The Balkan Branches of the Terror Network
By Dr. Nikolaos A. Stavrou
Special to the National Herald
In the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attack on America numerous
incidents of alleged in "ethnic profiling" and intense scrutiny of "Middle
East-looking persons" have been reported published. They should not be a
surprise to anyone, given the fact that the 19 terrorists who cause havoc in
the lives of thousands fit a particular ethnic mold. However, Bin Laden's
terror network has Balkan branches that could render ethnic profiling
irrelevant. Evidence in the public domain suggests that his organization
appeared in the Balkans as early as 1993 in search of blond Moslems.
Warnings about the appearance of a fundamentalist strain of Islam this
volatile region went unheaded by Bill Clinton's simplistic policy of "one
victim one aggressor." Prominent U.S. legislators, among them Senators Larry E. Craig
and James M. Inhofe, repeatedly warned about the existence of Bin Laden operatives in
Bosnia and Kosovo. Moreover, major news organizations (among them the Los Angeles
Times, Corriere Della Serra of Milan and New York Times) reported on the influx of
Iranian arms, Bin Laden operatives and assorted terrorists in Albania, Bosnia and
Kosovo. Concerns about the implications over this brand of Islam for European security
were also expressed by Archbishop Anastasios of Albania in April 1994 to no avail. "I
ring the bell of alarm; religious fundamentalism has made its appearance in Albania,"
said his Eminence. In the aftermath of Sept. 11, Bosnia and Kosovo should acquire new
relevance; they are reminders of well-intentioned schemes that produce monsters in
Afghanistan and gangsters in the Balkans.
Saudi and Egyptian " Islamic clergymen" appeared in Albania in 1993 at the
invitation of then President Sali Berisha. They broke along thousands of
Korans printed in Arabic, even though few Albanians could read them.
Berisha, who had a keen nose for Arab money, seemed eager to please the
Islamic missionaries and shared their zeal in Islamizing his multi-religious
country. He introduced a thought in Parliament that required ahead of the
autocephalous Orthodox Church of Albania to be an " Albanian citizen for 20 years,"
but the hordes Islamic clergymen of dubious religiosity were exempted for this law
under the pretext of " separation of church and state"! Under pretenses of
philanthropy, Saudi and Egyptian clerics were granted permission to manage orphanages
that were literally the left "orphan" when the communist regime collapsed. Like
Pakistan, orphanages become ideal recruitment fronts. So for the public debate about a
proper response against the perpetrators of the Sept. 11 tragedy has hardly focused on
the Balkan version of fundamentalism or Bin Laden's role fostering it. However,
European news organizations have been more attentive to this branch than their U.S.
counterparts.
Six years ago ANTENNA TV (Athens) aired a series of documentaries that
confirmed the appearance of fundamentalism in the region and at least two
visits by Bin Laden to Tirana. This series were augmented and we re-aired in
the week of Sept. 17. The ANTENNA revelations or hardly news; they reported ignored
facts.
In 1997 Yossef Bodansky (author of Osama Bin Laden: The Man Who Declared War on
America) had documented the presence of fundamentalists in the Bosnian military and
their links to the Albanian mafia that bankrolled the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA).
The latter is an organization that Robert Gelbard (Clinton's Balkan envoy) called "
terrorists" in February 1998 and the President declared "allies" only a few months
later. Ironically, the architects of the Balkan wars still don't get it; they persist
in touting our
Balkan follies as" successes" when debacle would have been a better term.
Richard Holbrooke and Wesley Clark, if in pious pontifications via CNN,
interpret their Balkan wars as evidence of U.S. willingness to defend Muslim
" victims." Predictably, Bush spokesman also point to the Balkans as evidence of
Western benevolence toward Islam. But the unintended consequences of U.S. policies
conceived in a historical vacuum are obvious in the Balkans as they were in
Afghanistan. In the Balkans these policies made gangsters and terrorists our
bedfellows and in Afghanistan paved the way for misogynists to parade as government.
Under the Albright-Clark-Holbrook watch thousands of Mujahedeens flocked to the
Balkans in support of Alija Izetbegovic's dream of a "fundamentalist Islamic
Republic." At the same time, half a millions a dollars worth of Iranian arms entered
Bosnia through Croatian ports even though a U.N. weapons embargo was in effect,
supposedly enforced by the Sixth Fleet. Warnings by the US Senate Republican Policy
Committee and Senator Craig that "Iranian arms transfer and would help turn the
Bosnian military into a militant Islamic base" went unheeded. Indeed an unknown number
of "Afghan Islamic Fighters" joined the Bosnian military and many would eventually
blend into the Bosnian society under NATO's nose. In due course, they could provide
blond looking recruits and sleeper agents. In a brazen display of things to come,
Mujahedeens with local wives have even attempted to create a version of a
mini-theocracy in Bosnia. At the outskirts of Bocinja Donja a sign warns all infidels
to be "afraid of Allah." In pre-war times this village was Serbian-inhabited, but its
new owners prudently cleansed it of its rightful owners, according to the Toronto
based Center for Peace in the Balkans.
In the threat from the Balkan branches of Bin Laden's sinister enterprise
have been exacerbated by the casual granting a Bosnian passports to
"Mujahedeen Fighters" and the theft of Albanian passports during the 1997
pyramid-caused meltdown of the Berisha regime. The evidence is disturbing.
On 24 September 1999, the Bosnian Muslim weekly Dani reported that Bin
Laden, himself was issued a Bosnian passport in Vienna in 1993. This
publication also revealed that the Bosnian Foreign Ministry was "seized by
panic" when a Bosnian passport surfaced in the hands of Meherez Aodouni, and Arab
terrorist arrested in Istanbul. Aodouni had obtained Bosnian citizenship and a
passport "because he was a member of the Bosnia-Herzegovina army", the ministry
explained.
But the question is how many more "members of the Bosnian army" crisscross the world
with similar documents. Further south, Albanian authorities have yet to account for
100,000 blank passports that vanished, along with thousands of weapons, in the 1997
implosion of the country.
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