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http://www.washingtontimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070808/EDITORIAL/108080015/1013/editorial&template=nextpage
Bracing Kosovo
Janusz Bugajski's fuzzy characterizations of Russia's position on Kosovo "the
Kremlin can claim," "Russia is posing," "Moscow is posturing" mask the fact
that, on this issue, the Russians hold the high ground in defense of the
accepted principles of national sovereignty and territorial integrity ("Kosovo
as part of Russia's design," Commentary, Friday).
Nothing in the rules of the international system to which all member states
have committed themselves under the United Nations Charter allows the ripping
away of any country's territory without its consent.
As someone with a long history of anti-Communist activism and service in both
the executive and legislative branches, I think it's a sad day when an accusing
finger accurately can be pointed at the United States for trying to violate one
of the most fundamental obligations of a responsible national government.
Rather than speculate about how Russia might view its policy on Kosovo as an
occasion to flex its muscles, Mr. Bugajski might better ask why America should
force a confrontation with Moscow and throw our European allies into an
impossible quandary to achieve an objective that is not in the interest of the
United States in the first place.
An independent Kosovo hardly would be a positive model for Muslims in the
former Soviet Union, as Mr. Bugajski suggests. It would be a disaster for human
rights and religious freedom. Two-thirds of the Serbian Christians already have
been terrorized from the province, and the rest are in peril. There is a
nonviable economy whose only functional sectors are international largesse and
organized crime (drugs, slaves, weapons); and independence would be a stimulus
for renewed irredentist violence in nearby areas.
Perhaps worst of all, imposed excision of Kosovo from Serbia would show every
separatist minority in the world that it only needs to be sufficiently violent,
intolerant and intransigent, and it, too, can get its own state. If only the
Russians are concerned about this kind of "model," we're in bigger trouble than
I thought.
Rather than seeing Moscow's objections to the forced and illegal partition of
Serbia as an obstacle to be overcome by resorting to an end-run of the UN
Security Council, as Mr. Bugajski advises, Washington should welcome the
current impasse as an occasion to re-examine the faulty assumptions that have
brought us to this point. A just and sustainable Kosovo solution should be
based on respect for legal norms and compromise between the parties.
JAMES GEORGE JATRAS
Director
American Council for Kosovo
Washington
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