Interview with Krsljanin: ‘Serbia is an occupied country’

Published Oct 17, 2010 10:26 PM 

On Oct. 5, 2000, a coup engineered by U.S. imperialist agencies and supported 
by Western European imperialist governments overthrew the Socialist Party 
government in Yugoslavia led by Slobodan Milosevic. At the time — only 16 
months after a vicious 79-day U.S.-led NATO air war against the people of 
Yugoslavia — there was much confusion even among progressive and anti-war 
forces in the imperialist countries due to the overwhelming anti-Milosevic 
propaganda in the corporate media. The following interview by Cathrin Schütz 
with former Milosevic aide Vladimir Krsljanin throws light on those events and 
the developments in Serbia in the last 10 years.

Ten years ago, on Oct. 5, Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic was overthrown. 
What is hidden behind this “democratic revolution for freedom” celebrated by 
the Western media and politicians?

For 10 years Serbia had successfully resisted the war against Yugoslavia, which 
began in the early 1990s. After NATO’s war of aggression against our country 
ended in 1999 without a clear victory, London and Washington carried out a vast 
special operation to overthrow Milosevic; it was the mother of all subsequent 
“color revolutions.”

Through a presidential decree, Bill Clinton gave the CIA carte blanche to carry 
out a coup in Yugoslavia. Enormous sums were invested in political parties, 
NGOs [non-governmental organizations] and media. The fragmented opposition [to 
Milosevic and the Socialist Party of Serbia] was unified under foreign 
guidance. A coalition of 18 parties under the umbrella called the “Democratic 
opposition,” or DOS, formed with one goal: overthrow Milosevic.

William Montgomery, the person later named as U.S. ambassador to Belgrade, set 
up a specially equipped office in Budapest [in neighboring Hungary]. Opposition 
activists attended courses that were run by CIA agents. The so-called student 
group known as “Otpor” (Resistance) used the slogan “Gotov je” (He is finished) 
to conduct the election — this was all a project of Western intelligence 
agencies.

How did the overthrow take place?

In the Yugoslav presidential election on Sept. 24 the incumbent Milosevic 
obtained 15 percent fewer votes than Western-backed candidate Vojislav 
Kostunica. However, since neither of these two leading candidates won an 
absolute majority, it should have come to a run-off ballot. The DOS parties 
claimed that Milosevic had falsified the elections and Kostunica was victorious 
in the first round of voting. Otpor led violent street protests.

DOS wanted to prevent the runoff, although they would have won for sure. 
Milosevic refused to accept a resignation without a second round of voting.

At the height of the dispute, the Supreme Court issued a strange decision: 
Because of rumors of irregularities in the first ballot, all votes from the 
southern Serbian province of Kosovo were simply canceled. Of course, the vote 
in those districts would have to be repeated.

With Kosovo’s votes cancelled, Kostunica’s vote share increased to more than 50 
percent. Milosevic acknowledged the decision and on Oct. 5 congratulated 
Kostunica’s victory. This step, which had barely been reported, was buried in 
what was a media-constructed “popular uprising.” As Otpor set the Parliament on 
fire, the Kostunica forces immediately and completely seized the government 
apparatus. With this coup they avoided a controlled handover of power.

It was thus not simply an electoral victory for the opposition?

The years-long image of Milosevic as a “dictator” in the Western media would 
have appeared absurd if he were simply removed by a Democratic vote. The West 
didn’t want to risk this loss of credibility. Mainly though, the “revolution” 
needed to be carried out violently to shorten the time until the new regime 
could allow far-reaching Western interventions in the state and economy, thus 
making the transformation irreversible.

After Oct. 5, government offices and businesses were occupied by so-called 
crisis units, and those previously in charge were dismissed. After a few months 
40,000 officials had been illegally removed from office. Today’s economy 
minister, Mladjan Dinkic, began his illustrious career by using machine guns to 
take over the National Bank.

Dinkic’s party, G17 Plus, was originally set up as an NGO by the West. Despite 
its marginal election results, for the last 10 years it has controlled public 
finances under successive governments. Dinkic’s first act as a national bank 
director was to dissolve the four largest Serbian banks at the behest of the 
International Monetary Fund — with the result that the Serbian banking system 
is now in foreign hands, and every year 6 billion euros flow out of the 
country. I remember Milosevic’s words before the election: “They are not 
targeting Serbia to grab Milosevic, but Milosevic to grab Serbia.”

But beyond the Western propaganda, there was in reality a great discontent 
among the population [in 2000]. ... Under the guidance of and in close 
collaboration with their foreign sponsors, the opposition understood how to 
blame on Milosevic the suffering caused by Western sanctions and NATO’s war and 
how to make big promises should they win the elections.

The bombs had destroyed the economy and infrastructure, which aggravated the 
social discontent. When the government used up the remaining government funds 
for repairing the main road and rail links, the voters felt even more pain and 
were susceptible to opposition propaganda that claimed voting out Milosevic 
would stop the foreign pressure and increase the standard of living. It is in 
this sense that one should understand White House spokesperson Ari Fleischer’s 
comments that the war was part of the “regime change” strategy of NATO and the 
United States, because it weakened Milosevic and led to his fall.

Why did the leading Western countries carry out such an aggressive intervention 
policy in Yugoslavia and Serbia?

Since the early 1990s there have been not many different wars in Yugoslavia — 
in Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Kosovo — it was all one war: that of the West 
against Yugoslavia. In this statement I fully agree with Milosevic. Former U.S. 
President George Bush Sr., while speaking during the celebration of German 
reunification, discussed the elimination of the consequences of the Versailles 
Treaty in Europe. A key point regarding Versailles at the beginning of the 20th 
century was to weaken Germany in favor of the Eastern European countries, which 
Germany had considered as satellites within the “Central Europe” doctrine.

Thus, those in Versailles for the first time recognized Yugoslavia as a state. 
Until Yugoslavia’s breakup, Catholic and Muslim groups in Yugoslavia were used 
by Western powers to counteract Russian influence, which was based on 
historical closeness with Serbs. In the 1990s, however, a resurgent Germany’s 
role was to serve as a NATO member to weaken Russia and Eastern Europe, which 
was to be transformed into a “Euro-Atlantic region” — but of course only as a 
colony. In line with the long-cherished desire of the British, Serbia 
especially should be weakened as a potential ally of Russia.

With Milosevic it could never happen. Kosovo is now home to Camp Bondsteel, the 
largest U.S. military base in Europe, in the area of the proposed major oil and 
gas pipelines from the Caspian Sea.

Did Milosevic’s fall pay off for Serbia’s population?

Immediately after Oct. 5, 2000, the Milosevic-SPS dominated Serbian Parliament 
was rendered powerless through the formation of a transitional government. 
Early parliamentary elections were held. DOS won a two-thirds majority and 
named Zoran Djindjic, the number one favorite of the West, as prime minister, 
the most powerful office of Yugoslav politics. Thus, the coup was completed.

Serbia is now an occupied country. Foreign “advisers” are sitting in 
government, army, police and secret service. The economy is flattened; the 
banking system in foreign hands. Privatization and sale of large companies 
bring poverty and hunger to Serbia. The army consists of only four brigades; 
the media have been silenced, the politicians corrupted. Montenegro has 
separated and Kosovo has declared its independence.

And while before Oct. 5, 2000, the Belgrade District Court tried in absentia 
and convicted the NATO leaders of war crimes, sentencing them to 20 years in 
prison, the sentence was repealed shortly after the coup. The head of the 
government TV station was found responsible for the death of his staff — those 
who died from NATO bombs. Afterwards Milosevic and several high-ranking state 
officials and generals were delivered to the NATO Inquisition in The Hague, in 
violation of the Constitution.

Thus nothing has improved. On the contrary, our remote-controlled president and 
the choir of the bought politicians and “experts” talk about great victories on 
the road to joining the European Union. But it seems obvious that this way is 
not the right way.

Published Oct. 6 in the German daily newspaper Junge Welt. Translated by 
Workers World managing editor John Catalinotto.

  _____  

Articles copyright 1995-2010 Workers World. Verbatim copying and distribution 
of this entire article is permitted in any medium without royalty provided this 
notice is preserved. 

Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011
Email: w...@workers.org
Subscribe wwnews-subscr...@workersworld.net
Support independent news DONATE <http://www.workers.org/donate/> 

 

http://www.workers.org/2010/world/serbia_1021/

_______________________________________________
News mailing list
News@antic.org
http://lists.antic.org/mailman/listinfo/news

Reply via email to