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Selection on comprehensive articles and backgrounds on the
conflict in Kosov@
- UNIVERSITY OF PRISHTINA STUDENTS INDEPENDENT UNION
- Tel&Fax: ++381 38 33 843 or ++381 38 35 109
- e-mail: upsup@albanian.com
Prishtina, 21.10.1997
Dear Sir,
We feel free to inform You that the Students Independent Union of the Albanian
University of Prishtina, again on 30 December 1997 is going to organize peaceful,
non-violent, students' protests with the intention to release with no conditions premises
and university room-space for delivering instructions in the Albanian language, as they
have been occupied by Serbian regime since 1991. As you already know, Students Independent
Union on 29 October 1997 organized peaceful students' protests and without any provocation
by students, Serbian police attacked with no prior warning in the most brutal way to
disperse the quiet protests during which the participators were arrested and injured.
As You may know, in 1991, about 1,000 Albanian professors and assistants and 200
administrative workers, adding to them more than 27,000 Albanian students, were expelled
by Serbian police forces from their university buildings, after 21 years of successful
work of the University, only due to the fact that they were Albanians and studied in their
mother tongue - Albanian. However, the students and teachers, aided by the Albanian
population, have resisted this occupation and violence by continuing their classes in
extremely difficult conditions in private houses. This is the seventh academic year that
the University of Prishtina has worked outside is official buildings. Therefore, the
protests have the intention to have the official buildings released, as they are the
property of the University. The peaceful protests will be organized and kept under full
control by the Students Union, which is a non-political organization and the sole students
organization at the University of Prishtina. The Students Union has made the required
preparations for the protests. It will not allow involving of some political force or
tendency in the protests with any requests that are outside of our own ones. The Students
Union is determined to avoid the use of force, causing of conflict or any physical excess.
Accordingly, we ask You, dear Sir, to send some representatives of Yours to observe our
peaceful protests, so that they may inform You appropriately about our noble intention, to
protect and to realize peacefully our fundamental human and national rights for studying
freely in our mother tongue, that is guaranteed by international covenants. We shall do
our utmost to take care of your representatives in these conditions. We feel free to ask
You to forward this information to the ones You find it convenient to make their
contribution to this action of ours.
Your observation on our peaceful protests would contribute much to avoid any escalation
for the situation otherwise tense in Kosova.
Extending my great thanks to You in advance for Your understanding, I remain.
Sincerely Yours,
President
Bujar Dugolli
- SIUUP - STUDENTS INDEPENDENT UNION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF PRISHTINA
- e-mail: upsup@albanian.com
- Tel&Fax: ++381 38 33 843 or ++381 38 35 109
- Students' Protests in Kosova: http://www.alb-net.com
- * >> Live photoes from protests of 29-th: www.dardania.com
- message picked up from SAGEnet, reposted by pnbalkans@igc.apc.org
- (Peacenet Ballkans Desk)
26 December 1997
PRISTINA, Yugoslavia (AP) Assailants hurled hand grenades and shot at Serbian police
Thursday in Serbia's restive Kosovo province, and thousands of ethnic Albanian students
held protest marches.
No one was injured in two separate attacks Thursday afternoon reported by state-run
radio. First, a police car was fired upon near the town of Podujevo, 18 miles north of the
province's capital of Pristina. Shortly afterward, two hand grenades exploded near the
police station there.
Meanwhile, 10,000 ethnic Albanians marched in Pristina for the second evening in a row
Thursday, demanding the right to study in Albanian-language universities that have been
banned by the Serbian government.
As on Wednesday, the student marches were mostly peaceful. The powerful Serbian police
forces stood by, but tried to interfere by allowing traffic in the pedestrian area where
the marches are being held.
The ethnic Albanian media reported that several ethnic Albanian students were beaten in
Pristina after Wednesday's march.
Serbia rules its southern province of Kosovo with heavy military and police power. More
than 90 percent of the population is made up of ethnic Albanians who do not recognize
Serbian institutions and want to see Kosovo gain independence.
Kosovo has simmered with violence since 1989, when then-Serbian President Slobodan
Milosevic abolished its broad autonomy. But fears of larger conflicts have increased in
the past 18 months after a wave of terrorist attacks killed more than 20 people.
Interview with Albin Kurti, a leader of the Students Independent Union in Pristina,
Kosova (in former Yugoslavia). The interview was conducted by David Hartsough, Director of
Peaceworkers in San Francisco while he was visiting Kosova in mid October.
Q. Tell me who you are and what position you play in the student movement and what you
do.
1. I am Albin Kurti, and I am 22. I am a student in the faculty of Electrotechnics, in
the branch: Telecommunications and computer science. Since June of this year I'm a member
of the presidency of Students' Independent Union of the University of Prishtina (SIU UP),
and now during the preparations and during the protests I am the spokesman (for public
relations) for our students' organization and for Organization Council too, where I am a
member together with 4 other students.
Q. Please give me a little background about what is happening here in Kosova with the
schools and the university.
2. In the year 1989, two years after Milosevic became the president of Serbia, he
abolished Kosova's autonomy. In that year and also in 1990, all around Kosova there were a
lot of demonstrations against the Serbian regime, which was also firing the workers from
their factories, doctors and nurses from hospitals, and forcing Albanian young people to
go in the Serbian army which was fighting in the war in Croatia. In 1991 about 27,000
students, 1,000 professors and 200 administrative workers were expelled from University
buildings in Pristina. So in that year the University, all the high schools and even some
of the primary schools were closed to all Albanians, and they are still closed for us. In
those buildings now only Serbian pupils and students are learning and studying, even
though Serbians here are less than 10% and Albanians are 90% of the population in Kosova.
Since the year 1991 the activities of our University and also all the high schools and
some of the elementary (primary) schools, are continuing in private houses in very bad
conditions. Now we have about 23,000 students in our University and they are in 14
faculties and 7 high schools (two year colleges) which are in Prishtina and also in six
other towns of Kosova. During these six years Albanian pupils and students have lived
under terror and repression, and a lot of times they have been beaten, arrested or killed
by Serbian police without any cause. Now we can't wait any longer and be patient because
this kind of situation is unacceptable.
Q. What are the goals of the student movement?
3. On August 10 of this year we began the initiative to organize peaceful protests with
only one demand: freeing of our university buildings and premises. After a lot of working
with students and meetings with different political parties, non-governmental
organizations, and important personalities and hearing their suggestions, we decided that
we should constitute an Organization Council for protests only on the level of our
University. That council has 9 members (5 students + 4 professors). We also constituted
organization sub-councils on the level of the faculties and high schools, and each of them
has 5 members (3 students + 2 professors). Also we have commissions for technical problems
(slogans, posters etc.), for information service, our own monitoring people who are also
students, and also we have commissions for medical help (first aid etc.) which is
constituted from students and professors of the Medical faculty. So we are now very
strongly decided not only for peaceful, nonviolent protests but also that these protests
are only students and faculty of the university. On September 15 we made our platform for
the protests and now we also have our own 11 main principles and rules for students who
will participate in peaceful, nonviolent, students' protests. I'm going to repeat once
more that our only demand is: freeing of our university buildings. We consider that this
is only a technical problem, so our demand as our students' organization is nonpolitical.
Q. What are you doing to achieve your goals?
4. We are doing a lot of preparing to maintain a high level of organization so we can
make and control all the time our protests. In this way we became a real students'
movement, with a great hope that with a lot of peaceful, nonviolent students' protests, we
can organize great pressure on the Serbian regime, and in that way, get back in our
university buildings.
Q. Tell me about your demonstration Oct.1. What happened?
5. Without taking into account the suggestions and warnings of foreign high diplomats
that we should postpone the protests until October, 15 we decided that we would begin our
demonstrtions on October 1 as we had planned because by the Law of our University, October
1 is the day when the academic year begins. On October 1 we organized peaceful, nonviolent
protests in Prishtina and also in 6 other towns: Mitrovica, Peja, Gjakova, Prizren,
Ferizaj and Gjilan. We planned to hold a march in which students and professors of our
University would be dressed in white shirts, and all of them were wearing badges on which
was the emblem of the University of Prishtina and the name of the faculty to which student
belonged. Albanian people were supporting us by staying on the sidewalks along the planned
route of our march and being all the time quite and silent. Students were holding up in
the air banners with the approved slogans including "PeacefulFreeing of University
Buildings and Premises, Hello Europe, Where Are You?, and Breath as we do! Students".
There was no shouting, yelling or whistling from our side. After we marched about 300
meters from the place that we gathered, a large police force blocked the road. We were
standing there about one hour and then a police tank started to move forward with the
appaarent intention to drive over us because we were about only 3 or 4 meters away from
the tank and from the cordon of the police forces. As we planned ahead of time, all the
students and professors sat down on the road as an act of nonviolent resistance. We the
Organization Council and also the Rector of our University Professor Dr. Ejup Statovci who
is also a member of the Organization Council, were on the first line of the march and we
were sitting for only few seconds and then, were beaten and arrested. Also I want to add
that the police attacked us without giving us any kind of prior warning or ultimatum. They
took us to the police station, beat us again and we were interrogated for about two hours.
Afterward they freed us, but they dispersed the other students, using police clubs, tear
gas, and a lot of brutal violence. There was no provocation from our side. That day in
Kosova were more than 500 people were injured, mostly students.
Q. Tell me about your commitment to active nonviolence and nonviolent discipline. How
did you come to that commitment?
6. In our protests we have been nonviolent, even when the police attacked us. Also we
had our monitoring people with red ribbons on their arms, and people whose duty was to
observe the situation and they were wearing blue ribbons. They have done an excellent job.
All the students and professors are respecting the decisions of the Organization Council
and the monitoring people. Also the nonviolent guidelines are very helpful.
Q. How are students and others here in Kosova feeling about the student movement so
far?
7. The students are feeling strong and committed to the nonviolent way to achieve our
demands. We also have a great sympathy from our people here and from the international
public opinion.
Q. What are your movement's plans for the future?
8. We will continue with our peaceful, nonviolent, students' protests, untilwe achieve
our goals.
Q. What message would you like to share with people in the international community
about the situation here and about your movement?
9. Our message is that we believe that nonviolent protests and nonviolent movements are
the greatest invention of this century, and that we hope our protest will be supported by
the international community.
Q. What kind of support can people in other parts of the world give to the student
nonviolent movement here?
10. The best thing would be if different organizations, universitites, and associations
would send their representatives to visit us in Kosova. In that way they can see with
their own eyes our commitment to nonviolence and our demand for respect for our basic
human rights. In addition, it would be good if all the people who want to help us could
help educate others in their countries about our situation and our nonviolent movement.
They can send us letters of support, organize teach ins, seminars, and meetings about
Kosova's problem and our protests. Also there are many ways they can show solidarity with
us without coming in Kosova like for example: sending letters to different government
officials in their countries requesting that they support us.
Q. Are you interested in students and others from other countries coming to support
your movement?
11. During the preparations for the last protest on October 29, we met with a lot of
students' organizations and we received a lot of support letters from them. Some students,
for example in Austria, organized protests in their countries to show solidarity with us.
If others around the world show their support for us, it will be better for us.
Q. What kind of things can people who come here to support do?
12. They can meet both with student leaders and with ordinary students, talk with them
and we can organize meetings and seminars with them. Also they can inform themselves about
our situation and make pressure on the regime which is applying police repression against
us.
Q. How did you keep such strong nonviolent spirit and discipline in youraction?
13. We are keeping a strong nonviolent spirit and discipline because we are spending a
lot of time on preparations, we have a high level of organization, we are commited to
nonviolence and we respect our nonviolent guidelines, we organize a lot of gatherings and
meetings with students.
Q. What has motivated you personally to get involved in this movement and tell me more
about your interest in nonviolence.
14. Resisting oppression without fighting back, gathering all the people and creating a
sense of community which is built in peace, and also maintaining nonviolence even in the
face of police violence are some of the elements which attracted me to think that with the
use of nonviolence, we can achieve a lot. Recently thanks to our friend, David Hartsough
from the US, we gathered a lot of books about nonviolence and some videos with which we
are starting a nonviolence library which will be available for all students.
Q. Anything else you would like to say?
15. It is important to create a mechanism which will maintain nonviolent resistance and
in that way create the rythm for organizing nonviolent protests until the university is
open for all students. This is the main purpose of our nonviolent movement.
Q. Why did you and the other students decide on nonviolent action as a means to reopen
the university to all students?
16. We, Albanian students are not asking that when we get back to our university
buildings, the Serbian students should leave. On the contrary, we are requesting that this
basic human right of education which is guaranteed with international acts and
conventions, be respected for all the people and nationalities in Kosova. Between war and
giving up is a great space with a large number of possibilities of how to win, and the
biggest one is building a nonviolent, peaceful movement. For more information, see our web
site Students' Protests in Kosova: http://www.alb-net.com. Live photoes from protests of
October 29 are on: www.dardania.com. Letters of support to the students in Kosova can be
sent to: upsup@albanian.com and letters of protest can be sent to President Slobodan
Milosevic at Tolstoyeva 33, 11,000 Belgrade, Yugoslavia.
UNIVERSITY OF PRISHTINA, STUDENTS INDEPENDENT UNION
Prishtina, January 7, 1998
To the rest of the world it may seem incomprehensible to be forced from your own school
because you want to study in your mother tongue, but that's exactly what has happened to
the Albanian students in Kosova.
The University of Prishtina (UP) was founded in 1970. Since then, more than 43,000
people have graduated (7,000 since 1991). Yet in 1991, the Serbian policy of "ethnic
cleansing" began in Kosova's educational institutions. Some 1,000 professors and
27,000 students were forced out of the University of Prishtina alone. Hundreds of
thousands of high school students were banned from entering school buildings.
In some of the elementary schools, children were allowed into segregated buildings -
with Serb children on one side, Albanians in the other. The University and high schools
began to hold classes outside their school buildings, in private houses, in miserable
conditions. This has been going on for seven years now. The Serb police raids on these
buildings are a common practice. Teachers are beaten in front of the children as a way to
promote fear.
In September, 1996, responding to international pressure to ease tensions in Kosova, an
"Educational Agreement" was signed between President Rugova and Milosevic. This
agreement was never implemented.
In signing the agreement, Milosevic intended to gain political points in the eyes of
the international community in the hopes of having Serbia's economic sanctions lifted.
Over one year later, the empty school buildings continue to be guarded by heavy police
forces to prevent the Albanians from moving in. Some buildings are used as refugee camps
for Serbs from Croatia. Now the situatioon has become unbearable for the Albanian students
as it appears no progress has been made towards opening the schools.
Therefore, the Students Independent Union of the University of Prishtina (SIUUP), the
only student organization in the UP, initiated peaceful protests, with one clear aim: the
unconditional return of the university and high school buildings, so the Albanian students
can attend normal classes in normal facilities, ironically built by Albanians themselves.
The Albanian students DO NOT WANT the Serb students to leave; they just want to use the
80% of the facilities that have been empty since 1991.
The University of Prishtina currently has 14 senior colleges and 7 community colleges.
23,000 students attend classes. The "regular" University buildings are only
partially filled by Serb students, but the rest of the buildings remain empty.
Although the Serb government has offered lucrative loans and housing, it has managed to
attract less the 4,000 Serb students from Serbia and Montenegro to attend classes in
Kosova. They only occupy some 20 % of the University buildings.
SIUUP is an independent, non-political, non-partisan organization. The demand for the
unconditional return of the school buildings is a non-political demand, based on
international law that guarantees education in a mother tongue as a fundamental human
right. In September 10, 1997, SIUUP established the University Protests Council. This
council has 9 members - 5 students and 4 professors. In September 15 the council
established the platform for the principles for the nonviolent and peaceful protests as
listed below:
- Whereas the Students Independent Union of the University of Prishtina has undertaken the
initiative to organize peaceful protests aimed at taking back the occupied buildings of
the university;
- Whereas the students had prior talks with the state institutions, politicians, and
representatives of other associations, from whom they had formal support, and hope that
they will follow by offering their concrete help;
- Whereas the University has offered support to the students' initiative for these
protests and have expressed their readiness to organize peaceful and dignified protests;
The University Protests Council issues the following:
- 1. Students' protests are organized for the purpose of retaking Prishtina University
buildings and other premises violently occupied by the Serbian regime in 1991.
- 2. Students' protests will be peaceful and nonviolent, using no arms or weapons of any
kind, with no violence against any public or private property, nor will we return violence
if it is used against us.
- 3. Preparation and realization of peaceful protests will be done by the Students Protest
Council of the University and other sub-councils of faculties and high pedagogic schools
(two year colleges), in close cooperation with the University, faculties and high
pedagogic schools. The public (in the country and abroad) will be appropriately notified
about the slogans and placards which will be used by the students during the protests. The
public will be notified in due time about other adequate actions which will enable better
organization and realization of peaceful protests. The media and other international
bodies will be informed and invited as well.
- 4. The Protests Council is open and ready to cooperate and coordinate the work with
institutions and other relevant subjects and associations on the basis of their concrete
declarations in support of the Platform and Declaration of Principles of nonviolent and
peaceful protests of the University of Prishtina.
- 5. The purpose of our protests is not political. Its intention is obvious: the
unconditional release of premises, buildings and the campus of the University, now under
police control.
- 6. We do not try to fight with our adversary, but we are demanding the respect of human
rights and civil freedoms equally for all peoples.
- 7. Anyone who provokes the police will be considered a police informer.
- 8. If the police use force against us, this does not mean that we ought to return
violence.
- 9. We are not going either to yell slogans, whistle or make any other kind of gestures
to offend or provoke anyone.
- 10. If anyone - a protester or a supporter - uses violence against the police or anybody
else in general we shall do our utmost to stop and prevent such an incident.
- 11. We will follow the orders and decisions of the University Protests Council and the
instructions of the maintenance personel during the protests.
In the meantime, the 1997-1998 academic year began on time. The University will be
working without interruption all the time. The teaching process will be adapted to the
peaceful protests and their duration, in accordance with the decision of competent
authorities and pursuant to the regulation in effect, the purpose of which should be
implementation of students' requests.
In addition, the Individual Colleges and Community Colleges' organizing subcommittees
were established. Each of the sub-committees has 5 members (3 students and 2 professors).
There are four committees within the Senior Colleges and Community Colleges. Three of them
are to make sure the protests remain peaceful and the fourth one is in charge of medical
help, in case the police uses force to crush the protest.
During the last three protests, held on October 1, October 29 and December 30, every
plan, strategy and detail was legal and it was publicly announced beforehand.
The slogans were published in the papers. The media, the public, the students and the
Serb regime were notified properly beforehand. This was done to clearly avoid any
provocation from anyone.
In addition to Prishtina, protests took place in 6 other towns of Kosova, where units
of the university are located. Despite the fact that the protests were peaceful,
non-violent and were strictly attended by UP students, the Serb police forces intervened
without warning, using batons and teargas. More than 700 students were injured. Since the
political parties were not welcome by the organizing board, there were no other people
beside students and teachers participating in the protest. However, there was a large
number of people who came out in solidarity, but who stood on the side walk and did not
mix in the protest.
The students of the UP stand firm with their demands and will not stop the protests
until the demands in question are met. However, if the peaceful protests are eventually
proven to be fruitless and concrete steps are not taken to meet the student demands, there
is real danger that the students will lose the belief that the peaceful mean to achieve
our goals. We ask everyone of you to help us achieve our fundamental right - the right to
study in our mother tongue.
BACKGROUND
Kosova is a region of the former Yugoslavia, inhabited by 2.1 million people, 90% of
which are Albanians, 8% Serbs and 2% others. Kosova is an area of 4,201 square miles
(10,877 square kilometers), located in the south of what used to be Yugoslavia. In the
former Federative Republic of Yugoslavia, Kosova was a constitutive autonomous province of
the federation.
However, in 1989, two years after Slobodan Milosevic came at the helm of Serbian
politics with his dictatorship policies, he violently and unconstitutionally dissolved the
Kosova parliament and practically occupied Kosova, stripping its autonomy. He did this
with the help from the Yugoslav Army and police. The illegal suspension of the autonomous
status of Kosova led to wide scale protests in Kosova, with hundreds of thousands of
people taking to the streets.
Even though these protests were peaceful, the Serb military regime violently crushed
them. From March 1989 until February 1990, more than 70 Albanians were killed and hundreds
were injured and tortured in Serb prisons. The members of the Kosova (unconstitutionally
resolved) parliament, after a few sessions, in July 2, 1990, unanimously voted and
declared Kosova a Republic within the Yugoslav Federation. In September 7 of the same
year, the Kosova Constitution was approved. Following these two events the Serb police
became increasingly brutal in punishing Albanians. The Serb Government shut down the
Prishtina Radio and Television (RTP). The Albanian daily newspaper "Rilindja"
was banned. Hundreds of thousands of Albanians were fired from their jobs when they
refused to sign "loyalty oaths" to Serbia. Those fired included doctors and
other hospital staff. In September 1991, a popular referendum where 99 percent of the
voters (89 percent of Kosova's eligible voters) declared the independence of Kosova.
In May 24 of the following year (1992), the first parliamentary elections were held.
After the elections, Kosova formed its parallel institutions. Even though all the actions
in the last few years were peaceful, the Serb authorities have killed more than 200
Albanian people since 1991. Kosova Albanians continue to pursue a non- violent resistance,
despite Serb repression they have to deal with on daily basis.
APPEAL FOR SUPPORT
The following are some of the ways you can help the University Students:
- 1. Write petitions and support messages for the non-violent, peaceful protests of the
students of the University of Prishtina in achieving their fundamental right of education.
- 2. Write letters of protest to the Serb dictator Slobodan Milosevic.
- 3. Write letters to the U.S. government and President Bill Clinton and to other western
capitals explaining the situation in UP.
- 4. Send books and other professional materials (university textbooks) in English
language to the students of UP.
- 5. Send different books for non-violent movements around the world since there is a lack
of this kind of material in UP.
- 6. Give access to our system operators to your educational FTP, WWW sites, FAQ's,
Hypertext PDF and Postscript books and literature, technical documentation and educational
software etc. to advance the studies in the UP and all other ways of exchanging electronic
data.
- 7. Organize protests in the schools you attend/teach.
- 8. Exchange students with UP.
- 9. Send student delegations to monitor the protests and/or see the conditions in which
the UP functions.
- 10. Write in your local papers about UP and about the education in the Albanian language
in Kosova in general.
- 11. Write to the U.S. and other Western media centers and ask them to monitor the
protests in Kosova.
- 12. Have lectures and discussion panels in your school/university about education in
Kosova.
Council for the Defence of Human Rights and Freedoms in Prishtina has available
information on 121 ill-treated persons in Prishtina, Peja, Gjakova, Mitrovica and Gjilan.
We have estimated that the number of ill-treated persons is much higher.
THE LIST OF PHYSICALLY ILL-TREATED PERSONS:
PRISHTINA: 123; PEJA: 17; GJAKOVA: 35; MITROVICA: 2; GJILAN: 1
The situation of human rights and freedoms was very difficult in Kosova during the last
year. They were violated by the Serbian authorities in an institutionalized and systematic
way. The international norms guaranteed by agreements and conventions signed by former
SFRY, (ramp FRY), as well as legal provisions were not respected at all.
Council for the Defence of Human Rights and Freedoms based in Prishtina (hereafter
referred as CDHRF), which has been monitoring the violation of human rights since its
foundation (1989), has concluded that during 1997 there was no single right or freedom
that was not violated.
In the course of 1997, CDHRF has registered 35 cases of violent deaths of Albanians, 5
of whom died due to the police torture, 12 were killed by fire weapons, whereas 18 died
under unknown circumstances. 22 woundings and 2 murder attempts were marked during the
very same period.
CDHRF based in Prishtina has available information on 5031 individual cases of
ill-treatments and 10.194 kinds of human rights violations by Serbian police and other law
enforcement authorities, as well as by Serbian citizens. Not even children (79), women
(258) nor elderly (56) were spared. The political, trade union, humanitarian activists, as
well as those of Financial Council of Kosova and CDHRF (413) were on the target of the
Serbian police.
The wave of convictions towards Albanians in the rigid political trials continued. On
30 May, the legal proceedings against 20 Albanians at the Serbian Run District Court in
Prishtina came to its ending. As members of Kosova Liberation Army, they were charged for
penal acts: "hostile activity", "threatening of territorial
integrity", 6 of them faced also charged for "terrorism". The Grand jury,
chaired by Dragolub Zdravkovic, announced the total sentence of 107 years' imprisonment
(prison terms ranging from 2-10 years).
On 11 July, at the Serbian Run District Court in Prishtina, the legal proceedings
against 15 Albanians charged for "terrorism and aiding terrorists" came to an
end. The defendants were sentenced to prison terms ranging from 4-20 years (a total of 264
years' imprisonment.
On 16 December, at the Serbian Run District Court in Prishtina, the trial against 19
Albanians charged for allegedly being members of Kosova Liberation Army, "hostile
activity" and "terrorism", came to its end. The Grand jury, chaired by
Dragolub Zdravkovic, sentenced 17 Albanians to prison terms ranging from 4-20 years (a
total of 186 years of imprisonment).
In three rigid political trials against 52 Albanians held during 1997, the Serbian Run
District Court announced the sentence of 557 years imprisonment. Council for the Defence
of Human Rights and Freedoms assessed that these trials and convictions as a genocidal act
of Serbian authorities based only on violence and terror.
The legal and procedural violations accompanied by the brutal torture against Albanian
defendants during the whole procedure had only one aim, getting self-incriminating
confessions. The Grand jury, as always when it concerns Albanians, did not take into
account any evidence or relevant fact presented by the lawyers and defendants.
The Albanian defendants were denied the judicial defence during the whole procedure.
Lawyers were not allowed to discuss the "act" with their clients.
Besides, 73 albanians were brought before courts for petty- offences for weapons or
other "offences" mainly fabricated.
The wave of collecting weapons has been one of the gravest kinds of persecution in
Kosova and it has not decreased at all in the course of 1997. Under the very same pretext,
Albanians have been taken to police stations, arrested, beaten, threatened and ordered to
report again. There were 854 registered cases.
According to the information made available by CDHRF, in the course of 1997, there were
1740 cases of physical torture. 587 victims were subjected to severe body injuries with
truncheons, wooden sticks, sharp things, kicks, etc. as an aftermath of such torture, tens
of Albanians are dead. During the very same period, 5 Albanians died due to police torture
or its consequences:
- * On 2 January, Xhafer A. Hajdari (52) from Bistrica e Shal‰s near Mitrovica died
due to torture at the police station, where he had been taken several times.
- * On 22 February, Besnik M. Restelica (1967) from Podujeva, an engineer arrested on 30
January, died due to torture in prison.
- * On 7 May, Naser H. Ferizi (1972) from Mitrovica committed a suicide, after being
ill-treated at the police station during the previous days.
- * On 16 October, Jonuz Zeneli (55) from the village of Ballaban near Prishtina, father
of 7, arrested on 30 April, died in the hospital of Central Prison in Belgrade.
- * On 26 November, Ismet €aush Gjocaj (1962) from the village of Gjocaj near
De‡an, was massacred at the police station of Irzniq near De‡an. Ismet was
arrested on 21 and 25 November. According to the sub-CDHRF available information in
De‡an, "the body of the deceased had been massacred. The eyes of the victim were
torn off. The right part of the skull was badly damaged. The victim had 6 bullet wounds on
his back. His right shoulder was broken to pieces. He had many wounds on his chest and
bruises all over the body. On both legs, under the knees, signs of injuries could be seen.
It is obvious that the victim had been subjected to inhuman and degrading torture..."
This and other cases testify the brutal torture exerted on arrested Albanians, for what
the international associations were informed.
In the course of 1997, CDHRF has registered:
- * 35 Albanians were killed or died in a violent way, of whom:
- * 5 died due to police torture,
- * 11 were killed with fire weapons by police or army,
- * 1 was stabbed by a Serb,
- * 18 were killed or died under unknown circumstances,
- * 1073 persons were arrested, of whom 125 were convicted,
- * 596 persons were arbitrarily arrested,
- * 803 persons were searched for and summoned to police stations,
- * 480 were taken for "informative talks"
- * 427 Albanian families were raided,
- * 1 rape attempt,
- * 207 threatening cases,
- * 5 hostage cases,
- * 3 kidnapping cases,
- * 57 cases of police intervention in educational institutions,
- * 8 cases of police intervention in political parties and associations,
- * 5 cases of police intervention in humanitarian associations,
- * 10 cases of profanation of national symbols,
- * 10 cases of real estate usurpation,
- * 9 cases of real estate confiscation,
- * 10 cases of hampering of economical activity,
- * 3 cases of hampering of private feasts,
- * 8 cases of police intervention in political institutions,
- * 3 cases of police intervention in cultural institutions,
- * 1 case of police intervention in religious institutions,
- * 39 passports were seized,
- * 14 cases of prevention of repatriation,
- * 12 summons for drafting in Serbian army.
The situation continues to be very grave in the area of education. Despite the
difficult conditions, the educational work has been burdened by the police violence and
repression. The year 1997 was the seventh consecutive year that Albanian pupils, students
and teachers have been conducting their lectures in private houses, basements and garages
made for the purpose. The situation has remained unchanged, although the Agreement of
Understanding regarding the education in Albanian was signed. In the course of 1997, 57
cases of police intervention in educational institutions were registered, whereas 295
educational activists were subjected to ill-treatment. In most of the cases of
intervention in educational institutions, the school documentation was confiscated,
whereas the educational activists were taken for "informative talks", were
subjected to physical and psychological ill-treatment and were threatened and hampered
while teaching.
The sports activists were persecuted in the same way. All sports facilities were
usurped by the Serbian authorities, therefore, Albanians are forced to develop their
sports activities in very difficult conditions. 31 sports activists were subjected to
ill-treatment during the very same period.
The wave of massive peaceful protests organized by the Students' Independent Union of
the University of Prishtina for the unconditional release of school and university
facilities included all university centres. Apart from Prishtina, the protests were held
in Prizren, Peja, Gjakova, Gjilan, Ferizaj and Mitrovica. During these protests, large
police forces intervened and exerted brutal violence on protesters. CDHRF registered 537
cases of ill-treatments during the protest held on 1 October. During the protest held on
29 October, police intervened in Peja and Gjakova, whereas during the protest of 30
December, 179 persons reported their cases. The gravest cases have the medical reports
attached. As regard the events during the students' peaceful protests, CDHRF has published
a brochure in Albanian and English.
Journalists have been hampered and threatened while doing their jobs. CDHRF registered
40 cases of ill-treatment of Albanian journalists and foreign ones, as well as
representatives of foreign humanitarian associations.
The state of emergency has still been prevailing in the fields of health care, culture,
economy, sports and others. The Albanian population has been impoverished by the violence
and repression continuously exerted on the innocent population. As an aftermath of such
state, many Albanians fled Kosova. This was one of the main objective of Serbian
hegemonist policy, aiming at the ethnic cleansing of Kosova. The sheltering and employment
of 20.000 Serbian refugees from Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania in Kosova is in
favour of the hegemonist aim of Serbia.
Cultural and scientific institutions are still closed down to Albanians of Kosova. The
banning of the Albanian language from administration and public service has almost come to
its end. The names of settlements, institutions, firms, squares, etc. are written in
Serbian with cyrillic alphabet, whereas the historical and cultural monuments in front of
schools, faculties, squares, etc. were replaced with the monuments of Serbian
personalities.
The evictions of Albanians from their flats continued in the course of 1997. 31
Albanian families were evicted from their flats and Serbian families moved in instead. 21
Albanians were dismissed from their jobs.
The looting from Albanians is a very common phenomenon. A special form of brutal
looting is the looting in the markets. It is very difficult for the CDHRF to get precise
information, due to the fact that many street vendors and merchants hesitate to report
their cases. In the course of 1997, 228 cases of looting goods and foreign currency were
registered.
CDHRF based in Prishtina concludes that the Serbian regime has intensified the
violation towards the Albanian population in Kosova and calls hereby the international
community and democratic public opinion to make pressure on Serbia to eradicate its
genocidal policy and violence exerted on Albanians for many years now.
Today, at about 5.15 a.m., in the village of Prekaz i Posht‰m, district of
Sk‰nderaj, fire shootings were heard. The house of Shaban Jashari was destroyed
completely. Iliriana Rifat Jashari (26) and Selvete Hamz‰ Jashari (20) were wounded.
Police forces withdrew at 6 a.m. Last night, the Jasharaj quarter ran out of electricity
and phones were disconnected. It is supposed that the attack was done by mortars and
grenade launchers. Large police forces are situated in the yard of the ammunition factory.
The dead body of Hysen Mangjolli (52) from Mikushnica, father of 7, was found in the
outskirts of the village of Klina e Poshtme. According to the eye-witnesses, he was shot
dead by police forces while withdrawing at about 7 a.m., when fire shots were heard.
Eye-witnesses claim that Arkan and captain Dragan were seen in Zve‡an last night.
In order to clarify the mystery of my kidnapping, I, Bajram Shehu, give this
STATEMENT
to the Council for the Defence of Human Rights and Freedoms (CDHRF) based in Prishtina
and media
I, Bajram Shehu, from the village of Greme (1960), temporarily employed in Switzerland,
a former political prisoner during the 80s, sentenced to a prison term of 3 years, taken
twice for "informative talks" about my activity, was kidnapped by the Serbian
authorities under the charges as member of National Movement of Kosova from 15 until 19
January 1998. The kidnappers were D. Bozhovic from Talinovc or Prelez living in Ferizaj
and another one, whose name I could not catch. First of all, they took me in the white
"Yugo" car and took me to the garage next to the police station of Ferizaj.
After 40 minutes, they tied up my hands and put tights on my head. Then, they put a
plastic sack on my head. They ordered me to lie down on the back seat of the car. After an
hour's drive, the car stopped. It seemed to me that I was in the basement of a hotel.
According to many signs, I can say that the place was somewhere in Brezovica.
The first question was: "Do you know where you are?". I said that I did not.
Then, they asked me whether I have heard about the Chetniks. I replied positively and they
said that we were going to confront them.
They told me to admit that I was a member of National Movement of Kosova and Kosova
Liberation Army. When I refused, they tied me to the radiator and kept me like that for
five days. They used to untie me whenever they interrogated and tortured me. I was hit
with truncheons all over my body.
"Have you heard of Sicilian tie?" asked the person that kept saying that
Bajrush Xhemajli had been subjected to their inquiries. When I answered negatively, they
started to show me how the Sicilian tie looks like. They hanged me upside down and I guess
my body looked like a tie. That position was more convenient for torturing me.
Another form of torture against me was the following: they used to open the door, put
my fingers on its frame and close it gradually until my fingers would grow thin. That
torture caused me a lot of pain. My finger tips are still black.
Such torture was repetead for three days. The fourth day, they brought automatic guns
and threatened me with liquidation. "The border is near here and we will say that we
killed you while you were running. We will also kill your wife and children".
Due to the torture and threats I accepted to give self-incriminating statement and
statements accusing others, as well as to cooperate with them in the future. I did this in
order to save myself from that hell.
They took me in a room upstairs where they had put the video camera, two tape recorders
and a camera. They took photos of me as we were friends for ages. With the help of tape
recorders and video camera, my pseudostatements were taped.
As ordered, I accused National Movement of Kosova and persons allegedly being its
activists in Switzerland and Germany. I was forced to state that those activists collected
money in order to purchase weapons, which are sent to Kosova. Those persons allegedly
recruit soldiers to KLA, train them in Albania and sent them to Kosova to act against
Serbia. Serbian Security forced me to state that the following persons are members of
National Movement of Kosova (NMK) for the regions of Ferizaj, Ka^anik and Shtime: Xhabir
Morina, Ilmi Re^ica, Enver Topalli, Sinan Azemi, Qamil Xhemali, Xhemal Azemi, Fevzi
Mehmeti, Rrahim Sadiku, Berat Luzha, Ylber Topalli, Shabi Matoshi, Murtez Shehu, Milazim
Haliti, Isak Limani, Kadrie Gashi, Rrahim and Sylejman Bytyqi, Gursel Sylejmani and me.
"I", my false statement continues, "was informed by Veli Isufi that Ali
Reshani has been transporting weapons to Kosova. The first delivery was sent to his house:
35 guns (Hungarian Kalashnikov). The second delivery was sent to Ferizaj. I met him in the
outskirts of Ferizaj and took 35 guns (Kalashnikov) to the house of Xhabir Morina. Xhabir
put the guns in plastic bags in order to hide them behind his house. Those guns were to be
delivered to the following persons in the village of Komogllava: 2 guns to brothers Isufi
(Veli and Shaban), 3 guns to brothers Xhemajli (Emrush, Bajrush and Qamil), 1 gun to Sinan
Azemi, 2 guns to Xhemajl Azemi, 1 gun to Rrahim Sadiku, 1 gun to Berat Luzha, etc. The
other guns were to be delivered to the friends in town. While transporting the third
delivery, Ali Reshani was caught in Italy and arrested to 5 years imprisonment".
"I, Bajram Shehu, with Qamil Xhemajli and Sinan Azemi have carried out the attack
on the police station in the village of G&rlica." But, they were not satisfied
with this statement (because at that time I was working at a cooperative in Netstal of
Switzerland) and forced me to give the next one: "I, Bajram Shehu, am familiar with
the fact that the attack on the police station in G&rlica was carried out by Xhabir
Morina, Enver Topalli and Ilmi Re^ica."
"The murder of the young policeman in Shtime and the attack on the police flats in
Shtime were perpetrated by Ramadan Avdiu, Naim Haxhiu (the village of Monopollc) and Isak
Limani (the village of Re^ak)."
This statement, which I signed, and the moment of "Commitment" to collaborate
with two Serbian inspectors under the codes "Sheh" for me and "Danush from
Shkup" for Serbian inspectors were taped by camera. I was given the phone number of
Bozhovic (27 853) to contact them. They ordered me to work abroad and inform them about
the addresses of the members of NMK and its activity. In the end, they helped me with the
shaving and cleaning and ordered me to say that I had been in Shkupi since I had heard
that the police were in search for me. Blindfolded, I was taken back to the market in
Ferizaj and released. The next day, I arrived in Switzerland. The very same day, on 21
January, I went to the doctor Dr. med. R. Kern. Ennenda, who prescribed me sedatives and
advised me to report my case to the police in Glarus in Switzerland.
I hereby inform the public opinion that my statements at the Serbia Security are false
and given due to torture. Being aware of the consequences that the above mentioned persons
might have, I ask the media to make public their names and details.
Bajram Shehu, Muhlefur str 2, 8755 Ennenda, GL. Switzerland, Phone: 055 640 38 25. 27
January 1998
- Humanitarian Law Center
- Avalska 9, 11000 Belgrade, FR Yugoslavia
- Tel/Fax: 38-111-444-3944
- Email: hlc@EUnet.yu
8 March 1998
Investigating reports on the killing of a large number of people in Likosane and Cirez
villages in the Drenica area (Kosovo), the Humanitarian Law Center arrived at findings
which contradict Serbian police reports on the number of dead and the locations and
circumstances in which they were killed. HLC representatives toured the area, scrutinized
the houses and outbuildings, examined traces, and spoke with eyewitnesses and people who
heard the gunfire and cries. The HLC investigations were conducted on 1 March after the
police withdrew from the area, and on 3 March when the dead Kosovo Albanians were buried.
The investigations established that police killed 26 persons, not 16 as officially
reported by the Serbian Ministry of Internal Affairs. At least 10 were killed in the yards
of houses, near barns, on the local road and in a field. Rukije Nebiu, mother of two and
near term with her third child, was killed in her home in Cirez. Her husband D`em{ir and
brother-in-law Ilir were also killed, while their father Sefer was seriously wounded.
Ajet, 63, and his nephew Be}ir were killed in the Red`epi family house. Four Sejdiu
brothers were killed: Be}ir, 28; Bekim, 23, and the 24-year-old twins Nazmi and Bedri.
Ibi{ Rama and Ismaih Behrami were kiled in the same village but the HLC was unable to
establish the circumstances of their death. Ten members of the Ahmeti family and a number
of other people went missing during the police action in Liko{ane village. On 2 March, a
private citizen sent word to Liko{ane that the bodies of the Ahmeti family members were at
the morgue of the Pri{tina state hospital. When taking over the bodies on 3 March,
relatives took also the bodies of five more persons, among whom they recognized [aban Muju
and Behram Fazliu from the neighboring village Gradica and who were at the Ahmeti house
during the police action. The three remaining bodies were identified by relatives before
they were buried. The HLC was unable to determine whether the Ahmetis, Djelji and Behrami
were killed on the spot or after they were taken from their houses or the village. All the
Ahmeti family members killed were males, from the 16-year-old Elhami to the 50-year-old
Ahmet. There were body parts, teeth and scattered clothing close to the wall encircling
the Ahmeti property. On the wall itself, there was an inscription made with a piece of
brick reading: "This is what will happen next time too," and a drawing of four
pieces of flint in the squares of a cross. Muhamet Islam Djelji, 70, and his son Naser,
37, were killed in the house opposite to the Ahmetis. Muhamet was killed in an outbuilding
on whose floor there was a pool of coagulated blood, an ax and a cap. His son Naser was
killed in the next room in the presence of his wife and two children. He was hit by a
bullet that came through a window over which he had placed a mattress for protection.
Traces of blood through the room, over the doorstep and into the yard showed that his body
had been dragged out of the building. It was subsequently found at the Pri{tina state
hospital morgue. While conducting investigations in the field, the HLC learned that Bekim
Be}ir Deliju, a 16-year-old cigarette seller, was killed in the village of Gornja Obrija
in the same police action. HLC representatives visited the homes of the Ahmeti family and
their neighbors, the Djeli, in Liko{ane, and the homes of the Sejdiu brothers and the
Red`epi and Nebiu families in ]irez. They saw traces of blood in the rooms, yards and
walls and on the walls surrounding the properties. The furniture was broken and personal
belongings were scattered around. Outbuildings in some of the yards had been torn down,
and shell casings of various caliber were everywhere. Tracks made by heavy vehicles and
signs of attack from helicopters were clearly visible on 3 March. Police blocked all the
roads leading to Drenica on the day of the funerals. All men who tried to reach Liko{ane
to attend were stopped on the road at Kosovska Mitrovica and Komorane, searched and turned
back. The Ahmeti family encountered major problems in getting to Pri{tina to pick up the
bodies of their relatives, and were detained for several hours when transporting their
dead back to the village. Many foreign correspondents, reporters for domestic media and
others were prevented from entering Drenica. No autopsies were performed on the bodies
left in the village. Nor were signs of autopsies visible on the bodies taken over from the
morgue in Pri{tina, and the families were not given any medical reports. The HLC is unable
to report developments in Drenica after 1 March as the area is under police siege. The
Humanitarian Law Center urges the Serbian Ministry of Internal Affairs to give reporters
and representatives of humanitarian and human rights organizations access to the area and
thereby enable accurate, full and timely informing of the public. The indications that the
persons killed, wounded or arrested were connected with the attacks on police must be
presented to the public. It is in Serbia's best interest to immediately institute an
inquiry into the circumstances of the death of 26 Kosovo Albanians in the police actions
of 28 February and 1 March, including exhumation of the remains for forensic examination.
Natasa Kandic, Director
- ANTIWAR CAMPAIGN CROATIA
- Network office
- Gajeva 55/1, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia
- Tel. ++385 1 431 374, fax 432 456
Zagreb, 18 March 1998
ADDRESSED TO THE CROATIAN PUBLIC, THE GOVERNMENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF CROATIA, THE
CROATIAN PARLIAMENT AND THE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC CROATIA
The network office of the Antiwar Campaign Croatia (ARK) is seeking to mobilise members
of the ARK network, civil organisations, political parties, the Croatian parliament and
other Croatian and international actors, to contribute to finding a solution to the
conflict in Kosovo - a conflict which threatens to escalate and cause population
displacement and long-term instability throughout the region. We consider it to be our
right and our duty to act, since we have experienced war ourselves and our everyday lives
are still affected by ist devastating consequences. The ARK network office believes that
it is essential that the problem in Kosovo is internationalised, and invites everyone to
contribute to resolving the crisis.
The conflict in Kosovo dates back to the beginning of this century, and has escalated
steadily since 1981. The situation has deteriorated so badly over the last 17 years that
the lives of many thousands of people are now in danger. The regular use of force and
widespread human rights violations by the police in Kosovo during the 1980s lowered the
sensitivity of the Yugoslav public to violence. Force came to be widely seen as a
legitimate means of dealing with civilian disputes. The violent repression seen in Kosovo
during this period provided a form of preparation for the wars which were later conducted
in the post-Yugoslav states in the 1990s.
The present situation in Kosovo is not simply an internal problem for a neighbouring
state, but represents a threat to regional stability that concerns our country and all ist
citizens. For this reason, we urge Croatia to react decisively and seek to
internationalise the Kosovo problem.
We propose that the Croatian parliament debates the situation in Kosovo, and passes a
resolution in which it:
- (1) requests the immediate cessation of violence by the police forces of FR Yugoslavia
and the armed representatives of the Albanians in Kosovo;
- (2) expresses concern about, and condemns, the killing of civilians;
- (3) suggests that the Contact Group appoint a representative who will mediate between
the two sides;
- (4) suggests that the international community establishes some form of transitional
authority in Kosovo (perhaps along the lines of UNTAES), on the grounds that the present
situation there is no longer the internal problem of a sovereign state, but has become a
threat to wider security in the Balkans and Europe. As such, it can only be resolved if
international institutions provide immediate and decisive mediation with support from
local and international NGOs;
- (5) emphasises that Croatia will respect the obligations arising from the international
conventions it has entered into, and accept refugees from Kosovo - whose number will
inevitably increase if the present situation continues to deteriorate;
- (6) and appoints an official Croatian delegation to present the resolution's proposals
to the government ofthe FR Yugoslavia and its people.
We also propose that international institutions take every measure in support of the
following priorities:
- (1) to secure the immediate cessation of violence - a prerequisite for peaceful
negotiations;
- (2) to have the Contact Group appoint a representative with a mandate to mediate between
the conflicting parties;
- (3) and to ensure a sustained cessation of violence by establishing an international
transitional administration for Kosovo, perhaps along the lines of UNTAES. This is the
only way to create the space needed to allow a long- term solution that is acceptable to
all sides.
TO OUR FRIENDS IN KOSOVO, SERBIA AND MACEDONIA
We wish to express our respect for the Albanian population in Kosovo who have been
committed to non-violent civil resistance for so long. Their commitment is particularly
impressive given that, in the present situation, the violent option seems a more effective
way of attracting the international attention needed to find a long-term solution to the
conflict. With all due respect for everyone's right to make their own choice, we want to
support all those who are still working for a non-violent solution - especially those NGOs
which have maintained a dignified presence over the past seven years despite severe
violations of their human rights.
Today, despite the bloodshed, we want to emphasise that non-violence still makes sense.
During the wars in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina, we learned that advocating and
practising the values of tolerance, solidarity, respect for the human rights and dignity
of every person, regardless of their ethnic origin or religious convictions, is central to
a worthwhile human existence. Because war undermines our entire values system, it is
especially important for the people stricken by conflict to maintain their self-esteem and
dignity and strive to protect the human rights of all. The war in Bosnia-Herzegovina
showed that a solution to this kind of conflict can only be found around the negotiating
table. Surely it is not necessary to, once again, kill hundreds of thousands of people
before we reach a political solution acceptable to all the Albanians and Serbs living in
Kosovo?
TO CIVIL SOCIETY, POLITICAL PARTIES AND THE CROATIAN PUBLIC
The ARK network office will continue to promote public debate about the possibilities
for individuals and civil and political groups in Croatia to contribute to the peace
process in Kosovo. We will work to internationalise the problem and support civil
organisations in the region. We will encourage non-violent civil resistance to continue
and will stay in regular contact with our friends in Kosovo, Serbia, Macedonia and
Albania. We intend to arrange regular visits by peace activists to Kosovo, Serbia and
Macedonia, so that they can share their experience of the wars in Croatia and
Bosnia-Herzegovina and support the work of groups in Kosovo that are trying to promote
dialogue. We will inform the public about these peace visits and all other future
activities of the ARK network office through our regular press conferences.
For ARK,
Vesna Terselic, Network Coordinator
There is a serbian nationalistic song that says something about a Serbian flag and a
trumpet that is calling Serbs to go (probably-fight) to Kosovo, etc. - trans.
As Tanjug [Serbian News Agency] has been authorized to announce, the Belgrade district
prosecutor has decided to introduce profesional standards in journalism and to teach
journalists the "trade". The Authorities joined the most recent campaign of
attacks by "patriotic" media on the independent media, which culminated with a
commentary of RTS [Radio and Television of Serbia] on Friday, march 6. Atacks on
independent media aren't new at all, since in 1991, it was anounced ... that it was OK to
lie if it was in the national interest, and liars got a boost as never before. This most
recent campaign, however, carries a new and very dangerous element. Before, it was
required that professional journalists ... omit unpleasant truths, if possible, if they
were really disgusted; now, RTS and the district prosecutor have introduced the obligation
of lying.
What is being objected to by journalists that don't want to howl in the same pack with
"patriotic" media? RTS explains what the district prosecutor wanted to say:
"While most of the media relies on the official statements of MUP [The Interior
Ministry] of Serbia, independent media have found and use other sources of information
which "can only suit terrorists". Hence the district prosecutor has undertaken
"appropriate measures towards editors" of five daily newspapers and some TV
stations, since that kind of writting "encourages actions of terrorist gangs and
falsly represents measures that members of MUP have undertaken against terrorists in
Kosovo and Metohija".
"Kosovo and Metohija" is an official Serbian name for the province.
"Metohija = "church lands"; Kosovo/a is dotted with Orthodox monasteries. -
ed
RTS objects to independent media terminology as well: if it's to be judged by the
terminology of RTS and Tanjug, guilty is just about anyone who doesn't use the term
"Shqiptari gangs".
There is a Serbian "theory" that says Albanians live in Albania, thus those
in Kosovo cannot call themselves Albanians but Shqiptari. In fact Albanians everywhere
call themselves "Shqiptari" but their leadership internationaly uses term
"Albanians". It's all about who holds "rights" on Kosovo, that's the
reason for regime media to object the use of term "Albanian" since it may seem
that Albania is wherever there are Albanians, whether in Albania proper or in Kosovo, the
two taken together being understood [by the Serbs] as "greater" Albania. It's
the same with the idea of "greater" Serbia, Serbia is wherever there are Serbs.
What this and other regimes do, they don't let others do; the term "Shqiptar"
sometimes has a derogatory meaning when used by people other than Kosovo Albanians. A
similar game that was played with certain terms could have been noticed in Bosnia as well,
terms "Bosnian" and "Bosniak" (for Bosnian muslims) have been
intentionally both internationally and internally used-missused in order to justify
certain claims, especially those teritorial ones, like, if "we" call ourselves
"Bosnians", than that means that the "land" is solely
"ours", never mind the fact that the population mentioned here calls itself
differently than what their "own" leadership calls them).
RTS gives further lessons: how come there are 25 dead when police says the number is
only 16? What "Albanians", when those were terrorists? Who do journalists
believe: police statements or their own eyes?
Police statements are precious source of information only if they are not
contradictory, confused and incomplete - as were the were police statements in the last
ten or so days of Kosovo crisis. Police were preventing journalists from getting through
to the scene; but some of them managed to get through, they saw and they reported. From
what they saw and heard, some very unpleasant questions [arise]: did the police act as a
police or as an army? Did all civilians killed in action die with arms in hands? Are there
any women, elderly, underaged? Did the police adhere to law and rules of conduct? Were
examining judges present afterward? There is no need to go further than that.
It [turns out] that 25, not 16, civilians from Likosani and C'irez met violent deaths.
Where did those 9 come from? We all remember the incident in Pakrac on March 2, 1991, when
"patriotic" media screamed about "bursts of fire into the people" and
"40 dead in Pakrac"; fortunately, it turned out that there was no wounded, never
mind dead. Profesional journalists, those who deal with facts, were atacked then as they
are now as "traitors", because they didn't want to lie - just as they don't want
to lie today. And, it's easier to lie in company...
If district prosecutor wants to introduce some new profesional rules, he should openly
say: there is no more reporting from the scene, only one source of information is going to
be used; terminology is going to be dictated by RTS; hence, all other public media are
superfluous since we have RTS. If someone disagrees, "appropriate" measures
follow - what these measures might be, lawyers aren't quite certain. Anyway, independent
media look like they have become the state enemy number one, so we shall find something
for them. Independent media were [the cause of economic problems]; now they are being
blamed in advance for the escalation of the Kosovo crisis and the consequences that are
going to follow. That brings misgivings; not because of the independent media, but because
of this state [Serbia], every time when things like this happen, defeats and tragedies
follow.
Peacenet Balkans Desk pnbalkans@igc.apc.org
By Vesna Peric-Zimonjic
BELGRADE, Mar 10 (IPS) - President Slobodan Milosevic's continued defiance over Kosovo
in the face of international outrage has won the backing of his political opposition and
is threatening to spill over into a crackdown on dissenting voices in the independent
media.
The Serbian opposition still regard Milosevic's crackdown on ethnic Albanians in the
southern Serbian province of Kosovo as an internal affair, despite the stance adopted by
the international community - including further economic sanctions pushed through at an
emergency meeting Monday in London.
U.S. secretary of state, Madeline Albright, Robin Cook, Britain's foreign secretary and
Germany's Klaus Kinkel, along with representatives from France and Italy, persuaded
Russia's Yevgeny Primakov - who had stayed in Moscow - to back U.N. considerations of an
arms embargo.
In a rare show of unity, most Serbian opposition parties agree that Kosovo is Serbia's
internal problem. Slight nuances of differences arise only when the question of human
rights for the two million strong ethnic Albanian community arises. Reactions to the
police brutality in the southern province have mostly been lukewarm; none of the
opposition have spoken out against the level of violence used by the police and Vojislav
Seselj, leader of ultra-nationalist Serbian Radical Party, even applauded their actions.
Dozens of ethnic Albanians have been killed in 10 days of police violence.
The official death toll from two sweeps by Serbian police in the last ten days in the
Drenica area included 46 ethnic Albanians, described by police colonel Ljubomir Cvetic as
''terrorists''. Serbian police boasted over the weekend that ''one of the cores of
terrorist organisation Kosovo Liberation Army (UCK)'' was destroyed and Adem Jasari, one
of its alleged leaders, was killed.
''Serbia and Milosevic will maintain a hardline position against what they call
'terrorism''' a Western diplomat in Belgrade said after being escorted around Drenica over
the weekend by the Serbian foreign ministry. ''Mounting pressure from the world and
demands that a political solution be found for Kosovo seem to fall on deaf ears, once
again,'' the diplomat added.
None of the political parties has so far mentioned reinstating autonomy previously
enjoyed by Kosovo. Ethnic Albanians outnumber Serbs by nine to one in the province and
were stripped of their autonomy in 1989 by Milosevic, president of Serbia at the time.
Until then, the Albanian language was the medium for education; there was an ethnic
Albanian police force and Kosovo held an almost equal status with the other republics of
Yugoslavia. The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia now covers only Serbia and tiny Montenegro.
''Parliamentary parties have almost all rallied behind ruling Socialists on the matter
of the Kosovo intifada,'' the independent weekly Vreme commented on Sunday, drawing a
parallel with the Palestinian 'intifada' uprising against Israeli occupation. ''Serbian
political and public opinion is completely unprepared for the next phase of development,
which is certainly going to be proposed by the international mediators, the return of
broad autonomy to the province,'' the newspaper added.
Many analysts agree that Belgrade is not prepared to negotiate over the autonomy of
Kosovo.
''Before 1989, Kosovo had an almost equal say in matters like defence, public security,
and even had the right of veto in federal matters,'' says Belgrade analyst Milan
Milosevic. ''I'm afraid that even if the public opinion in Serbia has reached the point
when people agree that 'something' should be given to ethnic Albanians, that 'something'
is still very vague,'' he adds. ''Even when Serbian politicians think that Kosovo can be
'lost', they do not think it should be given to ethnic Albanians''.
Stojan Cerovic, a columnist for the independent weekly Vreme, believes that there are
only two ways of solving the Kosovo problem. ''One would be to introduce a legal situation
where all the citizens of Serbia are equal, with the hope that Kosovo Albanians would then
accept such a country and eventually become loyal citizens,'' he said. ''The other way is
to give Kosovo to the people who live there - Kosovo Albanians. There is no third way,''
Cerovic added.
Fehmi Agani, one of the leading politicians among ethnic Albanians, has said that with
each passing year since 1989, Milosevic's regime has ''pushed the Albanians away from
Serbia''. ''Without tackling any of Kosovo's problems in those years, the regime has
deliberately pushed Albanians into extremism and radicalism...It was not a show of
Milosevic's real strength, but of his weakness,'' he added.
Ivica Dacic, spokesperson for Milosevic's Socialist Party, said recently that the
''threats of sanctions and of a military intervention are nonsense. U.S. special envoy
Robert Gelbard last week threatened military intervention to prevent the conflict
escalating into another Balkan war. ''If states were to have sanctions imposed on them for
unsolved internal problems,'' Dacic added, ''most of the world would be under sanctions
because many countries have problems similar to that in Kosovo.''
Milosevic's regime, meanwhile, has launched another Kosovo campaign; this time against
the media which dared to report impartially on the unfolding events in Kosovo.
In an unprecedented move, the office of District Attorney of Belgrade issued a
statement over the weekend, saying that it has undertaken unspecified ''necessary
measures'' against the editors of five Belgrade dailies and several unspecified television
stations. The newspapers Nasa Borba, Blic, Demokratija, Dnevni Telegraf and Danas are
accused of ''instigating terrorism''.
''The dailies and the television stations published texts, comments, headlines and
aired programmes that encouraged the actions of terrorists and at the same time falsely
described the actions of Interior Ministry of Serbia'' the statement said. It did not,
however, mention which law the editors are supposed to have contravened, and they are
still unclear of what exactly is their 'crime'.
''Hearing what both sides (in Kosovo) say certainly does not amount to instigation of
terrorism,'' Ljubinka Milincic of Demokratija said. Manojlo Vukotic of Blic newspaper has
said that he is willing to face the court or go to jail if ''editorial policy of dialogue
and reconciliation in Kosovo is a matter for the court''.
Slavko Curuvija, editor-in-chief of Dnevni Telegraf, concluded that ''once again, like
during the wars in Croatia and Bosnia, the regime has found 'real' enemies in the
independent media in Serbia''. ''That is the climax of craziness in this country... that
we (the independent media) are to blame for what is happening in Kosovo,'' he added.
Milos Vasic, president of the Independent Journalists' Association of Serbia, said that
this latest move by the District Attorney office is ''highly dangerous''.
''Serbian authorities and the regime-controlled media are denying Serbian press the
right of independent reporting, the right to use and compare different sources of
information and the right to question self-contradictory, confusing and sometimes
pathetically suspect official statements of the Ministry of Interior.
''Even worse: for the first time the regime-controlled Radio Television of Serbia
openly asks that all the press in Serbia shall use hate-speech, emotionally loaded with
ethnic insults against Albanians.
''The independent press had their reporters in the field in Kosovo; those reporters
saw, heard and sometimes smelled the factual truth, and reported it as well as they could.
Is that a treason, as the regime media in Serbia are hinting? Is there any hope for
justice if the there's no hope for truth?'' concluded Vasic.
By Dipankar De Sarkar
LONDON, Mar 10 (IPS) - The arms embargo imposed against Yugoslavia Monday for its
crackdown on ethnic Albanians in Kosovo shows that the disputed province in southern
Serbia is no longer an internal affair of that country, strategic analysts say here.
But, some analysts argued, steps agreed at the London meeting of the Contact Group on
Bosnia may be a case of too little too late.
''I must say I am pessimistic (about the prospects of peace in Kosovo)'', Dean Allen of
the International Institute for Strategic Studies said. ''There appears to be no readiness
among the Serbian or the ethnic Albanian population to compromise,'' he added.
The majority ethnic Albanians of Kosovo won the limited backing of the Contact Group -
composed of Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Russia and the United States - in their
efforts to internationalise issues arising out of tensions with ethnic Serbs led by
Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic.
In her remarks at the London meeting, U.S. secretary of state Madeleine Albright said:
''It's ethnic cleansing all over again. The only kind of pressure president Milosevic
understands is the kind that imposes a real price on his unacceptable behaviour.''
Milosevic has been accused of inflicting human rights abuses on Kosovo Albanians and
seeking to settle Serbians in the province in a bid to alter its ethnic composition.
Kosovo Albanians - with support from the government of neighbouring Albania - also resent
Milosevic's 1989 scrapping of the autonomous status that Kosovo had enjoyed within
Yugoslavia since 1974.
Balkan affairs specialist Tasos Kokkinides of the London-based British American
Security Information Council said the meeting showed that events in Kosovo are no longer
the internal affair of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. ''The example of (the Russian
province of) Chechnya illustrates that the international community can interfere in
European affairs,'' he said. Though the intervention of the Organisation for Security and
Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) in Chechnya two years ago failed to solve the problem arising
from the Chechens' campaign for independence, ''mediation did take place and tensions were
lessened,'' Kokkinides said.
The parallel with Chechnya is particularly stark, given that the OSCE did not take a
stand on the independence demand with Chechnya and does not do so now with Kosovo.
The Contact Group said Monday in its statement that it supports neither independence
nor the maintenance of the status quo within Yugoslavia.
''No one should misunderstand our position on the core issue involved... As we have set
out clearly, the principles for a solution of the Kosovo problem should be based on the
territorial integrity of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and be in accordance with OSCE
standards, Helsinki principles and the U.N. Charter. Such a solution also must take into
account the rights of the Kosovo Albanians and all those who live in Kosovo.''
The Contact Group supports an ''enhanced status'' for those who live in Kosovo and for
Kosovo within Yugoslavia. It backs a ''substantially greater degree of autonomy,'
including ''meaningful self-administration.''
''I have some difficulties with this idea,'' said Allen. ''The status that Kosovo
enjoyed in the past was very much a product of balance of the larger Yugoslavia during the
cold War. I doubt if it can exist in the same way in the smaller rump Yugoslavia of today.
One does have to be sceptical about whether this is at all possible,'' he added. ''I fear
that it may be too late (for a peaceful settlement of the problem),'' Allen said, but
added that he did necessarily see independence as the solution.
Under the former arrangement, Kosovo Albanians were allowed their own Albanian language
schools and Islamic holy days among other concessions.
However, when Milosevic took away the province's autonomous status in 1989, he deployed
large contingents of Serbian police and troops, declared Albanian language unofficial and
changed school curricula. He is also said to have tried to settle in Kosovo, Serbs fleeing
the formerly Serb-held Croatian territory of Krajina.
In response, Kosovo Albanians elected an Albanian 'shadow government' in 1992, declared
Kosovo's independence and set up a parallel system of schools, health clinics and welfare
agencies.
Tensions erupted with the emergence of the shadowy Kosovo Liberation Army (UCK) in
1996. Believed to be funded by Albanian exiles in Germany and Switzerland and using arms
smuggled from Albania, the separatist UCK are thought to be behind a string of terrorist
strikes - most recently in neighbouring Macedonia.
Gross rights abuses by Serbs over the past weeks have heightened tensions, with
European and American governments fearing a 'nightmare scenario' where the conflict spills
over to engulf Macedonia, Albania, Greece, Bulgaria and Turkey.
However, Kokkinides said the London meeting will succeed in preventing the conflict
from spreading to neighbouring countries. ''The international community showed yesterday
(Monday) that although it has very little to room to manoueuvre in order to force the
situation, there are steps that can be taken to stop the spread of the conflict in the
region. This is of paramount importance.''
For this to happen two things were needed, he added. First the OSCE would have to play
a role similar to that in Chechnya, without taking a stand on the independence demand.
Second, Yugoslavia should be readmitted to the OSCE - it has been suspended because of the
Bosnia conflict - with the condition that it will cooperate closely with the organisation
and allow OSCE delegations free access to Kosovo. ''This is the carrot that must be
dangled before Yugoslavia,'' Kokkinides added.
Meanwhile, Britain Tuesday announced plans to ''intensively follow up'' the decisions
taken at the Contact Group meeting, which was attended by the foreign ministers of all six
countries except Russia. British foreign office minister Tony Lloyd is to visit the region
as representative of the European Union' presidency, presently held by London. His trip
beginning Wednesday will take him to Skopje, Tirana and Belgrade. In addition, 26 heads of
government and foreign ministers are set to discuss the Balkan situation, including
Kosovo, in a meeting to be held in London Thursday.
- Pacifica Network, KPFK Radio 90.7 fm
- Los Angeles
- March 13, 1998
- Host: Suzie Weissman (SW)
- Producer: Nalini Lasiewicz
Intro: Once again the Balkans are in turmoil. Last week, the Serbian special police
massacred over eighty civilians in Kosovo, the southern Serb province populated almost
entirely by ethnic Albanians. Kosovo is a powder keg, and opening a war there invites the
possibility of broadening the war to perhaps Macedonia, Albania, perhaps Greece, Bulgaria
and Turkey. To help us sort out this dangerous situation, we turn to our guests:
Guests:
- In New York: Bogdan Denitch - Professor, CUNY/NY and Director for the Institute for
Transitions in Democracy, an NGO with offices in Zagreb, Sarajevo, Tuzla and Belgrade.
(BD); Marko Maglich - Serbian American human rights activists and law student. (MM)
- In Belgrade: Borka Pavicevic - Center for Cultural Decontamination (bp BP)
- In London: Christopher Long - British journalist who has covered the region during the
Balkan war. (CL)
SW: "Welcome to Beneath the Surface." Police attacks in Kosovo last week may
be a terrible preview of things to come, especially if the Serbian Radical Party has it's
way. According to their program, which is available on the Internet, they aim to eradicate
the Albanian presence, which is 90% of the population from Kosovo, which is hailed by the
Serbs as sacred land. The Kosova Liberation Army is a new but active force as well. And,
while the Serbs are responsible for this attack, and Milosevic started his bloody
nationalist career with threats to Kosovo in 1987, we are once again witnessing
nationalisms confronting each other with bloody consequences. To delve Beneath the Surface
tonight we speak first to Marko Maglich who was one of the organizers and speakers at a
demonstration yesterday in NY in front of the Yugoslav embassy. Welcome to "Beneath
the Surface", Marko. Can you tell us what you did yesterday in NY?
MM: Actually, it was Wednesday, which is the same day that Women in Black always did
the protests in Belgrade, (BP: hmmm) and we kind of mirrored that. We had a silent vigil
across from the Yugoslav mission to the UN on Fifth Avenue here. It was organized
basically by a couple of people who just said "we've got to do something." Here
I am, steeped in law school, and this thing was happening all over again where the
bloodshed begins to happen and you get consumed with it and you can't get your work done
and flames are being thrown all over the Internet. Some people that I had met through the
Balkan Dialogue Group at the American Friends Service Committee and I decided we just had
to get out there and say something. In the end we didn't say much because it was silent,
but we stood across the street with our signs and hopefully, we won't have to repeat it as
often as the Women in Black did. But, you never know, the way things are looking, it may
become a regular thing.
SW: The war crimes tribunal has decided, it appears, to take a closer look at what's
going on in Kosovo. Do you have any information on that?
MM: It's a good thing that the investigation is being done. It's not necessarily a
final assertion and establishment of jurisdiction for them, they can still come in and
challenge jurisdiction. The Tribunal, though, does cover everything in the territory of
Yugoslavia since 1991 so it is open-ended in terms of the future. So, it's open-ended for
time and it covers that territory. The problem is that the law that's covered isn't
applicable until you have an armed conflict. An armed conflict can be an internal armed
conflict, there is some law called Common article 3 to the Conventions which enables
internal conflicts to be covered, but they still have to meet certain criteria like the
opposing forces or the insurgent forces have to have certain amount of organization and
they have to have control over a certain amount of territory. It's kind of debatable
whether it's at that level, at least yet.
SW: You do have, of course, the insurgents in the Kosovo Liberation Army. Would they,
presumably, constitute this force?
MM: If anyone is going to constitute it, it would be them. But in terms of a legal
definition, it may or may not meet it yet.
SW: I think the burning question is - since this is clearly aggression that has been
started by the Serbs using not the Army but the Police, is this something that the
International War Crimes tribunal might have the courage to indict Slobodan Milosevic for?
MM: I mean, it depends if it leads back to him? In a sense, this might be one of the
positives. I mean, you know, we are looking at horror, but you look for the good things
that could come out of it. One of them is that he was shielded from liability in Bosnia
because he didn't have that command and control that (Radovan) Karadzic had. Obviously
that's going to be a lot harder for him to establish here. So if you get that ideal that
this stuff is covered legally, then I'm hoping he may have shot himself in the foot.
SW: Well, tell us Marko before you have to leave, what kinds of things are you doing in
NY.
MM: I'm hoping we don't have to keep doing this! I'm a student here, working on human
rights law and actually my focus now is on Turkey because I have to go on a human rights
mission this spring. But, however, the parallels are interesting.
SW: There may be connections too. Well, thanks for being here with us on Beneath the
Surface and good luck to you.
MM: Thanks for having me, it's been a pleasure.
SW: I'd like to turn to my other guests. We have Christopher Long, who is one of the
longest serving specialist war correspondents covering the front line events in the Balkan
war for the British media and was doing that, I believe, from 1991 to 1995. Welcome!
CL: Good evening.
SW: And Borka Pavicevic is from the Center for Cultural Decontamination in Belgrade and
has been a long time activist for democratic rights and spoke to us on a regular basis
during the monumental demonstrations that she participated in for at least three months
last year. Welcome back, Borka Pavicevic.
BP: Good evening Suzie.
SW: I'm so glad we have you with us too. Christopher, you listened to what Marko
Maglich had to say about the possibility of the International War Crimes tribunal taking
up this issue. Do you know anything about that?
CL: I'm not really an expert on that and have been learning a lot from him from the
Internet. (both chuckle.) My feeling is slightly pessimistic about the whole of the war
crimes effort because unlike the Nuremberg trials fifty and more years ago, we seem here
to be working from the small fry upwards. There seems to be quite a number of relatively
unimportant alleged war criminals surfacing and the ones at the top so far have not been
picked up. [SW: ...and in fact are still in power...] And in fact are still in power.
There are those who would say that names as grand as Tudjman and Milosevic should be on
that list. But I think if you work from the bottom upwards, there isn't the same deterrent
value as there is in picking off the big sharks first and then working your way down to
the little minnows.
SW: Great. We're joined now by Bogdan Denitch, I want to introduce him, he's a
professor of political sociology at CUNY (City University of NY) Graduate Center and also
he's the Director of the Institute for Democracy in Transitions to Democracy, an NGO with
offices in Zagreb, Sarajevo, Tuzla and Belgrade. Bogdan, welcome to "Beneath the
Surface."
BP: It's good to be here. Hello Borka. [BP: hello and good evening]
SW: So glad to have you all here. Now, let's move away from the war crimes tribunal to
the war crimes themselves. The Serbs are responsible for this massacre in Kosovo. I read
on the Internet the Program of the Serb Radical Party. It is amazing. It calls for the
eradication of the Albanian presence in Kosovo, that's 90% of the population. It calls for
doubling the salaries of Serbs who move in into their places. It's about as horrific a
Program as one can imagine, of course they're not in power yet, but let's ask Borka first
how do you see the situation and what is the response in Belgrade to this latest action?
BP: Listen. That's what you said now [is key] - who is or who is NOT in power. And,
what is on the front page, and actually what is behind it - and who is working with whom -
and what's really happened... that's what is very important to [talk about] What has
happened [last week] has not just happened yesterday [for the first time.] That it has
lasted for a long time and actually Kosovo becomes the topic or 'the issue' as some people
would like to say, at the moment when the Yugoslavia was divided. Then that problem of
course appears like a problem which was previously discussed inside of the former
Yugoslavia. I'm mentioning that because today, actually the main issue [in the Serbia] is,
is the Kosovo interior problem of Yugoslavia or of Serbia? Therefore I mention that was
once upon a time. And then, what we are doing, tomorrow at noon, we have at the Center for
Cultural Decontamination is a gathering of all NGO organization in Belgrade. Afterward we
are supporting Women in Black, which Marko mentioned when he was speaking, in a public
action in the city center, demonstrating against that violence. It will be tomorrow (Sat
March 14) the discussion will be called: "Information: The Report from Kosovo" I
think it is terribly important to be very precise. We invited all the people who have been
on Kosovo, so it will be a few journalists, and the people from the Helsinki and the
humanitarian Les Enfantes and we will show the tape of a documentary because I think it is
extremely important to know what really is going on. At the same time, you know this is
[discussion we're hosting is designed to give] some kind of demystification that you
should be a 'specialist' of Kosovo, that everyone has to have specialist knowledge to draw
any conclusions It is NOT like that. But at the same time it is extremely important to
inform the People in Belgrade what really is going on. Because it's a question of the
twenty years. I must tell you something you may or may not know, that we have an
incredible, almost INCREDIBLE "virtual reality" here - something quite opposite
to the Internet - and that is that official media have recovered all the war propaganda
and are using the words - very much like it was, even MORE strongly, than in was during
the war in Croatia, during the war in Bosnia, during the elections in the Montenegro, now
we have such a words for the 'Kosovo issue'. That means "the terrorist" and
"the terrorist" and "the terrorist." And, what I want to stress, now,
when we are talking about this, it's important to have a fine and real words. For all
sides. And even for the international community. Me. We. All [of us] are using the things
[what has already been said] that we think can save the situation, like a dialog you know.
We just have to find a proper way, a real open direct language, to explain what is going
on because it is the end of the using, how to say, [terminology embezzled by the State to
obfuscate its meaning, to turn it on its head.] The human rights problem is something that
is used in the sense of the State language and in the political language and of course,
here, for a long time, we are talking about 'State' and the 'State' and the 'State' and
the 'Frontier' and the 'Frontier' and the 'Frontier' but nobody is talking about what kind
of State do we have and what those frontiers mean.
SM: Well, OK, I'm really glad you said that Borka. It sounds like your group has a lot
of cultural decontaminating to do and I want to turn now first to Bogdan Denitch to kind
of respond to that and talk a little bit about these States. First I think we need to get
some background. I said at the opening that Milosevic really started his nationalist
career in 1989 with threats against Kosovo...
BD: ....'87
SM: 1987. Thank you very much, and this was clearly different from Bosnia because it
kindles a feeling, I guess, in all Serbs because Kosovo is so sacred to them. Can you give
us a little bit of information and background?
BD: Well, the sacredness of Kosovo is an artifact created by intellectuals and
academics. I mean let's not carry on. Most Serbs I know, intellectual or non intellectual
have never been in Kosovo, have never entered the monastery and they'd be perfectly happy
to have somebody else die for it. So, it's a split passion. It's very much like the
feeling many Israelis have about the West Bank. They don't want to give it away and they
don't want to face the fact that they're a small minority there. Almost everything that is
popularly believed about Kosovo and Serbia is wrong. From the history to today's time...
from the Battle of Kosovo, where probably more Serbs fought on the Turks' side than on the
Serb side, all the way down to what the population of Kosovo was. But the real relevant
thing is that, even if you took the argument at it's face value, that the Albanians are
'newcomers' having only come there from the 17th century, is a bullshit argument. They
came to Kosovo according to Serbian legend roughly when the Europeans came to north
America. It happens to be untrue, they were there from at least as early as the Middle
Ages. The real problem was I think put together very well by Koca Popovitch, a major
Partisan war hero, who said "with great difficulty, it is possible to imagine Kosovo
Albanians becoming Yugoslavs. It is completely impossible to make them into Serbs."
Now, what that means to me is that the only conceivable solution for this carnage that's
shaping up there, and the international community is keeping it's mouth shut on that,
would be for Kosovo to become a sovereign republic within Yugoslavia that is if Kosovo may
not succeed and must remain in Yugoslavia, it should remain in with the same rights as
Serbia and Montenegro. It should be a Republic. And, many well-known Albanian leaders
[like Bakali and Vlasi] have come out for that. There are two ironies in Kosovo right now.
One is that Rugova, who's committed to non-violence, (head of the leading party in Kosovo
- or the thing that was the leading party among the Kosovo Albanians/it's become a more
fluid question [since the police massacres,] and he has the most rigid demands. He demands
independence or nothing. The more radical guys, including the armed struggle people
actually would vote for demand for autonomy and the removal of the police [at a minimum].
The Serbian police are, of course, an army of occupation. They don't represent even the
local Serbs let alone the 90% population which is Albanian. The other irony is this,
Albanians in Kosovo are being punished by the international community for having been
non-violent. That is a clear message that is, 'non-violent struggle doesn't get you any
attention.' They were off the agenda [to the great relief of the international community
and Belgrade both]. They weren't discussed at Dayton and the world [believed] it had all
the time in the world to catch up with Kosovo. Once violence started, then all of a sudden
Kosovo becomes a [serious] thing. And lastly, at the point on which I insist and I think
that's where I differ from most NGO's in Serbia, not Borka but from the other NGO's, I do
not think it is appropriate for Serbian NGO's to denounce Albanian terrorism while
denouncing the police. I do not think that the two are equivalent. I think that the
Albanians who took arms, (I think it was a bad strategy,) but took up arms, were far more
analogous to the Algerian and other anti-colonial freedom fighters and even to the
Partisans, than to terrorists. The terrorists are the Serbian police.
SW: Do you know anything about the Kosovo Liberation Army, are these...
BD: They are very small. And there are apparently two currents. One probably is at
least theoretically closer to the Marxist party, although I don't think that the Marxist
party has anything to do with them, and their support comes from abroad, from the Albanian
Diaspora in Switzerland and in Germany. There also have been some talk that some of the
groups going under their name have been police provocateurs, which is quite possible, I
mean the Serbian police has done similar things in the past. But I think that there is a
genuine armed struggle movement and it is increasingly popular among the students and the
young.
SW: OK, we'll turn now to Christopher Long. You've listened now both to Borka and to
Bogdan and you were on the scene from 91 to 95, paying attention to what Borka said about
the heightening use of war language, how do you assess the situation there?
CL: Yes, well I happened to be there purely by chance in spring 1989, when exactly this
same sort of thing happened and it was in a way the beginning of the Serbo-Croatian and
Bosnian wars, so it's sort of like a flashback seeing it all happen again. I couldn't
disagree with anything either of them said, and I have tremendous admiration for Borka to
be able to say what she's saying from Belgrade because it's not easy to represent her
views there. I think the biggest problem Kosovo faces is that there isn't, yet, a
figurehead, a military leader who they can rally around. When I say that's a problem,
until a figure of that sort emerges, I don't think there is going to be anything on an
organized basis by the KLA and Rugova is certainly not going to be the military leader of
the future. It all rather reminds me of Izetbegovic, exactly as we've just heard, they
were told "Keep clean. Don't get involved. Don't fight. Don't arm... and the West
will look after you." And, of course, the West did nothing of the sort. We are seeing
the same thing happening again. They've been promised by CSCE and Skoplje and other places
"Don't get involved, don't fight, and we'll take care of you" and of course,
they haven't.
SW: Borka, turning to you now, how do you respond to first of all what Bogdan Denitch
said about not creating a symmetry between the actions of the Kosovo Liberation Army and
the Serbian police, and secondly as perhaps as a solution, organizing or demanding
autonomy within Yugoslavia.
BP: Yeah... isten... I first want to say that I completely agree with that mythological
and paramythological explanation of Bogdan's. I would just want to say that during all
this war the Serbian regime has an incredible number of the different excuses for the
violence. For example one is the territorial argument. The second are Historical. The
third time they are Familiar. The fourth time, they are Majority. Now, what is it we are
doing with the majority and minority? What is the democracy if most of the population
wants something, then how we deal with that when the most of the population was for the
Big Serbia you know? Bogdan is completely right in that 'using' the different arguments in
a volunteristic way as you like it to make a situation sure for yourself. I just want to
say something. And of course I make the statement that the officials are permanently
pushing, the single idea of terrorism and you will see that in most of the announcements
in Yugoslavia and in the international community. This is something which everyone is
stressing, dividing "terrorism" from people and then to speak about the Serbian
police action. Which is, by the police action it means that it is the solution of the
regime. And what I must say I'm afraid of is that some people want that war. You know,
this is a will for something. Because that will was present during the whole Yugoslavia
war, somebody wanted it. This is actually is a question of human rights in the context of
the political will when something is useful for that. We are looking for that for ten
years '87 was the beginning and every step of that regime was, in a sense, I don't know
ending, but it is the proper legitimization. You said the Radicals are not in the power.
But the police, Radicals, all together, as it was a very big story that we have
Paramilitaries. What does it mean Paramilitaries?! All those actions are subordinated and
somebody is ordering those actions.
SW: Who's doing this? Is this the last gasp of a weakened Milosevic, who's has had
demonstrations against him, who wants for some reason to ignore the IC and press ahead to,
for, I don't know, to gain popular support?
BP: You see, Suzie, this is one incredible paradox. You have this extremely developed
xenophobia here and now it, in a moment, is all Serbian, Belgrade if I may say, official
propaganda is they say that 'terrorism is something international.' And actually, that's
what happened with us and our dear regime is, that you have permanently denied the
international rules, and you say "No. No." And you are abusing that theory that
[everybody is hating us', that 'everyone against the Serb', that it is like this New World
Order and so on. At the end, you are accepting everything. What I want to stress is that
Milosevic is making a colony from these people.
CL: I think that actually another agenda is behind this... I'm sure that Milosevic is
trying to out-Seselj Seselj and out-Draskovic Draskovic because you know he can be certain
that he will have support from the vast majority of the Serb population and has bolstered
his position which is weakened... but there is another issue which has run right the way
through this war from the very beginning when Milosevic and Tudjman had their secret
talks, at the very very beginning of the war. And that is the question of where will the
north-south main rail and roadway routes run down to the Mediterranean. (BP: ah uh) At the
moment, the Croats are very, very busily and heavily investing in their Dalmatian route
which would run down from the Dalmatian coast into Albania and through to the
Mediterranean. There is the other big possible route which is Belgrade, Skoplje, Nis and
down to Thessaloniki, And in the background, whoever controls the north-south trade route
through what was Yugoslavia will be the gateway to Europe from the south, most of the
world. I think that this is an issue that is lurking right at the back of an awful lot of
things. I'm not saying it's the most important thing, it's not responsible for 80 deaths,
or more than 80 deaths in Kosovo last week. But it is on the agenda and it's something
which the West would be very unwise to ignore.
SM: How do you see it, Bogdan Denitch?
BD: Oh, I think that Milosevic is smarter than people give him credit for. That he is
going to manoeuvre the opposition into taking most of the initiatives over Kosovo. He's
already compromised Dodik, who was the best news we've had so far (BP moan) into offering
to enter into this case, which is a bad mistake. The demonstrations were betrayed, the
demonstrations of last year were betrayed. The leading party [Draskovic's SPO] is now in
alliance with Milosevic right now and the second most powerful party, the Djindjic's
party, is nationalist, quite clearly. I think that the terrible thing about Kosovo is that
the Parliamentary opposition, with a few exceptions, for the Vojvodina people [the League
of Social Democrats, led by Nenad Canak] people, is utterly silent [including Vesna
Pesic], and that this is the same problem we have in Croatia - in that sense, Croatia and
Serbia are alike. The democratic opposition that the west likes, the respectable centrist
opposition, will not counterpoise itself to the Nationalists. The people who do
counterpoise themselves to the Nationalists tend to be left wingers and (laughs) they're
not liked or rated. [given help by the West and by the U.S.]
SW: But, do they have any support?
BD: Yes, yes they do. For example, the trade union Nezavisnost in Belgrade, everybody
tells me it's a 'small union', when I go there, I notice that they have more members than
the rest of the NGO's put together. I don't know what 'small' means. [The 'democratic'
position parties are very small when it comes to actual members.] In the case of Zagreb,
there's really a massive opposition and there was demonstrations against Tudjman led by
the unions one day and by the NGO's the other. I think there is an opposition but I think
it has been kept out of the media, rather systematically, because it doesn't fit the
model. The model is, what the Americans want is, a pro-market, pro-Western, not very
radical, civilized liberal opposition. Those people just don't exist.
SW: Isn't that also the case in terms of the demonstrations we saw earlier against
Milosevic so that the working class was, let's say hesitant to take part?
BD: ... For one thing, their demands were never put together! The fact of the matter is
that much of what the middle-class opposition claims to want actually would make the
conditions for the workers worse.
SW: And I was going to say as well that looking to the other countries who have begun
the transition to the market. It doesn't look so good for the working class.
BD: No, particularly because Djindjic who at least is in the opposition, is very much
committed to a real market, which would mean massive unemployment in Serbia under the
present circumstances. The problem is that the mass opposition to Milosevic and to
Tudjman, in my opinion, given the great economic misery, will either be right populist,
like Seselj, or left at least social democratic, but it would not be liberal and moderate.
A nice moderate intellectual opposition will never have any real effect in that area.
SW: How would you classify Milosevic, as a populist nationalist?
BP: I think that the stupidest thing the opposition in Belgrade does is by calling
Milosevic leftist. I mean, that is the stupidest goddamn thing. It gives away the
legitimacy on left issues and it actually reinforces his support among workers. It is
stupid! By the way, it's interesting to consider why it is that they do that stupid thing
repeatedly and have the slogan as "Down with Reds and Commies" as the main
slogan of the Belgrade demonstrations day and night for months. [There were no social
demands.] I was there and I was there in Prishtina, day and night, in Prishtina the
students consider themselves left wing. [They were willing to support the students in
Belgrade, the Belgrade students did not support them.]
SW: We have to take a break and when we come back, I'd like to ask do you know anything
about the mood in Kosovo itself? What's the social composition of those who are opposing
Serbian aggression? Do we know?
BD: Just a word before we sign off... There's been an excellent statement put out by
Shkelzen Maliqi who is one of the more reasonable [intellectual] leaders in Kosovo and we
are in day to day touch. The trouble is that they find it very difficult to find opposite
numbers in Serbia. [One, Borka, is on your program today. There is also the head of the
Independent Journalists Association, Milos Vasic, and a few others.]
SW: If the war propaganda moves ahead and there is a new Yugoslav war against Kosovo,
and it has the possibility of drawing in Albania, Macedonia, and perhaps then Bulgaria,
Greece and maybe even Turkey, this is all conjecture, but I'd like to get your ideas on
that and what the international community's response should be. I'll start with Bogdan
Denitch.
BD: Well, I think that Turkey is extremely concerned about the Albanian issue. It's
calling for conferences and would at the very least provide arms.
SW: Is your believe that Turkey is interested because they are Muslims and they are
acting as a client of the United States in this regard?
BD: No, I don't think it's acting as a client for the U.S. I think they're interested
in secular Muslims. There are not that many of them in the world.
CL: I think it's to recognize that Turkey feels that she's been snubbed by the European
Community in not being offered membership because of her civil rights.
BD: That is, if the Kosovars were not Muslim, they would have been treated much better,
is the feeling.
CL: To some extent, I feel Turkey is feeling left out of things and that this is an
issue she can flex some muscles on.
SW: Continuing on this vein, do you see that this is the war that will spill over and
include much of Europe?
CL: The great danger with Kosovo, just to get it geographically right, its really a
very large plain entirely ringed by mountains and it's extremely poor. And the villages
are widely scattered, very very cut off from each other. Most of the names of places where
atrocities have been happening are not even marked on most maps, so Srbica, Likosane, they
are tiny, tiny places. So it's difficult for people in that area to mobilize and
communicate. It's like it was in the eastern part of Bosnia where the communities are cut
off from each other.
BD: Well, one of the places involved is Srbitza (chuckles) is where my grandparents
were from, it's not that small.
SW: (laughing) It's not so small then.
CL: Well, in a country where the population is 2 million at the most, I mean, they are
very small by comparison to an audience in the West who is listening to this program.
BD: But, like in Algeria, the percentage of the population which is of arms bearing age
is rather large. It's mostly quite young and I think it's to be devoutly hoped for that
the war would not be headed off. But I think that unless Serbia is hammered and hammered
by the international community right now, they will continue stalling on any substantive
talks. [Then the hard men and guns alone will talk.]
CL: I think that's right. I think that in the end, it could very easily mirror the
situation in Bosnia in which the sheer numbers of people and the commitment of people, I'm
talking about the Muslim community there, in the end they just win through.
BD: By the way, among the lessons from Bosnia is that, for God's sake, intervene early
enough so that lives are saved and so that the cycle of hatred and revenge isn't
established. The intervention in Bosnia proved that it could have been done equally well
two years earlier and I think that the United States bears a heavy responsibility because
they talk tough and do very little.
SW: But given that they are talking tough right now and I wondered why the Clinton
administration is jumping in with hard words from Madeleine Albright right now, do you
think this has anything to do...
BD: This is a pattern! They've done that on Bosnia. They made the Bosnians turn down
three agreements before the Dayton agreement. Always implicitly promising a better
agreement. Every agreement that the Bosnians got offered was worse than the previous one.
I think Albright is doing something extraordinarily irresponsible. She is talking very
tough when she knows that the Pentagon is not preparing for an intervention. I think a
slightly softer talk and a slightly bigger stick would make much more sense.
SW: OK. let's ask Borka Pavicevic what the feeling is from Belgrade. Do you have any
hopes that the international community is going to help out?
BP: What I think I have to say to Bogdan, I think it's very important, I think that you
can't speak in the terms of the subject of 'Eastern Europe transition.' In Yugoslavia,
there is NO transition. I am deeply convinced that the war burst out because of the
'non-willing' for transition. Actually, that's what's going on in Serbia. The regime wants
to possess everything. I deeply agree with Bogdan about the complete misunderstanding
about Milosevic and especially that the party of Mirjana Markovic, Milosevic's wife, is a
left orientated party. That game, between the opposition and the ruling parties, that the
ruling parties are left and that the opposition is right, is one of the most biggest
misunderstandings in all political life in Serbia. Neither of them are left parties,
neither of them are right parties. It's a mimicry of everything, and that is why,
actually, it has been done and why I think that the Kosovo situation is a terribly
dangerous. The regime in Serbia is not capable of ANY transition. They don't want that.
The Yugoslav war burst out because of non-possibility of a transition society and
non-possibility of entering modern European society. nd this is the nature of that regime,
and therefore this regime is producing the war, and therefore I think the situation is
extremely dangerous in that it is organized will [deliberate] to have the situation as it
is. And this is what I want to say to Denitch... I don't think that any transition, there
is no will here, nothing is a property, even the Hyatt Hotel in Belgrade has no (????)It
means that you are keeping a permanent volunteristic situation that you can do whatever
you want, in any minute that you need it and that it's useful for you. And now, who knows
what is the aim of Kosovo Battle, again, if I may say, because it was something in the
fourteenth century. But we see with our eyes that all that national mythologemma are just
the mimicry for stealing, and for the taking of all property in this country, including
our lives. So, I mean, this is for me the main point. I can't say everything about the
Kosovo situation. I'm afraid that there are confrontations of the political wills and the
international community, I think, should really recognize what is going on. And not having
this, in-general position, for example "dialog will save us," or any floscula
[Latin for buzz-word! Ed.] which is made upon something what we invented that is going on
and it's not going on for real.
CL: And also to recognize that Kosovo is not necessarily the last chapter in all this
because Sanjak is also waiting to happen, western Macedonia is another possibility of
serious problems of this sort, and I'd really be interested to know what Belgrade thinks
about how long Montenegro will remain loyal to Serbia? (BP: hmmm)
SW: So you're really talking about the continuing disintegration of Yugoslavia.
CL: I think there are still several more chapters to go.
BD: Macedonia is an independent state now.
BP: Any war from here is not finished.
BD: What Borka says makes a great deal of sense but we have to think another thing
through which makes this even worse. Namely, yes, this regime is not capable of making a
change and working toward transition. The tragic thing is that the opposition isn't
either. This opposition has been, on the Kosovo issue, just as bad as Milosevic. That's
why the decontamination that is being done is extremely important. There really does need
to be some decontamination. Macedonia, by the way, has been already worrying about
refugees. There are something like 8,000-10,000 Kosovar refugees in Montenegro already,
and one point which I want to make, which isn't too well understood, is that the Kosovo
opposition is not exclusively nationalist. The main paper, Koha Ditore is not nationalist.
It's published by Veton Surroi. They do me the honor of publishing my stuff.
SW: Are you saying then that what, it's a democratic opposition?
BD: They're for a civil democratic state, some of them. An autonomous republic within
Yugoslavia which would have special cultural relations with Albania just like Serbs want
to have special cultural relations with Republika Srpska in [in Bosnia-Herzegovina.]
SW: And so, what are the chances of this happening, do you think?
BD: The longer the police are there, the smaller the chance. There are over 100 people
who have been murdered. There are lots of women and children who have been murdered,
Christopher Hedges reports are quite detailed, there was torture of the people who were
killed. Incidentally, we have rather good reportage on Kosovo. NY Times has been
excellent.
SW: Yes, it has been excellent, with pictures...
BD: Hedges is, I'm worried about his safety. He's been to the funerals. He's been
talking to the armed struggle people...
SW: ... And other journalists have been beaten up...
BD: Right, and he's rather well known right now and an easy to recognize guy. I worry
about him.
SW: And Christopher Long, what about you, are you heading back to the area?
CL: I think that's likely if things carry on the way they're going, yes.
SW: I'd like to get ending statements from everybody about what you think should be
done what should be the response of the international community and what if anything our
listeners should know...
CL: I think a lot less of politicians meeting in guilded halls and smart hotels in
Western Europe and a lot more very decisive and very tough action on the ground in
Belgrade, in Prishtina. All this sort of diplomatic stuff is not going to achieve
anything, we'll just see Bosnia again and another four or five years of mayhem unless
these people learn from past mistakes.
SW: Thank you Christopher Long... and Borka, what final thought do you have?
BP: Listen, I think that if possible, as much as it is possible, it is necessary to
spread what's really going on in Kosovo and to try to mobilize democratic possibilities in
Serbia because I think that no where the political situation will change while such a
government and regime still exist and politicians are on the top of this society. And what
we can do is, really what Bogdan said, to 'decontaminate' I mean, this is actually after
so many years that some kind of the national sickness, which is used of course, and I
don't see any solution then to fight every fight against such a nationalistic regime in
Serbia. This is what should be changed, and at that moment you can talk about democratic
dialog and other civilized relations among the people.
SW: Thank you. We have one minute left. Bogdan Denitch...
BD: I think that massive aid is needed to the hardcore opposition to Milosevic and
Tudjman. I think the two are linked. (BP: yes) They both effect the Kosovo area because,
of course, there is always the argument, "these guys are getting away with this
stuff, why aren't we?" I think that we have been, the United States, extremely
damaging in the area because we have permitted our so called allies in the case of
Croatia, to commit the kind of crimes that we condemn elsewhere. In the case of Kosovo, I
think we need to help our friends. That is to say, democrats who are not nationalists.
SW: Well, thank you all for joining us. I'm Suzie Weissman . We've been discussing
Kosovo. Thanks to producer Nalini Lasiewicz. Thanks for listening and we'll be back next
Friday with another Beneath the Surface.
Copyright KPFK/Pacifica 1998 / Reprinted with permission
Copyright 1998 The New York Times Company, Sunday, March 15, 1998; page 6
By JANE PERLEZ
BELGRADE, Yugoslavia (March 14) - Several weeks before the Serbian police killed
scores of ethnic Albanians in the southern province of Kosovo, President Slobodan
Milosevic of Yugoslavia was warned by Washington's top Balkans negotiator not to carry out
the widely expected crackdown.
Why Milosevic, who in the same meeting was offered some concessions by the diplomat,
Robert Gelbard, for good behavior in neighboring Bosnia, went ahead anyway - so brutally
and so soon after the admonition - is not clear.
But Serbs and diplomats who have followed Milosevic during his decade in power say
that, with his deepening isolation at home and abroad, he may simply have miscalculated.
"Maybe Mr. Gelbard had a twitch, so Milosevic thought it was a wink to go
ahead," said Stojan Cerovic, a political journalist who writes critically about
Milosevic. "I can't explain it. But this time Milosevic has been forced to step back,
and from Mr. Milosevic's own point of view he is in a very bad position."
Last Monday, in a speedier reaction than Milosevic apparently expected, the United
States and ist Western allies imposed sanctions and threatened to strengthen them if
Milosevic did not make some significant moves to end the repression of ethnic Albanians
within 10 days.
Intense diplomatic acctivity, including a schedule visit to Belgrade early next week by
Russian Foreign Minister Yevgeny Primakov, is intended, American officials said, to
impress on Milosevic that his time is running out.
To reinforce this message, an administration official said Gelbard sent Milosevic a
letter last week pointing out that a columnist in The Financial Times had likened the
Serbian leader to Saddam Hussein. It was a comparison, Gelbard added, that was being
widely made.
Earlier in the week, Gelbard met with Milosevic and tried to persuade him to stop the
brutality of his police by handing him graphic photographs taken from the Internet of
mutilated Albanian women and children.
But the unanswered question is whether Milosevic grasps the situation.
"I think the West is serious and that they are fed up with Milosevic," said
Miograd Perisic, vice president of the opposition Democratic Party. "But I don't know
if Milosevic understands."
Always secretive, Milosevic has become ever more so.
He rarely appears on his main propaganda machine, government television, and when he
does, he has
the air of a sultan, secure and calm, seated in a brocade and gilt armchair, dressed in
a blue blazer, listening with ever-so-slight condescension to a foreign visitor.
People can barely remember the rare occasions when he has uttered even a few sentences
on television.
His only known confidant is his wife and childhood sweetheart, Mira Markovic, who runs
a political party whose officials are placed in key positions throughout the government.
Thus, Yugoslavia is essentially run by a husband-and-wife team, sometimes referred to
here as The Family.
Cerovic estimates that Milosevic talks on a weekly basis to no more than 20 people,
among them Radmilo Bogdanovic, the former chief of Serbian police. Bogdanovic publicly
warned last month that the ethnic Albanians of Kosovo would be dealt with.
Kosovo's ethnic Albanians, who make up 90 percent of the population, have been pressing
for greater autonomy or even independence.
Internationally, Milosevic is a pariah who almost never leaves home. The only head of
state to have visited Milosevic in the last four years was the neo-Communist leader of
Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko.
When he meets with visiting Western diplomats, Milosevic can be snide. Last year, he
told off one American official by saying that Washington's policy in Kosovo favored the
ethnic Albanians because "Albanian narcos" - meaning Albanian drug traffickers -
had bought off the State Department.
Although Milosevic gives the outward appearance of being secure - he controls the
police and the army and allows his Socialist Party henchmen to run the corrupt economy -
he faces potentially strong opposition in Montenegro, Serbia's junior partner in what
remains of Yugoslavia. The new president of Montenegro, Milo Djukanovic, is a political
rival and a critic of the Kosovo crackdown.
Copyright 1998 The New York Times Company, Saturday, March 14, 1998; page A3
By CHRIS HEDGES
LAUSA, Yugoslavia - A short burst of automatic weapons fire on Friday sent villagers
scurrying for cover down a narrow dirt street. There they gathered behind a wall of red
cinder blocks and scanned the hilltops nervously.
"There are Serbian snipers all through the hills," said Muharrem Geci, 56.
"They are in positions on the ridge tops every few hundred yards. When they see
movement in the street, they fire. Six villagers, including two small children, have been
killed in the last week. We go get the bodies at night."
The sweep of the province over the last two weeks by police and paramilitary units,
which has left some 80 ethnic Albanians dead, was intended to crush the outlawed
separatist group, the Kosovo Liberation Army.
It appears, however, that dozens of fighters from central Kosovo, where the attacks
took place, have escaped in small groups to the hills. Gunfire echoes through these
valleys. The police have built heavily sandbagged positions at road blocks, and late
Friday afternoon mortar rounds exploded in the distance.
The rebels, who fired on a police checkpoint a mile from here on Thursday, appear to be
shifting the center of their operations. In remote hamlets in the hills they are nursing
their wounded, collecting their weapons and establishing new bases. There are also reports
of armed groups collecting near the border with Albania.
"These armed groups appear to have scattered to new areas," said Veton
Surroi, the editor of the Albanian-language daily Koha Ditore. "We may have just
become Latin America."
The ethnic Albanians, who make up 90 percent of the two million people in Kosovo
Province, are edgy and suspicious, often denying any knowledge of the rebels. Some
farmers, however, have helped the guerrilla bands.
On a remote farm a few miles from Lausa, a man wounded twice in the attack on the
village of Prekaz last week lay on a mattress in a small shed. A doctor who walked around
the police checkpoints tended to him a few days ago, but the patient has no medicine or
sterile bandages for his wounds.
The man and the people sheltering him asked that neither they nor their location be
identified.
"I have lost the feeling in one of my legs," he said weakly, "but it is
too dangerous to send anyone again for medical help. If the Serbs find out that I am here,
they will come and butcher everyone in this house. It is better for me to die than put
them at risk."
The carnage may have spawned the low-intensity war that the Serbians were hoping to
avoid. There has been no withdrawal of the hundreds of special police units, and Friday
trucks were setting up portable metal living units for police.
Yugoslavian officials, who say they are engaged in a mopping-up operation, also concede
that the rebels fire nightly on police positions in areas where they were not believed to
have units.
The people in this region are no strangers to rebellion and violence. Most families
have sepia photos of fathers and grandfathers who died in the vain struggles against the
Serbs for independence.
"This is the third time I have felt in my bones the risk from the Serbs,"
said Lah Geci, 72, leaning on a wooden cane.
"The first was in 1941 when the Germans came. They weren't so bad, but the
Chetniks attacked them and tried to kill us all," he said, referring to the Serbian
royalist forces.
"Then in 1945 we wanted our independence and there was another fight," he
said, "and now again Friday."
As Geci spoke, a young man in a black leather jacket came up behind him. Shaban Geci,
18, lost his father, Osman, in the Serbian assault last week on the neighboring village of
Prekaz. Many of the ethnic Albanians in the village, a stronghold of the rebel movement,
fired back on the police, while thousands, including members of his family, fled their
homes.
"I hope the Serbs never touch us again," he said. "If they do, there
will be a war. Everyone will rise up."
Most ethnic Albanians, however, appear for now to be preoccupied with their security
and the effort to return to their homes.
Shani Gecaj, 43, sat on an old brown vinyl car seat in front of his house drinking a
cup of coffee. He is one of the few men to remain in the village of Lausa, 25 miles west
of Pristina. He winced briefly as shots rang out a few hundred yards away.
"I don't try to find out what is happening," he said. "It is too
dangerous. I am an innocent man with no rights and no job. If they want to kill me, they
can come and kill me in my house. My hands are empty. They have guns. For them it would be
an easy thing."
Monday, 9 March 1998
The Government of the Republic of Kosova, as the highest legitimate executive body of
the Albanian institutional life in the Republic of Kosova, in its capacity to perform all
the rights deriving therefrom and under political guidance by the Coordinating Council of
the Political Parties of Kosova in today's emergency situation, is honoured and privileged
to address itself to the distinguished Foreign Ministers of the Contact Group Countries
meeting in London, on Monday 9 March 1998, to discuss in an emergency meeting the
explosive and ever deteriorating situation in Kosova.
The Government of the Republic of Kosova wishes to reiterate, distinguished Foreign
Ministers, its most profound and grave concern over the recent barbarous, massive combined
and indiscriminate Serb police, paramilitary and military attack, from land and air,
against the defenceless and peaceful Albanian civilian population in various villages of
Skenderaj and Drenica zones. According to independent reports, in their large-scale,
police-military operation which is still going on, the combined Serb forces have killed
over 60 Albanian civilians, including women and children, destroyed numerous houses and
property, forcing the Albanians to leeave their ancestral homes an villages, in another
sweeping ethnic cleansing, which takes exact heritage from what the Belgrade regime
organised and carried out in Bosnia and Hercegovina during 1991-1994.
The Serbian Belgrade regime is using all kinds of manipulations, fabrications and
concoctions to try to justify their long-standing, overall anti-Albanian state terrorism
and genocide, as well as their present, totally unacceptable and fully condemnable
military and police aggression against the Albanian people of Kosova, with alleged
anti-terrorist operations. The whole world understands, as could be visibly confirmed by
all those few who have been able to penetrate into the sealed off region and some very
reliable TV channels, that this is not the case. All condemn terrorism, in whatever form
it appears. There is nothing new to this position. But what is happening in Kosova is
something quite different and far from Serb allegations, which can be hardly believed any
longer.
In the face of an ever increasing terror, violence, military aggression, ethnic
cleansing, flagrant violation of all international norms, standards, principles and
commitments, as well as all human, political and national rights of the two
million-strong, unprotected Albanian population of Kosova by the Belgrade regime, the
Government of the Republic of Kosova is appealing to the Contact Group to take immediate
action to stop this new wave of aggression and massacres against the Albanians of Kosova.
The Government of the Republic of Kosova, in its all-out efforts to work cooperatively
and constructively with the major factor of international politics, it its efforts to do
whatever it possibly can to stop the Serbian massacres and aggression, and to represent
faithfully the wishes, desires and aspiration of an entire people of two million in their
bid for the right to decide on their own political future, kindly takes this opportunity
to request to the Contact Group to show the necessary cohesion, cooperation and
determination to act, without losing time, to stop Belgrade's policy and dictator from
further pursuing ist political objectives through terror, oppression, violence and use of
force in Kosova.
Distinguished Foreign Ministers,
Rump Yugoslavia is another unsuccessful effort to keep unity by force. We all know that
forced unity is no unity and the coercive unity that Milosevic is advocating is again
serving only as a cover for Serbian hegemony, which we all know by now what it means.
Milosevic is unwilling to give to the Albanians in Kosova the same right to
self-determination that he demanded, inspired, encouraged and supported politically and
militarily, for the Serbs in Bosnia and Croatia, which subsequently led to terrible
blood-shed and loss of lives.
Old, sentimental alliances with and support for aggressive, warmongering regimes and
their policies for unjust causes in the modern, ever integrating world of democratic
countries that share the same values radiating over the entire world, seem to be
groundless and little justified, it at all, today, at the close of the Millennium.
With four of the former six republics and two autonomous regions of the SFRY gone
independent, and rightly supported in their bid to do so, Kosova, it is clear, cannot
survive in any sort of Yugoslavia controlled and dominated by Serbia. The Albanian people
of Kosova are not secure, in any way, and they cannot endure any more the kind of
genocide, oppression and aggression they are experiencing, nor can they be forced to live
in a building which has already collapsed, simply because one wishes to keep that
building's facade and the few remaining ones inside by force, when all its other
inhabitants have left.
After 80 years under Serbian rule, the Albanians have opted, through a broad popular
referendum, that they want to be free of Serbian state terror, humiliation, domination,
oppression, violation of all their political future, just as any other people has the
right to do and/or have done, including some of those of the former Yugoslavia. They have
been pushed by the Serb actions onto a path of no return towards absolute
self-determination and freedom. And they have chosen to do so through a resistance that is
non-violent, as they have demonstrated all along these decades and have been credited for
it. In view of the current tragedy of the Albanian people of Kosova, the Government of
Kosova wishes to put before you, through this Memorandum, certain concrete measures and
actions, which it proposes as part of a strong, forward looking package, which the Contact
Group hopefully would be in a position to agree upon, and bring to bear on Belgrade all
kinds of pressure, ruling out no option, if necessary, and save the entire region from
further, unpredictable destabilisation.
With all the above clearly in mind, in order to stop what is happening and find just,
fair and lasting solutions, projecting long-term stability, the Government of the Republic
of Kosova kindly requests the distinguished Contact Group Foreign Ministers to seriously
consider taking concrete steps as follows:
- * Present dynamics point to further violence by those who have the weapons, the
political orientation and goals to do so. The status quo cannot - nor should it - endure
any more. Avoiding such a violence requires an urgent, comprehensive international peace
process, in which all involved would participate as equals, with clear, indiscriminate
and/or superior-versus-inferior positions.
- * Kosova, as a major international issue of key significance for the future of the
region's stability, should be channelled toward peacefully negotiated political solutions,
with strong international mediation, a step that we have always asked for and which should
ultimately be imposed on Milosevic.
- * Certain non-military confidence building measures should immediately take place, in
the first instance, such as, the unconditional and immediate return of the OSCE
long-duration mission; an immediate end to all kinds of repression and human, political
and other rights and fundamental freedoms; immediate opening of school buildings and
permission of Albanian students to continue all studies in their mother tongue in their
normal school buildings; establish democratic institutions, including the independent
judiciary and the parliament; allow complete and unimpeded freedom of expression and
association, as well as freedom of the media; All this is part of the entire bulk of
international documents, decisions, resolutions and statements of the UNGA, UNSC, CoE
Parliamentary Assembly, EU, NATO, OSCE and its Parliamentary Assembly, national
parliaments, numerous NGO's etc.;
- * Reinstatement of all sanctions, previously lifted, on Serbia's Belgrade regime and
careful, very cautious use of carrots in the foreseeable future. We hail the new decision
of the US Administration to that effect, and urge all the other states to do so. The new
developments and situations are already teaching again the lesson that the international
community is dealing and will have to deal with a dictator, with a very unreliable, a
second Sadam in Europe, who is a manipulator and uses and misuses everything for his own
power and for his regimes political objectives, built on myths and far from any pragmatic
realism;
- * Immediate and entire lifting of the martial law imposed since 1989, and urgent
commencement of the gradual withdrawal of the police and the military from Kosova,
unilaterally, before the start of any negotiations;
- * Subsequent military confidence building, including full compliance with the Articles
II, III and IV of Annex 1B of the Dayton Accords, as well as commencement of inspection
and verification of compliance with full regard to Kosova;
- * Urgent dispatch of an advanced NATO observation team, possibly from NATO's SFOR
contingents in Bosnia and Hercegovina, as well as urgent decision on a no-fly zone over
Kosova, due to frequent Serbian air raids, attacks and helicopter gunships.
- * Imposition on and recognition by Serbia's Belgrade regime of the indispensable need
for political talks and negotiations to solve the question of the political status of
Kosova, under the auspices and mediation of the international community, in order to bring
about a lasting solution to the pending and unresolved Kosova and the Albanian question in
the Balkans;
- * Take concrete steps to immediately start consultations and talks, both with Belgrade
authorities and with the legitimate Albanian authorities and institutions, elected and
recognised a such, on all the modalities for these negotiations between Belgrade and
Prishtina; make all the necessary preparations for the appropriate setting in which these
negotiations should take place;
There is enough legal mandate and justification for the Contact Group, under the
existing relevant UNSC resolutions on the former Yugoslavia, to proceed swiftly and
unimpeded, with concrete messages and action.
Distinguished Foreign Ministers,
The situation today is no longer that during the years 1991-1992. We confidently hope
that the appropriate lessons have been learned from certain, long-dragged consultations,
discussions and negotiations, diverging views and interests, that dominated the
international scene in 1991-93 when the break-up of the former Yugoslavia started.
Belgrade's policy, objectives, manipulations and intensions vis-…-vis Kosova are the
same as those vis-…-vis other regions in the former Yugoslavia which experienced a
terrible war, and today are but too clear to repeat the same mistakes of the past.
If the conflict between the Albanians and the Serbs in the southern part of rump
Yugoslavia would be transformed from a war-not-fought into a large-scale open conflict, it
would surely assume dimensions which, in all probability, would engulf the whole
central-southern Balkans.
It is only through serious political dialogue and negotiations, at all levels, that
this impasse situation can be overcome. We express our profound hope in the democratic
values which western democracies have developed, stand for and are prepared to defend. We
pin great hopes in their might. What the situation urgently warrants and calls for is
determination and political will. By defending these values, the international community
is and will be defending themselves and their interests and regional long-term security
and stability. There are many examples when such will and determination has been
exemplarly displayed, as was the Iraq-UN crisis. We do hope the same would be the case
with the situation in Kosova and its just and fair solution. The Contact Group, its member
states, are the only ones invested with the necessary power and trust to do so.
The Government of the Republic of Kosova, the people of Kosova and the entire Albanian
people are looking forward to immediate and appropriate responses to this new tragedy, at
the roots of which lies the Serbian policy, the only one which is catapulting the Balkans
from one bloody war into another.
The Government of the Republic of Kosova wishes to reiterate ist full readiness,
commitment and availability to work closely and cooperatively with the international
community, to achieve the common goal. It is fully available, at all levels and any time,
to start consultations with the Contact Group or the relevant personality or body charged
by it to act on its behalf, on the points which the Government has been pleased to list
above. We would highly appreciate it and be grateful if the Contact Group would take our
request seriously into account during its very important upcoming deliberations on Monday
an subsequently.
The massacre of armed Serbian forces against the unprotected Albanian population of
Drenica in Kosova (28.02, 01.03, 05-07.03 l988), with over 100 victims (children, old men
and women), their homes being demolished and destroyed, the open ethnic genocide before
the face of the world, makes us recall that the main cause which is risking the eruption
of a general peopleps insurrection and accordingly an almost immediate implication of
several Balkan and other states in a new inevitable conflict of unforeseen dimensions lies
in the legitimacy of Serbian occupation of Kosova and other Albanian areas (in 1912, 1945,
1992) by the Great Powers and in the disregard of the will of Albanian people to be
independent and live in normal neighborhood relations with Serbs and the rest, and not to
agree with occupation and repression (see attached annex).
The cause of the present crisis can be implicitly identified after having considered
the following moments:
- * In Yugoslavia, according to the only legal position of the 1974 Constitution, Kosova
had an equal status with other 8 constitutional units of then federation;
- * In 1990 Serbia, one of 8 federal units, abolished forcefully and without any
constitutional basis the constitutional status of Kosova. It was this that generated the
decomposition process of the Federation and hence the independence of Slovenia, Croatia,
Bosnia and Herzegovina and Macedonia;
- * In the incomplete decomposition process of federal Yugoslavia, through re-designation
of the asymmetric federation of "Serbia + Montenegro" into
"Yugoslavia", Serbia tried to constitute the new state without and against the
political will of Albanians, the second largest ethnicity, and Kosova, an equal unit of
former federation;
- * In order to maintain this situation Serbia undertook systematic repressive police and
military violence against Kosova and Albanians: it abolished the legitimate, judicial and
political bodies of the executive government of Kosova; closed down schools of all levels,
all cultural and scientific institutions, the mass media; expelled Albanians from their
jobs; plundered the national property of Kosova; created a total apartheid;
- * The Assembly of Kosova, on the basis of its constitutional rights, did not agree with
the annexation of Kosova by Serbia and in 1990 proclaimed the Republic of Kosova. In 1991
a Referendum was held in which 90% of Kosova population was declared for Kosova an
independent state.
- * In the Republic of Kosova, declared by its Assembly, ruled forcefully by Serbia, the
political life has been led through Republic institutions and political parties. The
Parliament and the Government were forced to go into exile, whereas the President of the
Republic, elected in the multi-party election, continued working in Kosova;
- * Albanians pursued a peaceful policy and created their educational, cultural, and
public health system and other state institutions of the civil society, despite the
Serbian repression and violence.
The European Commission, known by the name of the French lawyer Badinter, decided to
recognize the decomposition of Yugoslavia into six federal units, a right which 4 of them
made use of, whereas Kosova, despite the request which had put forward legally and in due
time by its institutions and on the basis of its legal constitutional position and the
will of ist people, was not recognized this right.
Such unjust attitudes, as well as the irresolution of international community to stop
the militarist aggressiveness of Serbia, have convinced and incited even more Serbia to
continue uninterruptedly the systematic terror, persecution and expulsion of Albanians
from their land in the spirit of its conceptual and practical system of "ethnic
cleansing" which has already been witnessed.
The public opinion, political parties and the Albanian political movement have drawn
the attention of the international community for several years now about the apartheid,
the repression and the state terror exerted upon Kosova and Albanians. This unprecedented
peaceful movement for Europe of our century has enjoyed a strong moral support of
international public opinion. The support from international community institutions has
been mainly verbal. Serbia has continued and intensified violence at all levels. The
Drenica massacre was only a concentrated eruption of this situation and ist unique
manifestation which could happen to Kosova as a whole.
Reiterating the attitude that there is no police and army in the world which is
permitted to massacre the civilian population, that such punitive expeditions represent an
aggression against Albanians of former Yugoslavia and Kosova as one of its 8 co-founding
units; that the people of Kosova have the inalienable right for self-determination as
defined by the United Nations Chart; that the declaration of the political will of a
people through the referendum cannot be annulled by another state or people;
Denouncing the continual violence exerted upon Albanians and Kosova, in particular the
recent ethnic genocide in Drenica against the innocent and unprotected Albanian
population, since the elements of the state apparatus which would protect it were crushed
by Serbia;
Denouncing the siege of villages, the killing and the massacre of population in their
homes, kidnapping of persons and whole families and their execution without trial
- * We recommend an immediate intervention of appropriate international political and
military authorities (of the Security Council of UN, NATO and OSCE) to stop the further
run of Serbian genocide against Albanians, and the deployment of peace-keeping forces in
Kosova;
- * We request to bring before the international tribunal perpetrators who have committed
such unprecedented crimes against humanity;
- * We request to declare the state and the government of Serbia as the only one
responsible and guilty for the Drenica massacre;
- * We protest against the amoral identification of the Serbian state terror with
reactions of the innocent Albanian population in their self-defense, against the
hypocritical identification of the victim with the aggressor;
- * We request from the international community to recognize and protect the right of the
Albanian people of Kosova to declare for their future on the basis of principles of
self-determination, in a situation when the up to now state is being decomposed, whereas
the state of Yugoslavia which is trying to be created without and against the political
will of Albanians is treating them with ethnic genocide and massive expulsion, and to
renounce thus from furtherr perpetuation of the greates Balkan crisis.
The Kosova crisis solved by a peaceful process, negotiated on the basis of the right of
the citizens of Kosova to declare their free will would be that stability factor which the
Balkans lacks. Kosova repressed by violence and kept by violence is the source of the
tragedy which is taking place now and which in an inevitable form may assume serious
Balkan dimensions.
Prishtina March 18, 1998
- 1. Ajeti Idriz, albanologist,
- 2. Agani Fehmi, sociologist
- 3. Altimari Francesco, albanologist
- 4. Bajraktari Jusuf, historian
- 5. Basha Eqrem, writer
- 6. Berisha Engj&ll, muzikologist
- 7. Bokshi Besim, albanologist
- 8. ^elaj Zenun, journalist
- 9. Dobreci Sim&, physician
- 10. Gashi Sanije, journalist
- 11. Islami Hivzi, demographer
- 12. Islami Nehat, journalist
- 13. Ismajli Rexhep,albanologist
- 14. Kabashi Jashar, linguist
- 15. Kadriu Ibrahim, writer
- 16. Kelmendi Bajram, attorney
- 17. Limani Adem, physician
- 18. Maliqi Shk&lzen, publicist
- 19. Podrimja Ali, poet
- 20. Prelvukaj Zake, painter
- 21. Rexhepi Fehmi, historian
- 22. Shukriu Edi, archaeologist
- 23. Surroi Veton, journalist
ANNEX
Certain condensed points of repression:
- - 1876 - 1878: liquidation and expulsion of 640 Albanian villages from Toplica and
Kosanica regions in the north of todayps Kosova;
- - 1912-1914: massacres of Serbian army in Kosova, tens of thousands killed and tens of
thousands expelled and persecuted;
- - 1924-1939: systematic state repression by denying all national rights, forceful
expulsion through systematic police and legal terror such as the Agrarian Reform,
systematic confiscation of property and colonization with Serbs from other areas;
- - creation of the concept and theory of ethnic cleansing already practiced: the surveys
of Vaso Cubrilovic (1937 and 1944), the survey of Ivo Andric (1938);
- - 1945: the Tivar (Bar) Massacre, where thousands of unarmed Albanians, who were
mobilised by the Yugoslav Army, were killed by Yugoslav soldiers;
- - 1945: the massacre of Drenica;
- - 1948-1966: the systematic Serbian/Yugoslav terror upon the unprotected Albanian
population - repression, beating, maltreatment, killings and compulsion to migrate to
Turkey through the Gentlemanly Agreement of 1953 (over 100 murdered by tortures or killed
and hundred thousands expelled to Turkey);
- - violent repression of dissatisfaction expressed publicly through demonstrations of
1968;
- - violent repression of dissatisfaction expressed publicly in 1981 (estimated over 100
killed);
- - imposing the state of emergency (military or quasi martial law) for the two following
decades;
- - 1990: anti-constitutional and forceful annexation of Kosova to Serbia.
To Whom It May Concern
We are hereby asking you to transmit the following text to Your government:
TO:
- The Contact Group - London
- British Foreign Office Minister - Mr. Robin Cook
- French Foreign Affairs Minister - Mr. Vedrine
- German Foreign Affairs Minister - Mr. Klaus Konkel
- Russian Foreign Affairs Minister - Mr. Jevgenij Primakov
- Italian Foreign Affairs Minister - Mr. Lamberto Dini
- Secretary of State Department - Mrs. Madleine Albright
- Albanian Foreign Affairs Minister - Mr. Paskal Milo
- Special European envoy for Kosova - Mr. Felipe Gonzales
- Special American envoy for Kosova - Mr. Jim Swighert Geremek
- Vice-president of USA - Mr. Al Gore
- Secretary General of NATO - Mr. Havier Solana
- Orig From: SHL_SA@ZAMIR-SA.ZTN.APC.ORG (SHL Sarajevo)
- Organization: SHL Sarajevo
- Orig Subject: Report on Kosova/o
17.03.98
I visited Pristina by accepting an invitation from the Independent Union of the
University of Pristina from March 12th to 15th to observe the situation there. Then, I
spent two more days in Belgrade.
During my stay, there were two demonstrations. I was initially informed that there
would be one demonstration specifically for demands on the Education Agreements signed by
Ibrahim Rugova, the "President" of Kosova, and Slobodan Milosevic, in September,
1996. These agreements have never been implemented. Recent aggressive measures made by the
Serbian authorities in the Drenica region earlier this month have upset and altered the
students' intention for the demonstration as well as long-term goals of their struggle.
The demonstration was planned on March 13th; however, students were not able to decide
whether the demonstration would be held or not until the day before. When it was decided,
the aim of the demonstration was mainly aimed against the Serbian police brutality in
Drenica. It was repeated on March 15th when the mass was held in the Catholic church.
Meanwhile, the Serbian government sent its delegation to Kosovo and invited
representatives from the Kosova/o minorities for their dialogue. Despite repeated calls
from the Serbian side, the Albanian representatives have refused to attend the negotiation
with them. Responding to the third call, the Turkish, Muslim and Roma minorities had a
talk with the Serbian authorities (there is another ethnic group called the
"Goranis" who want to be part of negotiations). The Albanian side has soften
their stance for dialogue by possible exclusion of independence option as precondition for
dialogue.
Ibrahim Rugova's Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK) has been the biggest party, and
Rugova himself has been sticking to non-violent measures toward the brutal police state of
Serbia. However, it is quite clear that Kosova/o Albanians are running out of patience in
such an apartheid situation. The situation of Kosova/o has been aggravated and
deteriorated acutely since the Serbian special police started raid against villages in the
name of fighting against "terrorists" from the Kosovo Liberation Army. Many
civilians were killed and villages were entirely demolished. Reaction from the Albanians
was "Do you think kids and elderly people can be terrorists?"
a. State-sponsored student organization in Pristina
When I arrived Pristina by bus on March 12, I found out that there was no telephone
available at the bus station. The bus station was just outside the town center, and I
decided to use a taxi to go into the center. By chance, I came to one of the dormitories
in the university. As you might know, the Albanian students and faculty members were
expelled from the campus in 1991. This happened when the Serbian government (led by
Milosevic) reformed the school curriculum and outlawed the Albanian language education
(Kovova/o's autonomous status was already stripped in 1989 by Milosevic). The Serbian
government fired all the Albanian teachers because they protested against the new
all-Serbian education system and prevented Albanian students and pupils from attending
schools. As a result, the Kosovar Albanians developed their own education system up to
university level.
Two female students from one dormitory took me to their student organization. According
to Balkan Peace Team, there are four student organizations in this "Serbian"
university of Pristina. I was taken to one room where three students were drinking beer.
The room was so dim because of their relentless smoke. The two girls looked quite abashed
and embarrassed about this but also resigned as if they were telling me this was the way
it was at their place. Reactions from those three students were thrown at me in the form
of thundering questions such as "Who are good guys?" "Which side are you
on?" "Are you going to Siptars' (Albanians') side?", etc. These are typical
questions from the nationalist elements of Serbian and Croatian sides. Based upon my
experiences in "Herceg-Bosna" and Republika Srpska, Serbian and Croatian
nationalists usually ask which side you are on by nationality even before asking who you
are. Since I was used to these questions, I could answer quite properly by neither
upsetting them nor bending my personal principles.
Then, I was introduced to Aleksandar Jokic, the president of the state- controlled
union (Savez Studenata). The followings are what he basically said in this short meeting:
- -Kosovo Albanians want independence to create "Greater Albania".
- -Rights of Kosovo Albanians as well as other minorities of Republic of Serbia are
guaranteed.
- -The Serbian police acted only against "terrorists" and those civilians who
used weapons against them.
- -Indeed, Serbia tries to solve problems in Kosovo in the same way as other western
European countries do.
- -Albanian narco mafia from outside operates terrorist activities in Kosovo (According to
him, Sari Berisha's party has been supporting separatist groups in Kosovo, but the
socialist government also supply weapons).
When I asked if his organization currently had any contact with Albanian students, he
sternly said no. Then, I asked if he would participate in any dialogue with Albanian
students. He said that the Serb side would engage in dialogue with them if the Albanian
side would accept Republic of Serbia as their homeland with ist constitution. He meant to
say that there was no way that Albanian students would get their education in their own
language.
He said that there were about 20,000 students with 13 faculties in the university. He
estimated that there were 500 students from Bosnia and Croatia.
b. Demonstrations on March 13 and 15
In the morning of March 13th, I went to the office of the Independent Union of the
University of Pristina. The office was already packed with students, journalists and
observers.
Students from the Union have organized street demonstrations to demand for implementing
the Education Agreement so that they would be able to go back to campus. The
demonstrations in Pristina were twice (October 29 and December 30) harassed and assaulted
by the police. Until recently, the purpose of the demonstrations was "retaking
Pristina University buildings and other premises violently occupied by the Serbian regime
in 1991". The Students Protest Council of the University was established in a close
coordination with faculties and high pedagogic schools/colleges. The demonstrations have
been peaceful, non-provocative and non-violent. Although they are very much spontaneous
(for deciding date and place), they seem to have a means to spread necessary information
about demonstrations among the Albanian communities in Pristina and beyond. Since the
massacres in the Drenica region, the nature of the demonstrations have altered but are
still within their broad purposes - respect for human rights and protest against police
repression. One demonstration was carried out without any incident on March 9th.
Around two in the afternoon, a team of nine observers started heading toward the place
of protest. When we arrived there, thousands of people had already started showing signs
and chanting slogans. There were slogans and chants like "freedom",
"Kosova", "Drenica", "Stop ethnic cleansing" and
"Serbian police out of Kosova". The crowd led by the students also shouted
"Rugova!" Later on, Milot told me that was one of strategies to mobilize mass
support for Rugova for the upcoming election. There is an obvious frustration among the
Albanians toward Rugova's non-provocative, non-violent measures, and many students think
that Rugova has done nothing significant. Milot told me that there was no other credible
politician who could have mass support on the Albanian side. According to him, the
Kosova/o situation has radicalized the Albanian population and it would be difficult for
the Albanian politicians to make a compromises with the Serbian counterparts. Just like
Milorad Dodik and Biljana Plavsic in Republika Srpska who started cooperating with the
international community and the Federation, the Albanians need to keep their so-called
"moderates" to deal on this delicate situation with the international community
and the Serbian and Federal authorities.
On March 15th, the demonstration was held on the main streets of Pristina toward the
Catholic church where the mass took place for the Drenica victims. Again, thousands of
people came out with candles silently walked on the streets guarded by the Serbian police.
When the crowd arrived in front of the Catholic church, The blasting sound of a Chetnik
song suddenly came from one window of a nearby apartment. The crowd didn't react to the
provocation, and the protest proceeded without incident again.
Recent series of demonstrations have been quite peaceful, but it does not guarantee
anything. In Pristina, there is too much media attention now. It has been reported that
the police assaulted demonstrators in less-focused areas in Kosova/o. People's frustration
is indeed running out, and the situation is still volatile and explosive. It is easy to
light up any ignition for the Serbian authorities to suppress the population just like
they did mercilessly in Drenica. Low-intensity conflict may break out, and hope for
peaceful solutions for Kosova/o may vanish.
c. Various opinions from Kosova Albanians
I had conversations with several students, demonstrators and journalists from the
independent daily Koha Ditore. I was accommodated at the house of Milot, one Albanian
student leaders, during my stay in Kosova/o. On the night of 13th, three students from a
student organization in Belgrade University (there are more than 10 student organizations
in the university and they are not so centralized) stayed at his place as well. They had
intensive discussions until five in the morning, and I could follow until two or so.
Milot is considered one of the most open-minded students in the union and ready for
open cooperation with the Serbian students. However, he is quite careful about this open
cooperation because the union itself has been taking the "populist" cause by
organizing protests and demonstrations. The union has nationalistic characters and quite
centralized. It conducts conversations and discussions with politicians on their side. It
seems that the union is not ready for dividing itself in favor of either extremists,
[either conservative or liberal]. It wants to maintain the 'force of the mass' as a broad
coalition united for the cause of Albanian national question.
The Union does not have any contact with the Serb side in Pristina. They actually
deride students who are attending at the university. According to them, only the worst
students from elsewhere in Serbia go there because they are not able to go to any other
university. They finish their studies as quickly as possible due to their
"connections" or transfer to another university. Therefore, the Albanians claim
that these Serbian students are not attached to Kosova/o. The Belgrade students agreed
with them by saying that they would prefer to have contacts with Kosova/o Serb students.
The Albanians do their best to maintain their parallel education system, but it is
considered insufficient because of a lack of expertise and equipment. One of biology
students told me that she would not know how to contribute to her society. Practically
speaking, students graduate schools with diplomas which are not recognized by the Serbian
authorities. In the Albanian society, job availability for graduates is severely limited
(the unemployment rate is estimated at 70%). The parallel education system is creating
academics without prospects for applying their skills and knowledge in field.
At the same time, the system is based upon Albanian language. The younger generation
(so-called "generation of the Kosova Republic") does not speak Serbian language.
Hence, this system leads Albanians to the point of no return (obviously, they cannot
return to the Serbian education system).
The Kosova/o Albanians' life is dominated by politics, at least among people in
Pristina. There are quite a few humanitarian NGOs operating in Kosovo with neutral faces
in front of the Serbian authorities. So, they are not so popular. One of Koha Ditore
journalists said that there should be political solutions before any social help and
support in Kosova/o. She is a member of a social reconciliation project called
Post-pessimist which has conducted and participated in many dialogues and seminars with
Serbs since 1994. Ironically, pessimism on social reconciliation has prevailed and
Post-pessimism is not as active as before. "It's not so easy to maintain
contacts," she said "when Albanians are killed by the serbian authorities."
There is no clear physical and geographical division between the Serb and the Albanian
communities in Pristina. But numerous psychological boundaries have been created since
early 90s. After the Drenica massacre, people have been reluctant to venture out on the
streets after dark. This "neither war nor peace" situation of apartheid has made
stark and depressive mood in their life. And this mood has affected their everyday life
including cultural one. I told Milot that Mostar (smaller than Pristina) and Sarajevo have
kept their cultural life during war. Milot replied that Pristina was never the cultural
center. The Koha Ditore journalist said that now everything in life is related to
politics.
There is no question that students in the Union are committed to their cause. I got an
impression that their activities have become their lifestyle itself now. Otherwise, their
life will be filled with vanity and despair. I remember when the news about murder of two
Albanians came to the office in a busy afternoon, one of the students who was always
energetic and cheerful just sat down gazing hollowly at the floor with her downcast eyes
for a while. She started explaining to me about her ancestors' experience in Kosova/o but
had to interrupt because another job came in. Milot also frankly told me that he had to
put more priority on his activities in the Union than spending private time with his
girlfriend. This apartheid situation has ruined what's supposed to be a normal life which
we enjoy.
There were various degree of opinions among the Albanians on what the future of
Kosova/o should be like. But they more or less agreed with:
- -Kosova/o should not be under control of the Serbian government.
- -The negotiations should be carefully monitored by the international community as the
third party.
d. Student Union in Belgrade
There is one student organization in Belgrade which has sent ist delegation to Pristina
and initiated dialogues with Albanian students through a humanitarian organization Pax
Christi. I briefly talked with the three delegates of this student organization Studentska
Unija at Milot's house. But I had a chance to meet one of them called Branislav again in
his organization's office at Belgrade University on March 16.
It was unthinkable for them to establish any kind of official contact with Albanian
counterparts a few years ago; however, the Belgrade protests last winter seemed to have
made a breakthrough. There were some individual contacts with Albanian students even
before (dated back to 1994), but official contacts started in July last year when Pax
Christi organized a seminar in Belfast and invited students from Belgrade and Pristina.
After the October protest, the Belgrade student organization sent 10 students to Pristina
to voice their support for the Education rights of the Albanians. Indeed, one of them as
an individual (not as a member of the organization) nominated the Independent Union of the
University of Pristina for Nasa Borba tolerance award for last year. The Union won the
award, but this member was severely criticized by the state-controlled media.
Now the Belgrade student organization wants something more than dialogues through NGOs.
They would like to make a public declaration with the Union in Pristina. However, the
Union has been very cautious about this step because of the nature of the organization
that the majority of students adhere to. Milot thinks that it is not the right time for
the Union to do so in order not to create a division in their organization (the Belgrade
organization is one of big factions but still not as a whole while the Albanian side has
one unified organization). The Serb counterparts understand this problem but insist that
the Albanian side would need to encounter problems arising from within the Albanian
community. Branislav confided me that there are Albanian students who would want to openly
cooperate with the Serb counterparts. He told me that "they should say to their
public that there are good and open-minded Serbs."
The Belgrade student organization has some contacts with the Serb side in Pristina.
Roughly 70% of the students are non-Kosovar Serbs. There is basically no hope for dialogue
among students (so-called "puppets") who follow official lines such as the
state-controlled organization. Branislav told me that there are some Serb students who
would like to have contacts with Albanian students. "But then," he said,
"they would have problems with the authorities." This reminded me of the
situation in towns of Republika Srpska such as Foca. Towns are encircled by narrow-minded
power-mongers and townspeople are afraid of making any kind of initiatives because of
strict surveillance from the local authorities. I did not have a chance to meet with
'open-minded' Serb students, but basically they are contained in small ghettos even if
they want to do something. Serbian nationalism has not only gravely affected non-Serbs but
also killed life and hope of Serbs.
In the Balkans, people like to talk about their own versions of history to justify
what's going on now. Several Albanians told me about the sell-out done by the Ottoman
Turks (Turks are not popular among the Kosova/o Albanians) and Tito's communist
government. When I raised a question of conflicts between the two main tribes of the
Albanians (the Gej in the north including Kosova/o and the Tosk in the south), one of the
Albanian students answered that they were trying not to talk about it because they were
now dealing with the Albanian national question. The ordinary Serbs can tell you about the
glory and myth of Kosova/o dated back to the Middle Ages. For this question, Branislav
said, "Who had what first does not matter. What matters is how the situation is now
like human rights."
Branislav and others in the union put a priority on sincere and honest communications
among different ethnic groups at all levels and acknowledge that the Serbian government is
not sincere enough. They know that there is a lack of development in civil society on both
Serb and Albanian sides. At the same time, they also know that something constructive
needs to start and be developed on both sides. There will be a seminar on tolerance and
open-mindedness in Belgrade in May, and the Belgrade student organization is inviting the
Independent Union of the University of Pristina since the seminar would deal with Kosova/o
issues.
e. After the visit
There is no easy solution for problems in Kosova/o, but the international community
needs to act upon the fact that gross human rights violations have been done by the
Serbian authorities in this apartheid situation.
There is a lack of development in civil society on both Serbian and Albanian sides, and
there is little functioning democracy. At government level, much pressure on Milosevic
from the international community needs to be put continually for solving problems on
Kosova/o. Milosevic and his small circle of gangs will have to leave the political scene
with possible indictment for crimes against humanity in Croatia and Bosnia, but it will be
dangerous if Vojislav Sesej with the growing influence in rural Serbia replaces him. Some
transitional figures will need to build credibility in Serbia such as an opposition
politician Vesna Pesic until next step for development of functioning democracy (as
happening in Republika Srpska). Unfortunately, so-called "Zajedno" opposition
coalition of was pathetically disintegrated after the protests in Belgrade last winter. At
the same time,human rights and humanitarian organizations should have unhindered access
and freedom of movement in Kosova/o.
Granting political independence to the Albanians may turn out to be premature since
this may produce reverse discrimination and revenge politics against non-Albanians (as
happening in Bosnia). The Union in Pristina is a credible "middle-of-the-road"
force for a gradual, painful course for peaceful and meaningful solutions in Kosova/o.
They should carefully but steadily develop and improve their relationship with more
open-minded Serbian students such as Branislav's organization. Attention from the
international community is not the only thing that they should depend upon. Improvement of
the situation in Kosova/o is deeply connected with that of the rest of Serbia. Parallel
development of civil society throughout Serbia is a pre-condition for lasting stability in
the region. This cannot be done without deep and profound relationship between those who
are eager to commit themselves for their cause.
- For further development of Kosova/o, I encourage you to contact:
- Balkan Peace Team - (e-mail) bpt_bg@eunet.yu
- Helsinki Citizens' Assembly - (e-mail) hca@ecn.cz
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