Archive 1986 – 2017

Only the most dedicated spinmaster at the White House would have the audacity to claim victory as the outcome of the NATO war, especially at this stage. Milosevic’s “surrender” may spare the country further devastation and enable an eventual restoration of normalcy for Kosovo, but it hardly vindicates the means used to reach such goals. If anything, it transmits the dreadful message that the United States and its main European allies are willing to bomb a small country ferociously and indefinitely so long as we don’t have to accept casualties on our side. Not since Vietnam has the West fallen so deeply into a black hole with regard to a major foreign policy initiative as it did in Kosovo. In Vietnam, however, once Washington had acknowledged its policy failure and withdrawn, the country was left geographically, ethnically and psychologically intact. Kosovo continues to offer a far more difficult challenge. Ethnic...

By Robert Fisk inside KosovoThe Independent If cliches were permitted in Pristina and its like, city of fear would not be good enough. There are rifle shots in the empty streets, loud, close to hand, from somewhere behind the 15th-century Imperial Mosque. There is the constant roar of Nato jets and a thump of bombs in the hills around Kosovo’s capital that changes the air pressure in Marshal Tito street. There are acres of looted houses, homes to the persecuted Albanians, two of whom I met – still I wonder at their courage – walking down the Corso arm-in-arm, a husband and his pregnant wife waiting for their day of liberation. And there are the Serbs, fearful of their future, unable to sell their homes, tens of thousands of them, still unable to grasp what Yugoslavia’s “peace” with Nato really means. “The Albanians are coming with Nato,” a girl said....

Birger Schantz and Torsten Seeman The threat of an outbreak of smallpox anywhere in the world is indeed a frightening prospect. It’s quite obvious that even a very small terrorist organisation could easily spread the disease globally without technically advanced vectors – provided it had access to the pathogenic virus. Furthermore, smallpox belongs to the category of biological weapons of mass destruction. It is extremely contagious and will easily spread outside the area of conflict. Thus completely “innocent” or only peripherally affected people can be stricken with disease. This is a severe, global threat against one and all! As a Swedish citizen one must ask: can we handle an attack even if we are affected only in the second-hand? Have those who have been delegated the power created a realistic preparedness against what may happen? In 1980 smallpox was officially declared eradicated following an internationally successful vaccination campaign. Simultaneously the...

LONDON- This was (or still is?) the sixth war that affected the destiny of Kosovo this century. The first was in 1912. Serbia, along with Montenegro, Greece and Bulgaria divided up the remains of the Balkan part of the disintegrating Ottoman Empire. Then the Serbian army, living out the national quest, stormed into Kosovo. The second was in 1915 when the Serbs were chased out of Kosovo by the Austro-Hungarians and the Germans, with the Albanians of Kosovo taking their sweet revenge.The third was in 1918 at the end of the First World War when the Serbs swept back and, after taking their own revenge, they implanted- -Israel like–Serbian settlements inside Kosovo. The fourth was in 1941 when the Italians fighting on Hitler’s side captured Kosovo and incorporated it into Italian-ruled Greater Albania. The fifth was the victory of Tito against the Nazis and the Italians in 1945, which led to...

(Reuters) (Includes all points and both annexes to draft resolution) COLOGNE, June 8 (Reuters) – Following are extracts from the draft text of a U.N. Security Council resolution agreed by foreign ministers from Group of Eight countries in Cologne on Tuesday. Brackets denote additional background information supplied by Reuters. “The Security Council… 1. Decides that a political solution to the Kosovo crisis shall be based on the general principles of Annex 1 (the G8 principles agreed on May 6 in Bonn) and as further elaborated in the principles and other required elements in Annex 2 (the agreement reached in Belgrade with Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari and Russia Balkans envoy Viktor Chernomyrdin on June 4). 2. Welcomes the acceptance by the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) of the principles and other required elements referred to in paragraph 1 above, and demands the full cooperation of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in...

Is this the peace to end all peace? The Independent of London, June 6, 1999 by Mark Almond From the start of the Nato air campaign, Tony Blair was the most hawkish proponent of the claim that this was a war of a new type – “for principles, not national interest” – and it was one that air power alone could win (even if he sometimes gave the impression of wanting a good old-fashioned ground war). Slobodan Milosevic has not yet signed the EU-Russian peace plan, but the success of Nato’s 11-week air campaign has forced the armies of sceptics, as well as the Yugoslav forces, to accept that awesome air power alone can settle disputes. A sinister precedent has been set. Television viewers watching videos of smart bombs knocking out precisely chosen targets in Yugoslavia may feel that they have witnessed the hi-tech equivalent of what Goethe saw at...

By Robert FiskThe Independent So we’ve won the war, have we? That’s what we are now being told by our leaders. Messrs Clinton, Blair, Cook and all the rest are telling us that Nato may shortly achieve its aim of returning 750,000 refugees to their homes, of installing a Nato-Russian force in Kosovo and ensuring the withdrawal of Serb police and troops. Nato, after its failure to crush a country of 10 million people in fewer than 70 days, can now walk tall again. All the Albanians who trekked over the frontiers of Macedonia and Albania are going to head home under “our” protection. The BBC and CNN have gone along with this scenario – just as their cameras will be there to record the emotional return of the people of Kosovo to Pristina, Prizren, Pec and the other scorched towns. All that will be missing is the truth: that...

Times of India Editorial Saturday 5 June 1999 Although the peace agreement worked out between the US, Russia and the EU and imposed on Yugoslavia contains many elements that are distasteful to Belgrade, it is international law that has undoubtedly emerged as the biggest loser. For 72 days, NATO warplanes and missiles relentlessly bombarded a small nation of 11 million, killing more than 1,500 civilians, wounding several thousands more and destroying close to 100 billion dollars worth of property. Consequent to the bombing and to the unpardonable actions of Serb troops, more than 800,000 Kosovar Albanians fled their homes and took refuge in neighbouring countries. With so much destruction and displacement having taken place as a result of NATO’s armed aggression, the international community is entitled to ask why the agreement which was finally reached on Thursday could not have been hammered out much earlier. Though NATO leaders argue that...

Bombing “Success” Must Be Weighed Against Human Cost,Missed Chances for Peace From “Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting” Media analysis, critiques and news reports FAIR Media Advisory  Media commentators have been asserting that the Kosovo peace plan adopted June 3 by the Serbian Assembly vindicates NATO’s airstrikes on Yugoslavia. A New York Times editorial (6/4/99) claimed the plan, if genuine, shows that NATO’s “sustained bombing has been more effective than many critics allowed” and represents a “victory for the principles of democracy and human rights.” The Washington Post’s Stephen Rosenfeld wrote (6/3/99): “They said Bill Clinton was wrong to rely on air power alone to win the war, and — assuming the details are mastered — they were wrong…. This time around, anyway, he showed he was right. His weighing of means and ends finally clicked.” USA Today’s Walter Shapiro stated (6/4/99): “The record must show that Bill Clinton did the...

Full text of the peace document Friday, June 4, 1999 Published at 01:20 GMT 02:20 UK on BBC website This is the text of the agreement obtained from European Union sources in Cologne and was the document taken to Belgrade by the EU’s envoy, Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari, and Russia’s Viktor Chernomyrdin. Agreement should be reached on the following principles to move toward a resolution of the Kosovo crisis: 1. Immediate and verifiable end of violence and repression in Kosovo. 2. Verifiable withdrawal from Kosovo of all military, police and paramilitary forces according to a rapid timetable. 3. Deployment in Kosovo under UN auspices of effective international civil and security presences, acting as may be decided under Chapter VII of the Charter, capable of guaranteeing the achievement of common objectives. 4. The international security presence, with substantial Nato participation, must be deployed under unified command and control, and authorised to...

Amnesty International – News Release – EUR 70/89/99 4 June 1999 KOSOVO After analysing the reported version of the emerging peace plan proposed to end the conflict in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, Amnesty International expressed concern that human rights remain peripheral in the continuing international discussions. “We have not heard a single mention of human rights, humanitarian law or the duty to bring to justice those suspected of human rights violations,” Amnesty International Secretary General Pierre SanÈ said today. “Nothing has been said about consultations with human rights groups and the local population about how any peace-keeping operation is implemented,” Mr SanÈ stressed. “The human rights violations that have taken place in Kosovo during the past 10 years might have been prevented if effective steps had been taken,” Mr SanÈ said. “To stop further violations there need to be solid guarantees of human rights for everyone concerned.” Effective and...

LOW INTENSITY NUCLEAR WAR With NATO air-strikes entering their third month, a new stage of the War has unfolded. NATO’s “humanitarian bombings” have been stepped up leading to mounting civilian casualties and human suffering. Thirty percent of those killed in the bombings are children.1 In addition to the use of cluster bombs, the Alliance is waging a “low intensity nuclear war” using toxic radioactive shells and missiles containing depleted uranium. Amply documented, the radioactive fall-out causes cancer potentially affecting millions of people for generations to come. According to a recent scientific report, “the first signs of radiation on children including herpes on the mouth and skin rashes on the back and ankles” have been observed in Yugoslavia since the beginning of the bombings.2 In addition to the radioactive fall-out which has contaminated the environment and the food chain, the Alliance has also bombed Yugoslavia’s major chemical and pharmaceutical plants. The...