
Consider the fact that Kosovo Albanians became the majority by crossing
illegally from Albania into Christian Kosovo. Kosovo Albanians already have
a country, and that country is Albania. With independence, they have created
a Greater Albania.
As for Hayes’ comment, “We don’t expect it to get crazy, though,” I am
troubled when the deputy commander of Task Force Falcon, the U.S. contingent
in the 15,000-strong Kosovo Force, can’t tell the difference between ongoing
terrorism and “kids being stupid.”
Stella L. Jatras
Camp Hill, PA
U.S. forces getting set for events in Kosovo
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