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PRESS
RELEASE
Serbian Unity
Congress
2311 M Street,
Suite 402
Washington, DC
20037
Contact: Mirjana Samardzija
202-463-8643
Radmilo Bozinovic,
650-307-2354
STATEMENT
REGARDING SITUATION IN KOSOVO & METOHIJA
On the occasion of the
rapidly deteriorating situation in the UN-administered Serbian province of
Kosovo-Metohija, the Serbian Unity Congress feels obligated to state the
following.
The rampant violence and destruction that has engulfed the
province is not, as suggested in some quarters, a generic escalation of
"interethnic strife" or some spontaneous reaction of an embittered community -
rather, it represents racially motivated, organized terrorist activity, plainly
aimed at eradicating the physical and cultural presence of the Serbian ethnic
community. In the clear words of UNMIK's own officials:
"This is planned,
coordinated, one-way violence from the Albanians against the Serbs. It is
spreading and has been brewing for the past week [...] Wherever there is a
Serbian population there is Albanian action against
them".
The most current events are
not a departure from the norm but only an escalation of the violent treatment of
the Kosovo Serb as well as its Roma and other Christian Albanian minorities by
the Muslim Kosovo Albanian majority population. Of 200,000 minority Kosovo
citizens that were expelled by the Kosovo Albanians after the NATO bombing of
Serbia in 1999, only a few thousand have been allowed to return.
Harassments, killings and other forms of attacks are commonplace and the
protection of the international forces mandatory for the simple everyday
routines of going to school, work or family visits. Over 100 churches have been
bombed, burnt or otherwise destroyed. Remaining monasteries must have
around the clock international military protection with clergy receiving
ceaseless threats to their lives. For its minorities to live in
Kosovo has meant to live in a state of terror in spite of the international
presence.
These basic violations of
human rights of Kosovo citizens by an emboldened terrorist element of the Kosovo
Albanian population have been made possible by the lack of resolve by the
international community to enforce protection of human rights of all Kosovo
citizens and its failure to hold the Albanian leadership accountable for its
role in inciting these violations and/or its failure to exercise its leadership
in putting a stop to such violations.
Kosovo Albanians and their
lobby in Washington DC have actively courted Congress to gather support for an
independent Kosovo claiming tolerance and progress toward an multiethnic and
democratic state. Today’s events present a reality that is undeniably in
direct conflict with this image.
Furthermore, Kosovo today
is the center of Europe’s worst criminal activities – drug, arms and human
trafficking with the Kosovo Albanian mafia at the very heart of it. The
United States led the NATO bombing in 1999 to insure the protection of human
rights and thousands of our forces remain there in an earlier case of nation
building. What are our tax dollars paying for?
Just a day after the
Council of Europe debated the state of human rights in Kosovo, where it heard
the alarming testimony of the Kosovo Ombudsman about it being "clearly very far
from the minimum of international standards", the situation took a radical turn
for the worse.
At the same time that UNMIK administrators and Kosovo
Albanian political leaders project a picture of rising multiethnic tolerance,
refugee return and respect for law, extremist-led Albanian mobs are
systematically destroying, with total impunity, hundreds of returnee homes
funded by millions from international agency donations. [in Belo Polje, Lipljan,
Caglavica, Kosovo Polje and many other Serb enclaves].
At a time when the
world marvels at the wonders of Byzantine art (including many exhibits from
Kosovo) at the Metropolitan Musem of Art in New York, other priceless treasures
of that same civilization are being systematically razed to the ground,
including such cultural gems as the churhes of Our Lady of Ljevis, Saint
Archangels and Christ the Saviour in Western Kosovo (Metohija). While Al
Queda targets the Western world with its own religious zeal, the destruction in
Kosovo targets the Christian population and Christian edifices.
All of the above
severely violates the core values that Americans stand for and civilized people
of the world respect, and threaten to negate all efforts of the international
community over the years to restore normalcy in the province.
The “peace” in Kosovo is
unraveling. Policies to date have clearly failed and have emboldened the Kosovo
Albanian terrorists to operate with impunity. The currently stationed 17,500
NATO troops are not adequate to stop the violence. The US is sending an
additional 150 troops while Britain is sending an additional 500. Kosovo is
blowing up while we sleep.
We therefore call on the
United Nations as the administrator of the Province, and the United States
government as a key political factor in this context, to do whatever is
necessary to achieve the following:
- Stop
the bloodshed - take immediate and
resolute action to confront, contain and neutralize armed Albanian extremism
and implement robust security measures that will afford effective protection
to the Serbian and other non-Albanian communities.
- Reverse
damage - devise a plan to
quickly and efficaciously restore destroyed property and reestablish faith in
the crucial process of refugee (IDP) return
- Impose
accountability – hold the Kosovo
Albanian leadership accountable for tolerating, excusing and inciting
violation of the human rights of the Serbian and other
minorities
- Administer
justice - aggressively prosecute
perpetrators of this outrage, as well as the hundreds of other ethnically
motivated crimes during UN administration of the province.
It is time to
objectively review the situation in Kosovo. The situation warrants
Congressional hearings on the subject in relevant committees of both the House
and the Senate. We urge the US Congress to convene such proceedings as
soon as possible,
-- END
