The Global Reflexion Foundation contributes, according to its ability, to the distribution of information on international issues that in the media does not recieve proper attention or is presented in a distorted way. We receive information from different sources, that does not necessary reflect our opinion. If you don't want to receive it, please send us an e-mail. ********************************************* Thursday, april 12, 2001 1. Free Milosevic, jail Eagleburger, Zimmermann (etc.)... 2. U.S. troops shot at in Kosovo 3. Crisis builds up in Moslem Croatian federation of Bosnia & Herzegovina 4. Young Albanians forced into prostitution by own men 5. Lukashenko says West to earmark $500 million for his opponents *********************************************** FREE MILOSEVIC, JAIL EAGLEBURGER, ZIMMERMANN (ETC.)... by George Szamuely=20 Quiz time. Who said the following?=20 "Serbia has never had only Serbs living in it. Today, more than in the past, members of other peoples and nationalities also live in it. This is not a disadvantage for Serbia. I am truly convinced that it is its advantage. National composition of almost all countries in the world today=E2=80=A6has also been changing in this direction. Citizens of differen= t nationalities, religions, and races have been living together more and more frequently and more and more successfully."=20 Elie Wiesel? Madeleine Albright? George Soros? Vojislav Kostnica, Zoran Djindjic or one of the other creatures the U.S. installed in power in Belgrade? No, it was Slobodan Milosevic. He spoke these words in Kosovo on June 28, 1989, the very occasion on which he allegedly whipped the Serbs= into=20 a bloodthirsty nationalist frenzy. (1) The real Milosevic has never had the remotest connection with the idiotic cartoonish figure depicted by the U.S. government, the "two op-ed-page articles a year" denizens of the defense-industry-funded think tanks and the ignorant reporters passing for "Balkans experts" on NewsHour with Jim Lehrer.=20 Milosevic was neither a "nationalist," nor a "Communist," nor a "dictator" nor a "demagogue." To be sure, he was never one of those East European Communists-turned-Thatcherite-overnight so beloved by U.S. elites. Nor did it help that he won elections handily, or that in the late 1980s he was leading=20 massive demonstrations against the IMF bromides that were destroying Yugoslavia's industry. The U.S. actually did Yugoslavia a favor by imposing sanctions in 1992. It freed the country=E2=80"all too briefly, as the Serbs = are about to find out=E2=80"from the dreadful ministrations of the IMF. (2) Milosevic did not instigate the wars in the Balkans. On the contrary, his record throughout the decade was that of a man eager for peace. Who was really responsible for the wars? Those who insisted on secession without waiting to settle outstanding issues like final borders, the status of minorities or the disposal of state property and debt? Or those who, in accordance with international law, insisted that secession could only be "legal" if it was accepted by the seceding state and the seceded-from state? (3) There is no question that the US Government will put enormous pressure on the Belgrade authorities to transfer Milosevic to the Hague, where he would receive a ridiculously unfair trial in a "court" which has already pre-judged him guilty of "war crimes," "genocide" and "crimes against humanity". This is=20 the purpose of the the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia: to absolve the real instigators of the wars in the Balkans of any responsibility for their actions.=20 The Balkans today are littered with tiny, weak NATO protectorates whose domestic and foreign policies are shaped down to the last detail by the U.S. and its junior EU partners. This was an entirely foreseen consequence of U.S. policy in Eastern Europe since the end of the Cold War. There is no truth whatsoever to the legend that the United States wanted to keep Yugoslavia together but was thwarted in this noble endeavor by the machinations of the Germans. In February 1990, nearly two years before the villainous German Chancellor Helmut Kohl supposedly muscled in on the Balkans by recognizing Croatia and Slovenia, Deputy Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger was already telling the Slovenians that Washington would accept Slovenia's secession provided it was done "peacefully and democratically." The Slovenians did not need another signal. Even so, in October 1990=E2=80"eight months before Slovenia declared independence, one y= ear before war broke out in=20 Croatia=E2=80"Congress passed an amendment to the Foreign Operations Appropriation law barring any U.S. loans or credits for Yugoslavia unless the assistance was directed to a republic "which has held free and fair elections and which is not engaged in systematic abuse of human rights". This was an=20 extraordinary piece of legislation. According to Washington then, Yugoslavia had ceased to exist. The U.S. government was henceforth to deal with the "republics," entities with no international legal standing whatsoever.=20 In the days leading up to the secession of Croatia and Slovenia, U.S. officials would make pro forma declarations opposing unilateral declarations of independence. Then they would warn the Yugoslav army not to use force to stop the republics breaking away. It was a policy of accepting de facto independence. Moreover, it was revealed in the London Observer last year that, contrary to the publicly proclaimed Western policy of neutrality, the British were in fact secretly selling arms to Slovenia days before its declaration of independence. Since Britain is merely America's errand boy on=20 such matters, one can be fairly certain that this was a Washington-initiated policy.=20 The carnage that was to come in Bosnia was entirely the consequence of a ruthless and cynical U.S. policy. In March 1992, after seeing the bitter fighting that followed the secession of Croatia, the leaders of Bosnia's Serbs, Croats and Muslims sat down in Lisbon and hammered out a partition=20 plan of Bosnia. According to a 1993 New York Times story, European Community "mediators who brokered the agreement argued that partition was the only way to contain the ethnic rivalries. But the Bush Administration was pushing the Europeans to recognize Bosnia as an independent country, with a Muslim-led Government in Sarajevo." When the Bosnian Muslim or--more accurately--Islamist leader, Alija Izetbegovic returned to Sarajevo, U.S. Ambassador Warren Zimmermann called on him. "He said he didn't like it" Mr. Zimmermann recalled. "I told him, if he didn't like it, why sign it?" But after talking to the Ambassador, Mr. Izetbegovic publicly renounced the Lisbon agreement."=20 By April the United States had managed to bully the Europeans into recognizing the state of Bosnia, thereby setting in train the carnage to come. The U.S. subsequently sabotaged the Vance-Owen partition plan as well as the Stoltenberg partition plan. The fighting finally came to an end with a U.S.-sponsored partition plan at Dayton. We got what we were after all along. Bosnia was turned into a colony. (4) *** Further Reading: 1) To read 'What Milosevic Really Said at Kosovo Field in 1989' go to=20 http://emperors-clothes.com/articles/jared/milosaid.html=20 2) The IMF was directly involved in the Yugoslav coup of Oct. 5th. While=20 promising to aid, the IMF in fact presides over the destruction of= economies.=20 See 'The International Monetary Fund And The Yugoslav Elections at=20 http://emperors-clothes.com/analysis/1.htm=20 3) Analyst T.W. Carr has written a most useful account of the Western= assault=20 on Yugoslavia. See 'Germany and the US in the Balkans- a Careful Coincidence= =20 of National Policies?' at=20 http://www.emperors-clothes.com/articles/carr/carr.html=20 4) See Prof. Michel Chossudovsky's "Dismantling Yugoslavia, Colonizing=20 Bosnia" at http://emperors-clothes.com/articles/chuss/dismantl.htm=20 www.tenc.net [Emperor's Clothes] The URL for this article is http://emperors-clothes.com/articles/szamuely/free.htm ********************************************** U.S. TROOPS SHOT AT IN KOSOVO From: Rick Rozoff <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [What a reassuringly bland, vague, non-committal, evasive tone the following report has. Nowhere is it hinted that the snipers could possibly be members of the KLA - I repeat, the KLA - who were armed and trained by U.S. and other NATO military and intelligence personnel since 1995, at the very moment the Dayton Peace Accord was being negotiated. The Western propaganda mills, notwithstanding how thoroughly they've succeeded in misleading and stupefying their respective populaces, would have a difficult time explaining this about face. So the press wire services will simpy allude to certain anonymous malefactors taking shots at the 'peacekeepers.']=20 GUNMEN FIRE ON U.S. FORCES IN KOSOVO by FISNIK ABRASHI, Associated Press Writer PRISTINA, Yugoslavia (AP) -- Gunmen fired on U.S. and Polish peacekeepers in Kosovo as they were patrolling the rugged mountains near the border with Macedonia, a U.S. army spokeswoman said Tuesday. NATO-led peacekeepers returned fire and suffered no injuries in Monday's gunfight, the first since a joint U.S-Russian patrol came under attack in December, said Capt. Alayne Cramer, a spokeswoman for U.S. forces in Kosovo. No suspects were detained. The attack occurred southwest of the Kosovo village of Krivenik, where an Associated Press Television News producer, Kerem Lawton, was killed during a mortar attack March 29. The source of that mortar attack is under investigation.=20 Both ethnic Albanian insurgents and Macedonian government troops fighting each other in the area in March have denied responsibility. Peacekeepers have stepped up patrols in the border area in recent weeks, netting arms caches and discovering what appeared to be a camp used by extremists. Peacekeepers sought to prevent ethnic Albanian guerrillas from using Kosovo as a staging ground to launch attacks in Macedonia, where the insurgents are fighting for more rights.=20 Just nine miles along the border to the north, peacekeepers cordoned off the wreckage of a British helicopter that crashed in heavy rain Monday. Two people died and five others were injured. There was no indication of any hostile fire, said Maj. Fergus Smith, a spokesman for the British contingent serving in Kosovo. Despite the unease along Kosovo's borders, Serbia -- Yugoslavia's larger republic -- is moving ahead on drafting a framework for self-government that should allow elections this year, a senior U.N. official said. The announcement comes just days after Yugoslavia's President Vojislav Kostunica and Kosovo's U.N. Administrator Hans Haekkerup agreed that the Serbs should take part in the working group drafting the self-government framework. Jean-Marie Guehenno, the undersecretary-general for peacekeeping, said the working group has already laid out the skeleton structure of a framework for self-government. Yugoslavia's U.N. ambassador, Dejan Sahovic, also demanded security guarantees for the Kosovo Serb participants and demanded ''guarantees concerning equal participation.'' On Monday, Guehenno told an open U.N. Security Council meeting that ''serious measures to tackle law and order are beginning to bear fruit,'' but that he did not hold out hope for a return of Serbs and allied ethnic minorities before the election. U.N. administrators and NATO-led peacekeepers have been in charge of Kosovo since June 1999 after a 78-day NATO bombing campaign forced Yugoslav troops to withdraw and ended then-Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic's attacks on separatist ethnic Albanians. ******************************************* CRISIS BUILDS UP IN MOSLEM CROATIAN FEDERATION OF BOSNIA & HERZEGOVINA The government of Western Herzegovina, which is a constituent part of the Moslem Croatian Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, warns that it will no longer be able to guarantee security to members of the international community and to federal authorities.=20 The headquarters of an OSCE mission and missions of other international organizations in the province's administrative center, Siroki Breg, have been destroyed, with the personnel evacuated under the protection of KFOR forces.=20 It will be remembered that all federal ministries have been out of operation since March 3, the day Croatian self-government was proclaimed in territories with predominantly Croatian population in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. And the situation becomes increasingly complicated with very passing day.=20 The authorities of Western Herzegovina have formed a staff to address security issues, which will reportedly protect interests of the Croatian people, preventing anti-Croatian acts. This decision in fact withdraws the province from Bosnia and Herzegovina.=20 The federal defense minister, not recognized by the Western Herzegovina authorities, has called on the global community to take urgent measures to end the disorder. The Croatians' discontent wave and their threats to the world community, as well as to the federal government, army and police of Bosnia and Herzegovina extend to other provinces. (Source: Pravda.ru) ******************************************** YOUNG ALBANIANS FORCED INTO PROSTITUTION BY OWN MEN Young Albanians forced into prostitution tell of their sorry plight By Hans-Hagen Bremer Paris - Albanian women told a committee of the Council of Europe meeting in Paris on Monday grim tales of being auctioned off like cattle and of enduring brutal psychological pressure designed break them, to turn them into uncomplaining prostitutes.=20 "They are auctioned off like animals. If they're blonde and pretty, the bids are higher. Then they're trained for their future trade. They're raped, tortured and psychologically broken until they submit. It's a real slave market," said Briseida Mema, describing the techniques Albanian pimps use on women to supply western Europe with prostitutes. Mema belongs to the Independent Forum of Albanian Women.=20 Also invited to the hearing on the burgeoning trade in women and their sexual enslavement were parliamentarians, police specialists and representatives of private aid organisations, including a number from eastern Europe. The camps where the women are inducted into the sex industry also exist in countries of the former Yugoslavia.=20 Calls for classifying trafficking in women as a crime against humanity have been growing stronger recently. According to Socialist MP Lydie Err of Luxembourg, it represents a new type of crime against humanity which remains relatively unpunished. Where charges are filed, he says, they often result in sentences and fines below those imposed on dealers in drugs and arms.=20 Fearing revenge attacks by their tormentors, many women who have escaped from prostitution withdrew their agreement to publicly address the committee. Philippe Boudin, director of the French Committee Against Modern Slavery, puts the number of non-EU women forced into prostitution in the European Union since the collapse of communism in 1989 at 500,000 to 600,000. Every year, another 120,000 or so join their sorry ranks. For the traffickers and pimps, business is booming, says Don Cesare Lodeserto, head of the Regina Pacis womens' shelter in Lecce, Italy. The introduction of the euro has only boosted earnings.=20 Experts at the United Nations put turnover in the global sex-slave trade at seven to 13 billion dollars. The EU declared war on the illegal trade in women back in 1999. Several directives aimed at harmonising and stiffening relevant laws are currently being examined by the council of ministers. As yet, none has been passed into law. So far, only Belgium and Italy have declared the trafficking of women for the prostitution industry as a crime and taken steps to provide help to victims of ruthless gangs of human traffickers. In Belgium, for example, escaped women can assume a new identity if they wish.=20 Part of this problem is that many if not most of the male European MP frequently use prostitutes. Power corrupts in many ways.=20 (Source: Frankfurter Rundschau online. Published: 4-9-2001 Author: Hans-Hagen Bremer) ****************************************** LUKASHENKO SAYS WEST TO EARMARK $500 MILLION FOR HIS OPPONENTS MINSK, Apr 10, 2001 -- (RFE/RL) Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko on 6 April said the West is planning to allot $500 million for candidates who will challenge him in this year's presidential ballot in Belarus, Belapan reported. Lukashenko said he obtained this information from former Russian Prime Minister Yevgenii Primakov. According to Lukashenko, the Belarusian presidential elections will also be crucial for the fate of Russia. "We may not, we don't have the right to lose this [presidential] campaign. If we lose these elections, Russia's days will be counted," he noted. ****************************************** Global Reflexion - Amsterdam - The Netherlands Ph. ++ 31 20 615 1122 - Fax: ++ 31 20 615 1120 RECOMMENDED WEBSITES For news on international affairs (dutch and english) see TARGETS at: http://www.targets.org/ For news and special reports on Cuban affairs (english and spanish) see CUBAN REVIEW at: http://www.globalreflexion.org/cubanrev/ For special reports on the developments concerning Yugoslavia see BELGRADE FORUM (forum for the world of equals) AT http://www.belgrade-forum.org/=20 Critical webside to expose media lies and US-policy=20 see THE EMPEROR'S NEW CLOTHS at: http://emperors-clothes.com/
