Serbian News Network - SNN

Recognition of Kosovo a boon for terrorists - Ltr. by Michael Pravica - The Washingotn Times

2010-03-09T16:36:00.001-05:00

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/mar/09/recognition-of-kosovo-a-boon-for-terrorists/comments/ (comments)

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/mar/09/recognition-of-kosovo-a-boon-for-terrorists/

Recognition of Kosovo a boon for terrorists

March 9, 2010

Thank you for publishing Julia Gorin's excellent column on Albanian blackmail of U.S. leaders vis-a-vis Kosovo ("The blackmail of America," Opinion, Thursday). It was an accurate portrayal of the sort rarely seen in our mainstream media.

The illegal recognition of Kosovo's independence initiated by our government stands as one of the greatest failures and embarrassments of our foreign policy. It continues to haunt us in the form of the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the Madrid train bombings, attempted attacks on Fort Dix and the London bus bombings (among numerous other examples). That our State Department initially proclaimed the Kosovo Liberation Army to be a terrorist drug-running group and then suddenly switched its position to support the group speaks volumes about our leaders. They were not interested in pursuing true justice and resolving a decades-old conflict but instead were interested in stealing territory from the Serbs to establish the largest U.S. base outside of America (Camp Bondsteel) to use against Russia and to protect the AMBO oil pipeline, being constructed through Kosovo.

By assenting to Albanian extremist demands, we have set an example for the world: The borders of sovereign nations can indeed be altered by terrorism, and international law is meaningless. We have created a terrorist safe haven that will always be a failed, landlocked and impoverished territory with plenty of desperate Muslim extremists and anti-Western recruits. We also have established a road map for irredentists in our own nation.

I strongly encourage President Obama to learn what is really going on in Kosovo and rescind our recognition of Kosovo's independence. Only honest compromise on both sides - not just the long-suffering Serbs - will enable a peaceful resolution to this long-standing conflict. If the Albanians try to blackmail him against doing this, he can wash his hands of the region and let the Serbs and Albanians find a solution on their own.

MICHAEL PRAVICA

Henderson, Nev.

Iran Nabs Top NATO Terrorist with Help from Pakistan

2010-03-07T15:06:00.001-05:00

Iran Nabs Top NATO Terrorist with Help from Pakistan

Webster G. Tarpley
TARPLEY.net
February 25, 2010

On Tuesday Feb. 23, Iran announced the capture of Abdulmalek Rigi, the boss of the terror organization Jundullah, which works for NATO. The capture of Rigi represents a serious setback for the US-UK strategy of using false flag state-sponsored terrorism against Iran and Pakistan, and ultimately to sabotage China's geopolitics of oil. The Iranians claim to have captured Rigi all by themselves, but the Pakistani ambassador to Teheran is quoted in The Dawn as claiming an important role for Pakistan. The Iranians say that Rigi was attempting to fly from Dubai to Kyrgystan, and that his plane was forced to land in Iran by Iranian interceptors. This exploit recalls Oliver North's 1985 intercept of the accused Achille Lauro perpetrators, including Abu Abbas, forcing their Egyptian plane to land at Sigonella, Sicily. But other and perhaps more realistic versions suggest that Iran was tipped off by the Pakistanis, or even that Rigi was captured by Pakistan and delivered to the Iranians.

Jundullah, otherwise known as the Rigi organization, is a clan-based Mafia organization that has long infested the Iran-Pakistan border. The Rigis are traditionally smugglers and drug pushers of royalist persuasion, and now they have branched out into terrorism. Jundullah is mounting a Sunni rebellion against the Shiite Iranian regime in Iranian Baluchistan. They have blown up a Shiite mosque, killing 25, and managed to kill 50 in a bombing in Pishin last October, where their victims included some top commanders of Iran's Revolutionary Guard, against which Mrs. Clinton has now declared war. There is no doubt that Jundullah is on the US payroll. This fact has been confirmed by Brian Ross of ABC News, the London Daily Telegraph, and by Seymour Hersh in the New Yorker. Hersh noted that Jundullah has received some of the $400 million appropriated by the US Congress in the most recent Bush-era regime change legislation targeting Iran.

Jundullah is a key part of the US-UK strategy of fomenting ethnic and religious civil war in both Iran and Pakistan. Jundullah is a twofer in this context, since it can help destabilize both sides of the Iran-Pakistan border. Baluchistan has special importance because any oil pipeline linking Iran with China must go straight across Baluchistan. Jundullah's false flag jihad is a means to make sure that strategic pipeline, which would help solve China's energy problem, is never built.

There is also no doubt that Jundullah functions as an arm of NATO, a kind of irregular warfare asset similar in some ways to the KLA of Kosovo. Rigi is reported by the Iranians to have met with Jop de Hoop Scheffer when he was NATO Secretary General. Rigi has also met with various NATO generals operating in Afghanistan. Who knows — he may have met with McChrystal himself, a covert ops veteran from Iraq.

This capture comes at a moment when Baluchistan is the object of intense US-UK exertions. The current US-NATO offensive in southern Afghanistan targets Marjah and the rest of Helmand province, which directly faces Baluchistan. Many observers were puzzled when the US and NATO publicized the Marjah offensive in advance. Militarist talking heads like General Barry McCaffrey responded that the main goal of the Marjah offensive was not to destroy the Taliban, but to drive them out of the province. It was thus clear from the beginning that the real goal was to drive the Helmand Taliban fighters into Pakistani Baluchistan. Why?

A statement from the Afghan Taliban covered on the RIA Novosti web site suggests that the real goal of the US-NATO offensive in Marjah-Helmand is to attack Chinese economic interests in Pakistani Baluchistan, and especially the port of Gwadar, one of China's largest overseas projects. If the US can push the Taliban into Pakistani Baluchistan and into the area around Gwadar, they will have a pretext for militarization – perhaps through Blackwater mercenaries, who are already operating massively in Pakistan, or perhaps through direct US military involvement in the zone. US jackboots on the ground in Baluchistan would interfere mightily with Chinese economic development plans. They would also allow the US to commandeer Gwadar as the home port of a new NATO supply line into southern Afghanistan, allowing the avoidance of the Khyber Pass bottleneck. The US could also use Baluchistan as a springboard for bigger and better terror ops into Iran, electronic surveillance of Iranian activities, and so forth.

The US and NATO had evidently planned a double envelopment of Baluchistan, with Taliban fighters from Helmand arriving from the north, while the Jundullah escalated their own activity on the ground. Now that Rigi has joined his brother in Iranian jails, Jundullah has been decapitated, and the NATO strategy has consequently been undermined. Iran has bagged a dangerous terrorist foe. Another winner is Pakistan, where The Dawn celebrated the capture of Rigi as "a godsend" and "a lucky break" for Pakistan. By helping Rigi to fall into Iranian hands, Pakistan may have finally found an effective way to counter the US-UK strategy, which notoriously aims at the breakup and partition of Pakistan. The coming Iranian trial of Rigi may go far towards exposing the real mechanism of terrorism in today's world, with the CIA sitting in the dock next to Rigi.

http://tarpley.net/2010/02/25/the-battle-for-baluchistan-iran-nabs-top-nato-terrorist-with-help-from-pakistan/

Bin Laden is Bosnian and Karadzic is in the Dock?

2010-03-06T19:22:00.001-05:00

Bin Laden is Bosnian and Karadzic is in the Dock?

03.03.2010 | 02:53

With friends like Osama Bin Laden among the Bosnians, why should Radovan Karadzic need enemies? As the defence enters the last day of two, we see the utter injustice of the International Criminal Court, a NATO instrument of kidnapping, illegal detention and laundering of NATO war crimes. If it were a serious legal institution, Bush and his cronies would be languishing in a cell. As it is, it has again violated its own Constitution and the case is void.

Radovan Karadzic, the Bosnian Serb leader during the Bosnian war, entered the first of his two-day defence today in front of the ICC at The Hague. Denying two counts of genocide and nine others (murder, extermination, persecution, forced deportation and seizing hostages), he declares that he will "defend that nation of ours" which followed a "just and holy cause". After all, Radovan Karadzic was fighting international terrorism. And who was on the other side? The one the CIA referred to as UBL, himself: Osama Bin Laden.

Claiming that the Serbs were demonised for everything they did and promising to tell the "marble truth", Dr. Karadzic, a psychiatrist, has been accused of orchestrating a campaign to ethnically cleanse areas of Bosnia-Herzegovina in a campaign which included the 44-month siege of Sarajevo and the so-called "massacre of Srebrenica" in July 1995 in which 8,000 Moslem males were killed.

But what is the other side to the coin? Dr. Karadzic claims to "have good evidence and proof" that the Serbs were only defending themselves against the Croatian and Moslem "ethnocentric aims" of Franjo Tudjman and Alija Izetbegovic to carve out their own States and that the 8.000 figure was an invention by his enemies including civilians and soldiers killed by the Moslems themselves.

Furthermore, several Dutch soldiers from the Netherlands battalion in Srebrenica have come forward, declaring they were hated in their own country, that there is complete repression against them and claiming that they did not see any Serbs committing any war crimes, that they had to defend themselves against the Moslems and not the Serbs, and further stating that the Serb soldiers were helping the Moslem women and children (as they had done in Kosovo, where women were fleeing the KLA prostitute rings and trying to reach the Serb lines).

ICC breaks its own Constitution: Case void

The ICC was set up by the Rome Treaty. Under its own Article 55 on Rights of Persons during an Investigation, section 1 (d) it states that a person:

"(d) Shall not be subjected to arbitrary arrest or detention, and shall not be

deprived of his or her liberty except on such grounds and in accordance

with such procedures as are established in this Statute."

Why, then was Slobodan Milosevic illegally kidnapped from the Republic of Serbia and taken to the ICC, where he lost his life under illegal detention, which went against every fibre of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the Republic of Serbia at the time? Why does the ICC not have a massive compensation case pending against it to Milosevic's family?

Under Article 67 on Rights of the Accused, Section 1 (b), it states that a person has the right:

"(b) To have adequate time and facilities for the preparation of the defence and

to communicate freely with counsel of the accused's choosing in

confidence;"

Why then did Dr. Radovan Karadzic not have enough time to prepare himself, given that the prosecution submitted 415.000 pages to the trial since October? Who can read 2,766 pages a day and adequately prepare their defence? Given this, the case is void.

What was Dr. Karadzic fighting against?

For one, Osama Bin Laden is the proud holder of a Bosnian passport, according to an independent publication (Dani) which claimed that the Bosnian Embassy in Vienna "granted a passport to bin Laden in 1993" stating then that "High Moslem officials of the Bosnian Foreign Ministry agreed that (the destruction of these files) was of a high priority" and further that "the Bosnian government confirmed it had granted citizenship and passport to a Tunisian-born senior aide of bin Laden in 1997".

What was bin Laden doing? Establishing an Albanian operation, setting up terrorist camps (in Bocina Donja near Maglaj in Bosnia), training Islamic fighters to carry out terrorist attacks on Serbs and funding the NLA in Macedonia, which controlled the drugs trade through the region. Moreover, Alija Izetbegovic failed to live up to his commitments under the Dayton Agreement (to remove all foreign Moslem fighters from Bosnia), for large numbers of foreign Mujaheddin remained in the area after the agreement.

And Dr. Radovan Karadzic is in the dock?

Timothy BANCROFT-HINCHEY

PRAVDA.Ru

http://www.moscowtopnews.com/?area=postView&id=1954

NATO Chief Arrives in Moscow To Have Russia Involved in Afghan War

2010-03-06T15:46:00.001-05:00

NATO Chief Arrives in Moscow To Have Russia Involved in Afghan War

Front page / Russia / Politics

17.12.2009

Source: Pravda.Ru

Pages: 1

NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen arrived in Moscow on December 16 for an official visit. The official asked Russia to support NATO troops with arms, military training and a new additional railway channel to maintain the troops in Afghanistan.

Rasmussen said prior to his visit to Moscow that he would like to see Russia's further participation in training NATO's military contingent in Afghanistan. He also said that Russia could provide arms and other military equipment for security forces in Afghanistan.

In other words, the NATO bloc, which does not seem to be able to cope with Afghan Mujahedeens, would like to receive AK-47 assault rifles, machine guns, guns, grenade launchers, shoulder-carried air defense systems, artillery, armored vehicles, An-32 cargo planes and helicopters.

There is nothing surprising about the fact that NATO needs the Russian arms. They are reliable, better and easier to use. The weapons, which NATO troops use, do not function very well under extreme conditions of Afghan natural environment.

What may Russia gain from this cooperation with NATO? Does the alliance intend to have Russia involved in its endless war? The USA had a similar experience in the beginning of the 1950s when the nation found itself involved in the war in Vietnam.

Pavel Zolotarev, an expert with the Institute for the USA and Canada said in an interview with Pravda.Ru that Russia was interested in establishing cooperation with NATO.

"Americans and their allies need to stay in Afghanistan. We only need to help them in a reasonable way, and we should of course sell our weapons to them. When the alliance needs something from us, it is being very nice with Russia, but if there is an intense situation, like it was during the Caucasian war last year, NATO does not want to speak to us at all.

"Americans and their allies need to stay in Afghanistan, because the situation there will be destabilized otherwise. We've learned this lesson in 1979 – what happens in Afghanistan if it is left without attention. If Taliban and al-Qaeda win the fight there, it will affect the situation in Russia's Caucasus in the worst way," the expert said.

Konstantin Sivkov, the first vice president of the Academy of Geopolitical Sciences, believes that Rasmussen's requests automatically imply Russia's direct participation in the Afghan war.

"How can we assist them in training the allied troops? Russian troops will have to be sent there for that. If they manage to have Russia involved, the Russian administration will be disgraced both inside and outside of the country. This is extremely dangerous taking into consideration what may happen in the Muslim world. The war in Afghanistan is the war against the whole Afghan nation. US officials recently said that there were probably a hundred of al-Qaeda members left. What do they mean by 'international terrorism' then? Afghanistan does not pose a danger to Russia. This country needs our food shipments, and they are ready to be in commercial relations with our country," the expert said.

Sergey Balmasov
Pravda.Ru

http://english.pravda.ru/russia/politics/17-12-2009/111201-nato-0

The Show Goes On

2010-03-06T10:55:00.001-05:00

The Show Goes On

by Nebojsa Malic, March 06, 2010

The show trial of former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic continued on March 1 before the Hague Inquisition, but also in the media. Both in the West and in the Muslim world, Karadzic and the Bosnian Serbs have been convicted by the press of vilest atrocities long ago. One could almost feel the frustration of the commentators and reporters that there even has to be a trial in the first place, so strong are their convictions about Karadzic and the Bosnian War. Evidence? Facts? True believers need no such things. Nor do the Hague prosecutors, apparently.

Challenging Cherished Myths

Reading through the coverage of the trial inevitably reveals that reporters and editors aren't so much telling what happened in the courtroom, but trying to argue with Karadzic's defense. Take, for example, Ian Traynor of the Guardian, who "reports" from the trial as if he were the prosecutor rebutting Karadzic's opening statement. Other journalists took a similar approach, typically presenting the accusations as indisputable facts then saying that Karadzic "denied" war crimes.

He did, in fact, challenge the Official Truth about several key episodes of the Bosnian War, saying that there was no genocide in Srebrenica, and that Sarajevo was divided rather than besieged. The Bosnian Muslims, he argued, used civilian buildings as fortifications, and often shot at their own people for propaganda purposes. Moreover, he also claimed the war was a result of Muslim desire to establish dominion over all of Bosnia, driven by a radical Islamic agenda. He says he has evidence to back all of this up. If he does, that is more than the prosecutors, the Tribunal itself, or the media have produced so far.

Consider a feature (video) by Al-Jazeera reporter Rageh Omar, which opened with the images of the grieving Muslims at the Srebrenica memorial and a video montage implying that the Bosnian Serb forces rounded up eight thousand or more Muslim civilians and executed them in broad daylight. Yet actual forensic evidence has found around 3800 bodies, 3600 of which were men aged 15 to 65 — legal age of conscription into the Bosnian (Muslim) Army. And less than five hundred had blindfolds or bindings, indicating executions. But the ICTY and the media continue to claim that the Serbs killed eight thousand people, and declare this to be genocide, based on questionable testimonies and badly mishandled evidence.

A Different Tune

The very same day Karadzic appeared in a Hague courtroom, one of his former adversaries was detained at Heathrow airport. Ejup Ganic, once the right hand of Muslim leader Alija Izetbegovic who styled himself the "vice-president" of Bosnia, was arrested by British police acting on a Serbian warrant.

Belgrade is charging Ganic with responsibility in the May 1992 ambush of the retreating Yugoslav Army column in Sarajevo. The crumbling federal army had made a deal with Bosnian and Macedonian authorities to depart unhindered. Izetbegovic's forces violated that deal, and the resulting massacres of retreating Army columns ensured the bitter enmity of many Army officers, who then joined Karadzic's nascent military.

One would think, then, that an opportunity to examine these events in a court of law would be greeted with enthusiasm by the politicians and the press that keep talking about the need for "justice, truth and reconciliation" in the Balkans. Yet the response in the very same media that have covered the Karadzic trial with so much zeal and emotion this week has been completely different when it came to Ganic.

The Economist, for example, dismissed the ambush as a matter of "forty rifles" and bemoaned the damage allegedly done to "Serbia's attempts to rejoin the European fold" by "dragging up the past." Others focused not on what Ganic may or may not have done back in the 1990s, but on the "tensions" and "muddled ties" his arrest may cause, "feeding Balkans hysteria" in a year when Bosnia is having a general election.

What are they implying, that the Karadzic trial has no effect on Balkans relations, or tensions or ties? That the incessant propaganda about the Serbs as genocidal aggressors is good, perfectly normal and desirable while a mere mention that a Muslim could have been responsible for an atrocity is a cause for panic? Talk about a partisan press…

Just Cause?

The Tribunal and the media maintain that the Bosnian Serbs, and Karadzic as their leader, sought to occupy Bosnia and destroy Croat and Muslim populations as part of some grand conspiracy to create an ethnically pure "Greater Serbia." Even a cursory look at the facts indicates that these charges are absurd. Alija Izetbegovic never denied being an Islamic revolutionary. He openly stated that he would "sacrifice peace for a sovereign Bosnia." Karadzic may have mishandled the Bosnian Serb war effort, both strategically and tactically, but there is no doubt that it was the Muslims who sought dominion over the Serbs and Croats, not the other way around.

One of the things Karadzic said in his opening statement was that the Bosnian Serb cause was "just and holy." He didn't actually call the war itself holy — though the distinction escaped many reporters. ICTY translations have been notoriously unreliable. For example, a phrase attributed to Karadzic — "marble evidence" — does not actually exist in Serbian. He could have called evidence concrete, but never marble. So it isn't surprising that Karadzic's description of his "holy" cause — freedom from a Muslim government bent on dominance — is being miscast as some sort of crusade. The Tribunal and the media have twisted words before.

Exercise in Futility

Given that the countries sponsoring the Tribunal have also played a major role in supporting Izetbegovic's drive for a centralized Bosnian state – before, during and after the war — and occupying a portion of Serbia to carve out an "independent," ethnically cleansed "state" of Kosovo, there is no chance of Radovan Karadzic getting anything even remotely resembling a fair trial. Too much political capital has been invested in the Bank of Collective Serbian Guilt for the investors to admit the error of their ways now.

But the persecution of Radovan Karadzic and other Serb leaders isn't going to help the Empire any. Least of all will it inspire gratitude in the Muslim world, a goal several policymakers have openly alluded to in the past. Back in the 1990s, to an Empire in search of a cause it seemed like a no-brainer: claim a "genocide" through hysterical propaganda about the evil Serbs slaughtering innocent Muslims, step in to save the day, and emerge as a knight in shining armor. Over and over the Western leaders, from Bill Clinton to Tony Blair, have repeated this trope. The world's Muslims didn't buy it. Instead, the Muslim public opinion chose to regard the West as an evil, conniving force that stood idly by and watched the slaughter.

Ironically, that was one of the major talking points of the whole hysterical propaganda effort.

http://original.antiwar.com/malic/2010/03/05/the-show-goes-on/

GORIN: The blackmail of America

2010-03-04T10:02:00.001-05:00

Another excellent commentary by Julia Gorin - click on to link to read the comments. Stella

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/mar/04/the-blackmail-of-america/

GORIN: The blackmail of America

How the United States became Albania's enforcer

By Julia Gorin

Something happened after President Clinton's 1999 war in Kosovo: It never ended. Its continuation was characterized by anti-Serb arson, kidnappings, bombings of NATO-escorted civilian buses and efforts to kill everyone from schoolgirls to octogenarians, plus the rare peacekeeper who tried to prevent any of this.

Toward the end of 1999, several major newspapers reported on findings that mass graves such as the infamous Trepca zinc mine turned up empty, as did the stadium we were told was being used as a concentration camp. Anyone reading this one-time follow-up also would have learned that the "cleansing" of 800,000 Albanians had more to do with NATO bombs and Kosovo Liberation Army orders than with the outrageous claim that Serbia was trying to empty the province of 90 percent of its population.

But the bombshell postwar story had no legs. No media outlet, human rights organization or congressional subcommittee launched an investigation, and the press moved on, taking the public with it. So Americans don't know that within months of our serving as the Kosovo Liberation Army's (KLA) air force, the Albanian insurgents also tried to seize the Presevo Valley area in southern Serbia and by early 2001 started a civil war in Macedonia, which had sheltered 400,000 refugees during the Kosovo war.

At the same time, the Albanian fighters started to engage NATO troops openly. In February 2000, the U.N. and NATO in Kosovo issued a joint statement that "two young French soldiers, who came here as peacekeepers, are lying in hospital beds suffering from gunshot wounds inflicted on them by the very people that they came here to protect," the CATO Institute's Gary Dempsey reported. He added, "As a candid intelligence officer with the U.N. Mission in Kosovo [UNMIK] explained to me in November, 'We are their tool, and when we stop being useful to them, they will turn against us.'"

In March 2000, The Washington Post reported, "A senior Pentagon official warned yesterday that U.S. troops in Kosovo this spring may have to fight their former allies, ethnic Albanian guerrillas who are rearming themselves and threatening cross-border attacks against Serbia. 'This has got to cease and desist, and if not, ultimately it is going to lead to confrontation between the Albanians and KFOR [NATO Kosovo Force].' "

But that didn't happen. Instead, we came around to seeing things the Albanian way. In November 2005, CNSNews.com explained why: "Rebels have blown up several vehicles belonging to UNMIK and the Kosovo [Police] Service, leading UNMIK to warn employees to check their vehicles for bombs before starting the engines. ... [G]raffiti across Kosovo warned 'UNMIK get out!' ... NATO's Kosovo Force has an emergency plan called 'Operation Safe Haven' in place to evacuate internationals. ... [Ex-OSCE security chief Tom] Gambill believes that Albanian frustration over the independence issue could lead armed rebels to forge an alliance with al Qaeda. Both groups want the international presence out of Kosovo and al Qaeda has a history of attempting to destabilize the Balkans region. ... The threats are played down, Gambill said, because 'it does not suit the internationals to have a serious crisis such as this at the time when they are sending out reports on how much improvement has been made in Kosovo.' "

We didn't want Albanians to start killing us, so we let them keep killing Serbs. Rather than see what would happen if we tried saying "no" to Albanian demands and designs, and risk Americans discerning the real nature of their new best friends - which of course would compound the domestic terror threat - we guaranteed ourselves a bigger, more entrenched and more global problem.

When Kosovo re-entered the headlines in 2008, some started catching on. In March 2008, Northwestern University law professor Eugene Kontorovich wrote in the New York Sun, "An important ingredient of Kosovo's success in achieving self-determination seems to be their constant threats of violence. The Kosovar prime minister ... often warned of 'dangers' and 'unforeseeable consequences' if the province were not allowed to secede. ... As a result, NATO and America have become parties to the carve-up of a sovereign state that they subdued by force. ... For international law, the entire process is a string of humiliations ... peacekeepers are hostages; and sovereignty is trumped by the threat of terror."

"Hostages" precisely describes the West in Kosovo. If anyone wonders why the George W. Bush administration joined the Clintonites in the belief that "independence is the only viable option" and "there can be no compromise," it's because in the gangster's paradise of Kosovo, the United States alternates between hostage and gangster. The Albanians give us ultimatums, and we give the Serbs ultimatums. Our government toes the Albanian line, and our press toes the government line. United Press International's Robert M. Hayden gave a glimpse of it in March 2008: "The problem is not that 'Serb nationalists' are resisting 'the West,' as it is put by those U.S. journalists who honor the First Amendment by parroting the State Department. ... [A political solution] could have been reached with Serbia, but neither the Clinton administration nor that of George W. Bush wanted one."

A clearer picture emerges of the "failed" negotiations between Belgrade and Pristina, to which the Serbian delegation would come with lists of various broad compromises, and the Albanian delegation would look at their watches. Sabotaging the "negotiations" before each round - and redefining the term - Mr. Bush or Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice would announce that the end result would be independence.

An excerpt from a 1999 Q&A in Time magazine illuminates how far we swerved from our original goals: "The alliance wants Kosovo to be given autonomy within the Yugoslav federation, but opposes the full independence that the KLA is fighting for, fearing that creating a new Kosovar-Albanian state would further destabilize an already volatile region."

Today, however, even the language is reversed: that which we knew would destabilize the region is now promoted as what is needed to "stabilize" the region. And so our military is being used to enforce KLA directives and make the last of the resisting Serbs comply with the new reality.

Most of the last resisting Serbs are in the only remaining part of Kosovo where it is still safe to be Serbian, Northern Kosovska Mitrovica, along the boundary with Serbia. The Serbs there have been open to a partition that would allow them to stay within the internationally recognized borders of their country, Serbia. But we were informed by our Albanian "partners" that a partition was out of the question, ironically invoking "territorial integrity" - which our leaders then repeated.

Rather than Kosovo's diabolical path to statehood, our bureaucrats and media point to Belgrade as the problem, because it backs Northern Mitrovica, where Serbian institutions are still in place. We are warned that the real threat is Belgrade's refusal to recognize the land grab, its turning to Moscow for support and its creation of "parallel institutions." A rich admonition indeed, given that Kosovo's parallel Albanian institutions within the host society were what brought us to the hailed secession itself.

NATO troops have been amassing around Northern Mitrovica, and in a few months, with or without Belgrade finally selling out the Kosovo Serbs (always a looming possibility), we will witness the next act of war by U.S.-led NATO against an ally that has never been a threat to America. We will be enforcing borders that only one-third of U.N. member states even recognize to deliver nothing less than the full territory that our masters demand.

This time, when Americans watch our military "contain" the Serbs, they should recognize it for what it is. The troops themselves would do well to understand what is being enforced with their hands. And when the images gracing American TVs are again exclusively of the "wild" Serbian reaction, meant to depict Serbs as violent and therefore justifying the aggression that caused it, Americans should ask themselves how they might react if coerced to secede from their country by an ethnic group that reached majority status in their area.

In February 2007, Jim Jatras, a former senior analyst for the Senate Republican Foreign Policy Committee, asked a Hungarian member of the European Parliament, "Why are you rewarding Albanian violence with state power?" The member replied, "Because we're afraid of them."

Julia Gorin specializes in Balkans issues and is an unpaid advisory board member of the American Council for Kosovo.

__,_._,___

What’s Wrong with Canada?

2010-03-03T18:42:00.001-05:00

What's Wrong with Canada?

02.03.2010

Source: Pravda.Ru

This is not a piece I had intended to write today, since I have far more important things to research. However, due to the disparaging remarks plastered by my sparring partner Matt Gurney on the Net after our debate in the John Oakley show broadcast yesterday morning live in Toronto, Canada and due to the insolence and misrepresentation used in these, I have been asked to reply.

Opinion pieces do not necessarily respect the views of the editorial staff of PRAVDA.Ru.

I enjoyed myself early yesterday on the AM640 John Oakley radio talk show in Toronto and I enjoyed very much speaking with the host, John Oakley. Evidently the feeling was mutual because the feedback I received from the radio show (not one message but several) was not only positive but effervescent, and they asked if I would like to come back. For me, that was that. I smiled, shrugged, had a coffee, prepared a few lessons for my University students and started preparing my editorial about Dr. Karadzic.

Not Matt Gurney, my sparring partner (Assistant Editor, Comment and Member of the National Post Editorial Board) who was called to the John Oakley show to spice things up, who managed in twenty minutes to say three things (two of them unfortunately playing into my hands) and who then appears to have spent the entire day writing pages trying to justify himself and claiming how he had pasted me on the show. (??) He seems to be the only person who shares his own opinion.

To be perfectly honest, if that makes him happy, big deal. I am far more worried about the terrapin that went missing in my garden three days before I move house and sell up here. However, one thing is crystal clear, and this is that there is a Russophobic cabal in the international media which strikes at the heart of Russians at every twist and demonises Serbs at every turn. And the epicentre right now appears to be in Canada.

Let us take, for example, the photo Mr. Gurney chose to illustrate the piece in his newspaper, a picture of a clapped-out Lada with the caption "Lada: Apex of Soviet Achievement". Er…why didn't he choose the world championship winning KAMAZ? Right, we know the answer. And why did the National Post allow him to print it?

Let us then warp over to the beginning of the radio show in which John Oakley kindly allowed me to present my piece, and then turned to Matt Gurney. He started straight off by stating that "he (myself) obviously doesn't know very much about the Olympics" and accused me of "complete ignorance" for raising the issue of Canada's competence in holding the Games while mentioning the numerous cases of strange and hurtful decisions against Russian athletes, quite apart from the rumours of harassment which have yet to be investigated. We will come back to that.

Claiming that I "crashed and burned" (…erm…Who…who insinuated that Russia attacked Georgia? Kinda weak for a "journalist"?), claiming that I "audibly choked" when I said the Soviet Union "changed" (in fact a momentary silence was provoked by my coming inside due to an aircraft flying low over my head), writing in his piece on February 25^th and I quote: "1941 – Germany invades Russia, just as Stalin planned" and then gloating over the Chernobyl disaster chortling in glee as he calls it a "devastating fireworks display" sending a "massive cloud of friendship over Western Europe" we see we are dealing with one ignorant and insolent pith-headed, lame, challenged wannabe pucker little upstart who was out to get Russia since way before his "debate", started it by firing broadsides and then when his opponent started hitting back, fell apart snivelling. And then jokes about kids getting killed. What does he think happened at Chernobyl? See what I mean about the cruelty? What does this guy do, kick the dog to death for doing a whoopsey on the carpet?

Coming back to the point made by Matt Gurney at the start of the radio show, nobody is claiming that "Canada" made odd decisions which were the realm of the IOC. What I said and reiterate here loud and clear is that the Games took place in Canada and Canada benefited whereas Russia most certainly did not.

Having dealt with Mr. Gurney, let us deal with a more sinister question:

What is wrong with Canada?

The National Post has as its Assistant Editor and Member of its Editorial Board someone who speaks about journalistic integrity and credibility yet seems confused as to who started the Georgian War, convinced that the USSR actually wanted Hitler to attack (in a war in which nearly 27 million souls were lost), who jokes about the horrific accident at Chernobyl, derides Russian science but then has to suck Big Brother's…sock… because Canada did not get very far in competing with the Soviet Space Program.

Furthermore, around 95 per cent of the comments (and death threats…what is wrong with people over there?) I have received from hundreds of Canadians are fraught with spelling mistakes and glaring grammatical errors. How about outsourcing your education system to the Cubans?

What is wrong with Canada? Are Canadians really so thin-skinned they cannot take a piece of criticism? Chip on the shoulder?

What is wrong with Canada, a country where a journalist in a senior position has apparently the impression that Russia attacked Georgia first (no mention of Georgia having declared a ceasefire and then having slaughtered between one and two thousand civilians in South Ossetia) and where people seem to have a fixation about the Cold War? Why? What did Russia ever do to Canada?

Does anyone in Canada know that the Soviet Union entered Afghanistan to counter international terrorism unleashed against the socially progressive regime in Kabul which by the way protected women's rights? Does anyone in Canada know who launched the Mujaheddin movement in the first place? And where did the Taleban movement come from?

What have people been taught? Is anyone in Canada aware that the Cold War is over? That the Soviet Union did not collapse but dissolved voluntarily and that this was entirely within the terms of its Constitution? Does anyone know about Georgia's obligation to hold referendums in the territories of South Ossetia and Abkhazia? Apparently its senior journalists don't. Or is Matt Gurney the Canukistan version of a joke?

Where is all this hostility coming from, and why? What is wrong with Canada?

Timothy BANCROFT-HINCHEY

PRAVDA.Ru

http://english.pravda.ru/opinion/columnists/112450-2/

Kosovo – what is wrong with negotiations anyway?

2010-03-02T18:40:00.001-05:00

Kosovo – what is wrong with negotiations anyway?

Further negotiations to seek an accommodation based upon forms of shared or overlapping sovereignty may offer the only way forward for Kosovo – thereby avoiding continued stalemate, renewed conflict or outright partition.

By Gerard Gallucci

To hear the negative chorus of voices from Pristina – including the Albanians and the representatives of the Quint (the US, UK, Italy, France and Germany and including the EU and NATO) – it would appear that a fully negotiated settlement for Kosovo status would be the worst possible outcome. They all have vigorously rejected Serbia's suggestion of negotiations after the ICJ decision on Kosovo independence later this year. Why – in the 21st Century and the heart of Europe – are the leading Western democracies arrayed against a negotiated final status agreement?

The short answer is that the Europeans appear not to know what else to do as their attempt to define the outcome by fiat has not worked. The Balkans has always seemed to produce "too much history" for the rest of the continent to consume. In 1991, Europe's inability to help Yugoslavia to a softer landing allowed the conflict there to degenerate into ethnic warfare. Failure to intervene forcefully and urgently to stop the slaughter of civilians in Bosnia and Herzegovina – and especially at Srebrenica – still haunts Europe. And Europe still seems spellbound for this (hopefully) last act of the breakup of the former Balkans state.

The Kosovo issue has deep roots. Ever since the French Revolution and Napoleon unleashed upon the world the reality of the "nation," it has proved impossible to stop it spreading. Any group that comes to see itself as a nation – usually defined in relation to "who we are not" – will most likely at some point demand autonomy or independence. Since the passing of "divine right", political power has been legitimized on the basis of the "people". Though this may take the form of citizenship or class, the most powerful claim is that of blood. Once the claim of blood receives widespread acceptance within a group, it becomes very difficult to overcome or brush aside. In this sense, Kosovo independence was inevitable after 1999 and overdue by 2008, in the face of pent up Albanian demand to get out from under an international tutelage that had run its course. However, the mixing of peoples in the Balkans under the Ottomans – including in Kosovo – makes the fixing of boundaries complex and simple separation impossible.

In 2007, the great powers – all six of the Contact Group (the Quint plus Russia) – failed to settle Kosovo's final status. In response, the Quint decided they did not have to bargain with Belgrade and pushed the negotiator – former Finnish President, Martti Ahtisaari – to devise a "compromise" settlement package that they then sought to impose. The Albanians were not enthused about this package as it provided for an apparently strong form of decentralization for some of the non-Albanian enclaves and for a continued international role in overseeing their independence. They agreed because it was the price of Quint support for independence. But the Serbs, where they could and especially in the north, rejected the package as it recognized independence and put them under the rule of Pristina. After the electoral defeat of the Kostunica government and formation of a new one by President Tadic, the EU thought it would get help from Belgrade in forcing the Serbs to accept the deal. But the EU again seems to have underestimated the bond of blood, not least the political dynamics it creates. Tadic could not be seen to be giving Kosovo away even if he had wished. The EU's bullying tactics – allowing southern Serbs to be intimidated into accepting Kosovo institutions and continuing efforts to impose them in the north – further reduced his manoeuvring space.

So, unless Belgrade and the northern Serbs simply surrender, the Quint is in a bind. They keep the Albanians in-line – the issues of trans-border migration and crime being essential for the Europeans – in large part by promising them all of Kosovo and still cannot deliver. So they cannot be seen to accept the need for further negotiations, nor can they react forcefully when Pristina hints at an irredentist agenda of fomenting further ethnic division elsewhere.

To be fair, some may also see negotiations as simply heading for partition. Some argue that the precedent of ethnic partition would be bad for the Balkans and elsewhere (despite the fact that the separation of Kosovo itself is clearly such a partition). But this may represent more a lack of sufficient inventiveness rather than inevitability. Negotiations may offer the only way forward avoiding continued stalemate, renewed conflict or outright partition.

An emerging, if still minority, opinion within the EU supports further negotiations, perhaps in the context of a joint approach toward EU membership for Serbia and Kosovo. Recently there has been the suggestion of a possible solution in the form of a confederation of cantons for Kosovo. Though perhaps not practical in itself, it does raise the possibility of looking at a formula for shared or overlapping sovereignty. It might be instructive to consider the 1998 peace that finally settled centuries of conflict and war between Ecuador and Peru over territory they both claimed. In a jungle area both marked in blood, they accepted an arrangement offered by mediators that granted an area of one square kilometer at the site of the fiercest fighting (Tiwinza) on the Peruvian side of the border – and in the middle of a bi-national peace park – to Ecuador as a non-sovereign private property. This allowed Ecuador to erect a monument and fly their flag in a place where many of their soldiers died. Kosovo is not a jungle park but any future mediators might think broadly and imaginatively to help the two sides reach an accommodation both can live with. (US Ambassador Luigi Einaudi was instrumental in reaching the Ecuador-Peru agreement. Perhaps he can be urged to try again.)

The ICJ decision is unlikely in itself to settle the status issue. Negotiations are not the enemy. Simple insistence on there being nothing to negotiate cannot be the Quint's only response. Paraphrasing Elvis Costello, what's so wrong with peace, dialogue and understanding?

Gerard M. Gallucci is a retired US diplomat. He served as UN Regional Representative in Mitrovica, Kosovo from July 2005 until October 2008. The views expressed in this piece are his own and do not represent the position of any organization. You can read more of Mr. Gallucci's analysis of current developments by visiting http://outsidewalls.blogspot.com

http://www.transconflict.com/News/2010/March/Kosovo_what_is_wrong_with_negotiations_anyway.php

The Scandal of Serbian Government U.S. Lobbying Deals

2010-02-27T20:12:00.001-05:00

http://www.balkanstudies.org/articles/scandal-serbian-government-us-lobbying-deals

The Scandal of Serbian Government U.S. Lobbying Deals

by Srdja Trifkovic

Two articles published on this site recently have prompted inquiries from different quarters regarding the lobbying deal between the Government of Serbia and Mr. Milan Petrovic and his Chicago-based APS Inc. In view of the seriousness of the matter and its potential legal implications we feel obliged to acquaint the public with the known facts of this case, which has all the makings of a political scandal in Serbia itself.

Who Is Milan Petrovic? – As the Chicago Sun-Times reported on April 10, 2008, Petrovic was then-Governor Rod Blagojevich's top fundraiser: over the years, Petrovic had raised over $1.9 million for the Governor, or half a million more than Tony Rezko, convicted on several counts of fraud and bribery in 2008. To be precise, during Rezko's trial, FBI Special Agent William Willenborg testified that Petrovic raised $1,963,485 for Blagojevich, outpacing Rezko, who raised a mere $1,437,350

According to the Chicago Tribune, "By the time Blagojevich came to power in 2003, lobbying the hospital board had grown into a fertile business… the field was also saturated with lobbyists from Blagojevich's orbit [including] Milan Petrovic, a friend and fundraiser of the governor." Illinois Issues magazine, published by the Center for State Policy and Leadership at the University of Illinois at Springfield, noted that "Gov. Rod Blagojevich's main re-election platform made the spotlight again when the Sun-Times reported the state's new All Kids health insurance program awarded a major contract to McKesson Health Solutions. The company is reportedly represented by a Chicago lobbying firm, Advanced Practical Solutions, led by Blagojevich's top political fund-raiser, Milan Petrovic."

The Belgrade daily Borba reported on August 13, 2009, that Milan Petrovic was „involved in numerous affairs and in the state of Indiana he was even disbarred":

„A great unknown in the career of Milan Petrovic is the deal he signed with the international giant CH2M Hill which earned $11 million from a contract with the State of Illinois. CH2M Hill suddenly decided in 2004 to become an APS client, although Petrovic's firm APS was founded only a year earlier, as a beginner lobbying group. Why the giant... firm chose Petrovic as an intermediary, although he was drowning in debt, remains unknown to this day. It is noteworthy that Petrovic sought bankruptcy protection on April 5, 2001, and on May 23 of that year he surrendered his law licence to the Indiana Bar because he was under investigation by the Indiana Supreme Court. He admitted knowing of the investigation and that he 'acknowledges the material facts so alleged are true' and b that he would not be able to launch a successful defense if he was indicted. The facts of that case were sealed by the Indiana court and they are not known to the public... Blagojevich's 'money man' donated $20,000 in 2006 to New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson's reelection campaign."

As Bloomberg reported on April 24 of last year („Blagojevich Fundraiser Represented Firm in New Mexico Probe") a client of Petrovic, CDR Financial Products Inc., was under investigation in a federal pay-to-play probe in New Mexico.

"Milan Petrovic, who raised $1.96 million for Blagojevich, introduced CDR to Illinois budget and debt officials, according to e-mails obtained under a public records request. He and his lobbying firm also donated $20,000 to New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, a one-time Democratic presidential candidate who withdrew from consideration as U.S. Commerce Secretary following disclosure of the CDR probe. Richardson 'is a public official I admire,' Petrovic, 43, said in a telephone interview, declining to comment further… In Illinois, Petrovic has also represented Stratton & Associates, a Denver-based consulting firm run by a senior political adviser to Richardson, state lobbying records show. Stratton lobbied on CDR's behalf in New Mexico, according to William Sisneros, chief executive officer of the New Mexico Finance Authority… Petrovic and his firm, Chicago-based Advanced Practical Solutions, contributed $20,000 to Richardson's campaign and political action committees in 2004 and 2005, New Mexico political finance records show. Petrovic's friends, business associates and clients donated at least $50,500 to Richardson."

Regarding that CH2M Hill contract, there is no mystery. In a detailed report on Petrovic („A Closer Look at Blagojevich's Top Money Man"), NWI.com reported on December 21, 2008, that on Nov. 30, 2006, the Illinois Toll Highway Authority gave CH2M Hill a $2.26 million contract to do a master plan development for the Northwest Tollway, and in 2007, the Chicago Tribune reported the firm got $11 million in tollway contracts.

The Plus Side – To his credit, Milan Petrovic appears to be a strong proponent of ethnic diversity. In 2008 one Shquipe Osmani, of Advanced Practical Solutions, was listed as making a donation of $2,300 to Hillary Clinton. This clearly indicates that, whatever Petrovic may be accused of, he should not be accused of any Serbian nationalist bias, not only in his hiring practices but also in support for the woman who boasts of having nagged her husband into bombing Serbia in 1999.

The Reaction in Serbia – According to the Belgrade daily Borba, „Serbia's lobbying in America is in reality a well developed scheme for private misappropriation of money which belongs to the citizens of Serbia." The paper commented the deal with Petrovic on July 27 of last year by saying that the Government of Serbia was paying „obscure firms and second-rate politicians, and that at the same time the public in Serbia knows nothing about the activities of these so-called lobbyists, or their results, and especially not about the way in which huge sums of money are being spent":

„Two main outfits for this deal are the above-mentioned firm of... Milan Petrović and '30 Point Strategies LLC,' which taken together cost Serbia $145.000 each month, or $1.74 million a year. To make it all even more suspicious, through those agencies other firms are paid too, such as 'Prairie Avenue Advisers LLC,' which cannot be found on the Internet, with one interesting detail: when its name is entered on... Google, it automatically corrects the last word to advisors, instead of advisers, which merely shows that the person creating this firm in Chicago even does not speak good English."

The paper added that Serbian taxpayers' money has been paid to „candidates" from Illinois, including one Footlik Jay (ed.: defeated by Dan Seals in the 2008 Democratic primary in the 10th District). It pointed out that the contract with Petrovic's firm was signet by Tamara Stojčević, secretary-general of the Government of Serbia, on 30 April 2009, on the same day when the Government approved it. The first payment was made and the contract registered with the U.S. Department of Justice (No. 5933) already the following day, „while the gullible citizens of Serbia were firing their grills for the long May Day weekend." According to the paper, the deal with Petrovic was arranged in 2008 at the Democratic Party Convention in Denver by Srdjan Šaper, a trusted member of President Boris Tadic's inner circle, who represented Serbia's ruling Democratic Party at the Convention.

Serbia's opposition politicians were outraged. Nenad Prokić, a deputy of the pro-Western Liberal Democratic Party of Serbia, said that the decision of the Government of Serbia to designate the contract with Petrovic as „Secret" (even though it is a matter of public record in the United States) aroused suspicion:

„Lobbying is desirable and useful, but the secrecy of the contract may indicate the desire to conceal some aspects of the truth about it. If it is to be legitimate, it has to be transparent... It is necessary to verify whether this is a method of passing money through the window into a family firm."

Dušan Janjić, Director of the Forum for Ethnic Relations in Belgrade, has expressed surprise that the Government of Serbia had signed the contract with the firm of Petrovic which is implicated in the affair of Rod Blagojević: „Since that agency is compromised, I think that the Government has made a perillous choice." According to Janjić, this contract shows the extent to which its signers fail to understand the importance of lobbying.

Biljana Kovačević Vučo, President of the Lawyers' Committee for Human Rights YUCOM in Belgrade, has expressed indignation at the lack of transparency: „The members of the Government use taxpayers' money as if it was their own, and violate the first principle of democracy that nothing should be clandestine".

Vesna Pešić, a member of Serbia's parliament, had tabled a Deputy's Question to the Government asking it to reveal the details of the contract, disputing its „Top Secret" designation on a contract which will inflict a multi-million damage on the taxpayers:

„The main problem in this whole story is that the public has not been informed on what the people elected to lead us are doing. Since when is the secretary of the Government authorized to sugn such a non-transparent contract, for which all government ministers claim that they had never seen it in their lives. I have asked the Government about it... but I expect them to remain silent, as they had done before... (President Boris) Tadić certainly knew about this contract, because (Foreign Minister Vuk) Jeremić knew about it."

The story does not end there. It will continue. Watch this space.

The Debacle of Serbia's "Lobbying" in Washington

2010-02-26T12:18:00.001-05:00

http://www.balkanstudies.org/blog/debacle-serbias-lobbying-washington

The Debacle of Serbia's "Lobbying" in Washington
By James G. Jatras
Friday, 26 Feb 2010

The lobbying contract between the Government of Serbia and Milan Petrovic's firm appears still to be in force, but it is hard to be sure since there are no discernable activities being performed. And of course that is the real scandal, in which the "yellow" press organs obsessed with my work for Bishop Artemije seem to take no interest.
***********************
Since the suspension of Bishop Artemije of Ras and Prizren from administration of his Eparchy, efforts have been made by some to use my role as a lobbyist in Washington on his behalf as a weapon in the campaign against him. I already have addressed elsewhere the questions, first raised last week by Blic (parroting an Albanian-American source), about the source of the funds used for lobbying in the U.S. and whether their use for that purpose was legitimate application of the ruling Bishop's discretion.

But the more damaging thing about these attacks is the notion that lobbying for Serbia's right to keep Kosovo was somehow a "waste" of money, and that there were no results from it. This is more than a belittlement of the efforts that were expended by my firm and those working with us. It is, rather, a suggestion that it is immoral and futile for Serbia to struggle for her interests by lobbying to change US policy.

When we started in the spring of 2006 we were the only professional (as opposed to volunteer) activity lobbying on behalf of the Serbian cause. Our activities, through a US nonprofit organization we created, the American Council for Kosovo, were not confined to narrowly focused lobbying in the form of quiet meetings with American officials and Congressmen. More importantly, we knew we had to change the terms of debate on Kosovo, from a place where the noble West saved innocent Albanian Muslims from evil Serbs, to a place where the criminal, terrorist UÇK was committing genocide of Christian Serbs. Most of our activities in the U.S. and elsewhere (Britain, Germany, Israel, India, Italy, the EU, Russia, etc.), often in cooperation with The Lord Byron Foundation and with the support of other volunteers, were focused on public opinion. We forced people to look at "the other side" of the Kosovo story, to the outraged howls of the Albanian lobby that we were trying to "hijack" US policy. While we were not able to overturn an American policy misinformed by decades of Albanian (and Croatian) anti-Serb propaganda, I believe were successful in helping to delay Washington's final push for almost two years, giving Serbia a chance to fight back. Our contract, only a part of which was ever paid, was for $100,000 per month, including (about 40% of the total) cost of advertising, conferences, travel, and other expenses.

In evaluating our degree of success, it might be useful to make a couple of comparisons. A few months after we began our effort under the direction of Vladika Artemije, the Serbian government (under Prime Minister Kostunica) hired another firm, Barbour Griffith and Rodgers, to lobby officially on its behalf. That contract was for $60,000 per month, plus costs. As far as has been publicly disclosed, they were not specifically tasked with lobbying on Kosovo, but such concentration can be inferred. Their activities were entirely closed-door meetings, and they did no public activities to make Serbia's case. They were dropped soon after the UDI in February 2008.

In the summer of 2009, Belgrade (the current government) hired another firm, Chicago-based Advanced Practical Solutions, for $85,000 per month, plus most costs. As a professional lobbyist, I don't generally like to throw rocks at a competitor, but APS seems an odd choice. They have no active website and apparently not even a Washington office. APS's President, Mr. Milan Petrovic, is known mostly as a top fundraiser for former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich. According to press reports, when "Blago" was governor APS did a nice little business steering state contracts to its clients, mainly in the healthcare field. The operation fell apart with the Antoin "Tony" Rezko bribery conviction, Blagojevich's resignation, and Petrovic's withdrawal from the Indiana bar to avoid imminent expulsion. Maybe APS was hired by the Tadic government because it's a "Serbian firm," although that in itself means nothing. But an online search of US political campaign records finds several contributions to candidates (all Democrats: Blagojevich, John Kerry, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama) by an APS employee named Shqipe Osmani, which doesn't sound Serbian. The APS contract appears still to be in force, but it's hard to be sure since there are no discernable activities being performed. And of course that's the real scandal, in which the "yellow" press organs obsessed with my work for Bishop Artemije seem to take no interest. I wonder why.

I'm sure these figures for lobbying activities in the US must seem astronomical to readers in Serbia, where people are struggling to scrape by. The sad fact is, this is the kind of money it takes to array a battery of experienced media and lobbying professionals, usually with experience as government officials, Congressmen, Senators, and (like me) Congressional staff. These are people who have the access to make a foreign country's - or politician's, or political party's - case heard in Washington's corridors of power.

Many countries a lot poorer than Serbia have made the decision it's an investment they need to make, if only for self-protection. It is a choice Bishop Artemije, to his credit, made when no one else on the Serbian side was willing to step forward. And now there are those who seek to punish him for it, and punish Serbia too. Thats not just a crime, it's a blunder.

An edited version of Mr. Jatras's piece will be published next week by the Serbian-language newspaper 'Vesti' http://www.vesti-online.com

Al Jazeera : The Secret Life of Radovan Karadzic

2010-02-24T19:16:00.000-05:00

Interview: Radovan Karadzic

From left: Karadzic in 1994, in 2008 at The Hague and in his guise as Dr Dragan Dabic [EPA]

In the first episode of his new series, The Rageh Omaar Report, Rageh Omaar travels to Serbia and Bosnia to investigate the decade-long period Radovan Karadzic, the former president of the Republika Srpska, spent in hiding and to examine his legacy in present-day Bosnia and beyond.

Ahead of the imminent resumption of his trial for war crimes at the International Criminal Court, the former Bosnian Serb leader gave an exclusive written interview to Al Jazeera from his cell in The Hague.

Rageh Omaar: Why have you decided not to attend the trial so far?

Radovan Karadzic: I did not attend the trial in October because I had not been given adequate time to prepare. I am keen to attend my trial provided I am allowed to participate. I am not going to be a plant standing in the rain and snow without the opportunity to actively participate. If I were to do so it would be a shame for me and the Tribunal.

What do you think of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) process in your case and in general?

One can always hope. All I can do is hope for a fair trial.

For 13 years you avoided arrest. How was life as a fugitive? Did you live each day wondering if you were about to be arrested?

There is a saying that whoever is dying from fear has an enormous number of deaths. So I lived - I did not die.

When you look back on your time as Dr Dragan Dabic, how much of him was really you and how much was a part you were playing?

As Dr Dabic, I didn't do anything that Radovan Karadzic would not do. While Radovan Karadzic was a medical doctor trained in scientific medicine, Dr Dabic practised traditional medicine which has been around for thousands of years. I believe that the two types of medicine are complimentary and should be integrated. There is no reason to abandon such rich experience of the old cultures. In that sense, Dr Dabic was Radovan Karadzic and vice versa.

What exactly were the terms of the deal you have repeatedly stated was made between you and Richard Holbrooke, who served as the US envoy to the Balkans?

Richard Holbrooke, acting on behalf of the international community, including the United Nations Security Council, promised that if I resigned my positions as president of Republika Srpska and the SDS party, did not participate in the upcoming elections, and withdrew from public life, I would not be prosecuted in The Hague.

I fulfilled all of my promises. I am still waiting for Mr Holbrooke to fulfill his.

How do you feel about your role during the Bosnian war?

I had a misfortunate role in a misfortunate war in a misfortunate country.

It was a war that we did not want and that we did not need.

It was a war among Serbs, since the Bosnian Muslims are Serbs who adopted Islam under Turkish rule. It was not in our interest to be enemies.

Our clashes are always tragic for all people in Bosnia and beneficial only to third parties.

Had there been a different leadership of the Bosnian Muslims in the early 1990s, the war would have been avoided.

People in Bosnia always wish for peace. There is a habit among people in our country of saying the words "Peaceful Bosnia" at the end of a sentence.

This can tell you how rarely it is peaceful in Bosnia.

The Rageh Omaar Report: The Secret Life of Radovan Karadzic can be seen from Wednesday, February 24, at the following times GMT: Wednesday: 1900; Thursday: 0300, 1400; Friday: 0600; Saturday: 1900; Sunday: 0300.

The Rageh Omaar Report is a new series of one-hour, monthly investigative documentaries in which award-winning correspondent Rageh Omaar reports on the world's most important current affairs stories.

The first edition of the programme, The Secret Life of Radovan Karadzic, airs ahead of the imminent resumption of Karadzic's trial at the International Criminal Court in The Hague.

Rageh Omaar travels to Serbia and Bosnia to investigate the decade-long period the former president of the Republika Srpska spent in hiding and examines his legacy in present-day Bosnia and beyond

Click here for more on The Rageh Omaar Report.

http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2010/02/20102229152873163.html

Press Communiqué: Serbian resolution on Srebrenica

2010-02-22T20:33:00.001-05:00

Communiqué de Presse about Serbian resolution on Srebrenica

Paris, 14. 2. 2010

As a member of the Serbian Diaspora in France, I wish to express in the name of my friends around journal "Dialogue" and in my name strong disagreement with the proposed adoption by the Serbian parliament of a resolution regarding so called the "Srebrenica genocide". The use of the term "genocide" in such a resolution would be harmful to Serbia and harmful to the cause of peace in the world.

It would be interpreted as an admission that Serbia was responsible for the crime of "genocide" committed during the tragic civil war in neighboring Bosnia-Herzegovina. This may entail grave political and even economic consequences for the people of Serbia.
As a result of such an interpretation, it would be used to undermine and eventually destroy Republika Srpska, by representing the Bosnian Serbs as "Serbian invaders" whose entity has been built on "genocide" and therefore has no right to exist. This could actually rekindle war in Bosnia.
It will be used to justify the 1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia, and thereby the independence of Kosovo, since the pretext for the NATO bombing was to prevent "genocide" in Kosovo and Metochia, based on the allegation that the Belgrade regime had shown its genocidal tendencies in Srebrenica.
Worst of all, it will encourage further NATO aggression, when it can be shown that even the victims of such aggression can be made to take the blame for war waged against them.
A fifth and equally serious, but more subtle, consequence, would be to contribute to the "clash of civilizations" by confirming the allegation that European Christians (Serbs in this case) hated Muslims so much that they wanted to exterminate them, while other European Christians stood by and allowed this "genocide" to happen. This allegation is widely echoed throughout the Muslim world, and therefore serves to build fear and hostility between Muslim and Western countries.

If the Serbian government would adopt a resolution as one which is in preparation, this would be terrible mistake. I categorically reject in advance to recognise such declaration as representing my and our, Serbian, opinion. By accepting such resolution, such government will cease to represent interests of the Serbian people. This government and its president will have to take all consequences of not representing and fulfilling the will of the citizens of Serbia and the Serbs abroad.

The way to contribute to peace and justice is not to give in to pressure to make forced confessions, but rather to seek reconciliation through truth, recognizing that in a tragic civil war, there were criminals and victims on all sides. The truth is not the exclusive possession of the victors, but the result of a scrupulous process that has yet to be carried out in an independent scientific manner.

Dr Dragan Pavlovic

Director and Editor in chief, "Dialogue", Paris, France

Statement by James George Jatras Regarding Allegations of Misuse of Funds to Support Lobbying in the United States on Behalf of Serbs in Kosovo and Metohija

2010-02-17T22:38:00.001-05:00

Statement by James George Jatras Regarding Allegations of Misuse of Funds to Support Lobbying in the United States on Behalf of Serbs in Kosovo and Metohija

February 18, 2010

Washington

In connection with the suspension of His Grace, Bishop ARTEMIJE, from supervision of his Eparchy, allegations have been made to the effect that funds allocated for other purposes (variously reported as earmarked for humanitarian relief or for repair of churches) instead were used to pay for lobbying service by two firms with which I have been associated, Venable and Squire Sanders. To the best of my knowledge, this was first raised in Blic yesterday. Later that same day, an item appeared in a website purporting to be that of the Diocese of Ras and Prizren and Kosovo and Metohija, denouncing me for beginning circulation of an open appeal in defense of Vladika Artemije, which started yesterday.

I will address the accusation of the alleged misuse of funds in due course, below. But first it needs to be made clear what is going on here: that a concerted effort is being made to destroy the man who, more than anyone else, has become the symbol of Serbia's resistance to amputation and annihilation of Serbia's most important spiritual and national patrimony. Can anyone doubt that should it succeed what would be the consequence for the Serbs of Kosovo and Metohija and for the whole Serbian nation? Even if there are legitimate questions to be asked about administrative matters in the Diocese, everyone can see the methods being used to obliterate Vladika Artemije's public witness and to terrorize and intimidate his supporters. Who benefits from that?

With regard to my contract for lobbying services on behalf of Vladika Artemije and of the Serbian people of Kosovo and Metohija, I have and always will regard the fact that His Grace asked me, and not someone else, to perform this task in Washington as the great honor of my life. It should be kept in mind that beginning with my work at the U.S. Senate, and subsequently during my testimony as the trial of Slobodan Milosevic at The Hague, I have tried to be conscientious regarding both the damage my own country was doing to itself through its misguided Balkan policy (and particularly support of radical Islamic elements in Bosnia and Kosovo) and the obscene unfairness of the demonization the Western powers, especially the United States, attached to the Serbs during the Balkan wars of the 1990s. For that, well before being engaged by the Serbs of Kosovo, I was attacked from many quarters, notably by Islamic organizations and the Albanian lobby. Perhaps for that reason, when Vladika Artemije decided that something on a professional basis needed to be done on behalf of his people, he selected me knowing that it would not be just a "job" performed by a "hired gun" who could just as happily represent Serbia's enemies but someone committed to his cause.

In March 2006, I signed on behalf of Venable an agreement with the Serbian National Council of Kosovo and Metohija (SNC), under the signature of its president, Mr. Dragan Velic. It should be kept in mind there was then no official Serbian government lobbying effort in the United States, at a time when the U.S. government clearly was moving towards a "final solution" of the province's status. (Several months later the government did sign an agreement with another firm but not, as far as I know, with specific reference to Kosovo.) Vladika Artemije concluded that if no action was going to be taken by official Belgrade, he had no choice but to try to do something himself as the centerpiece of a professional effort to put the truth about Kosovo in front of the face of the American people and decision-makers. This is the same decisiveness and courage he displayed when I first met him, when I was working at the Senate, during the period 1997-1998, when he was, as far as I know, the only Bishop willing to speak against Milosevic and to come to Washington on a mission of peace.

Upon signing of the March 2006 agreement with the SNC, Venable immediately launched the American Council for Kosovo. Our goal was to provide a real American voice against the wrong-headedness of our country's policy of supporting a group of Islamic terrorists and organized crime organizations (the KLA) under the command of the criminals Thaci, Ceku, and Haradinaj; and to show that far from perpetrators of genocide in Kosovo, Serbs are the victims. We knew we were starting a fight with an entrenched policy position in Washington, which held that all the merits were on the Albanian side and none on the Serbian side. We also were fighting against an Albanian lobby that had been active, literally, for decades, and which had vast sources of funds (of course, including criminal proceeds), the amounts of which can only be speculated, and which lavishly gave to American politicians' campaigns.

The reaction to our beginning operations was hysterical. One of the Albanian-American groups accused us of trying to "hijack American policy toward Kosova," to which, of course, the Albanians were accustomed to full and uncontested enjoyment. (It is quite meaningful that the information in the Blic article is taken almost word-for-word from this Albanian-American site.) They hacked our website. They launched a phony mirror site (which even fooled some people into thinking we were working for the Albanians too!). They denounced us as racists, extremists, etc., for pointing out the truth of Kosovo and the "friends" America had adopted there. We believed we could win only by changing the terms of debate. When we began, "Kosovo" meant only "the place where America stopped genocide of peaceful Albanians by evil Serbs." Due to our efforts, for many, many Americans "Kosovo" now means "the place where our government insanely helps jihadists and gangsters terrorize Christian Serbs."

Were we successful? Let us remember that when we began our efforts Washington fully expected smoothly to arrange the "final status" of Kosovo well before the end of 2006. The architects of American policy expected minimal resistance from Belgrade and were sure the Russians were not serious in their opposition to independence. And of course there were virtually no dissenting voices in the United States. While our efforts may not have been early enough to have accomplished a reversal of American policy, I am confident that if not for this campaign under Vladika Artemije's guidance and direction Washington would have moved much faster than it did to "resolve" the issue. Instead, we threw enough sand in the gears that contributed to a delay of almost two years, by which time the Russian position had become rock-solid and it had become impossible for anyone (openly, anyway) in Serbian politics to consent to losing Kosovo. Even when Washington did make its move in early 2008, in concert with the KLA kingpins and with unprecedented bullying of our European allies, they did so with the increasingly desperate knowledge they were losing ground and that it was "now or never." The result – the ongoing, unresolved crisis – is not one anyone wants to see but is far better than what likely would have been the case if we had not moved when we did at Vladika Artemije's initiative. I sincerely believe we helped give Serbia a fighting chance, which it is still her option to take advantage of or not.

With respect to the money, there is a curious assumption behind the accusation that moneys were "diverted" to lobbying: that while Serbia's enemies should take full advantage of all the influence money can buy, Serbs should rely solely on goodhearted, voluntary, nonprofessional efforts. That assumption is a large part of why Serbia and Serbs ended up where they did in the propaganda wars of the 1990s. It is an assumption Vladika Artemije wisely understood he had to reject if he was to have any hope of saving his flock. In any case, the cost for services in the agreement signed between SNC and Venable in March 2006 was for an initial six-month period for $600,000, and continuing thereafter unless cancelled at the same rate of $100,000 per month. Any search of lobbying records for international clients shows that is this is well within the range of such services, with two provisos:

First, that the payments under the SNC/Venable agreement were inclusive of out-of-pocket costs (like media buys, travel, conferences, etc.), and was not just for professional fees to the firm for its work. This is not usual. In most agreements the contract amount is what goes for the work, with costs added on top. This means that out of the SNC/Venable contract from one-third to up to forty percent of the funds paid went not for professional fees but for things like ads in papers read by officials, like Roll Call and The Hill; in well-read political sites like DrudgeReport and Daily Kos; conferences at locations like the Capitol Hill Club (Washington's most well-regarded Republican gathering place); for travel around the U.S., Britain, Germany, Russia, India, Israel, Belgium (EU), Rome, and other locations; and similar expenses. This also means that the actual amount paid for the work of Venable's professionals was far exceeded (by a factor of two or three times) by the amount of time devoted to the mission.
Second, that funding ($600,000) for the initial six months, which was paid out over the period March-December 2006, virtually exhausted the sources available for support of the representation. In February 2007, because I had changed firms, the agreement with Venable was reassigned to Squire Sanders Public Advocacy, under the signature of Fr. Simeon (Vilovski), continuing at $100,000 per month, though by then no further funds were available. Notwithstanding, the work continued at the same intensity throughout 2007 and 2008, and into 2009. Since then, it has been necessary to scale back the work but it has never fully ended despite having, in effect, ceased to be professional effort and transformed into essentially a volunteer activity.

So, that means that since the signing of the March 2006 contract, that initial $600,000 for six months has bought almost four years worth of work of varying levels of intensity. That's an average of about $12,500 per month, of which, as noted above, a sizeable portion went to costs.

None of what is related above is a state secret, however. As noted, all of this has been public record since March 2006, and in a sense it is absurd and insulting to have to explain it. How, then, to understand the sense of breathless discovery by those trying to discredit Vladika Artemije? When all is said and done, there is only one legitimate question than can be asked that relates to the lobbying issue: did the funds for it come from some specific source for which it was absolutely impermissible to be used for any other purpose, such as lobbying? Not being party to the Eparchy's ledgers, I would strongly doubt it. First, money is fungible. If money is given to the Eparchy for various purposes and then is spent for a number of legitimate activities, how is it determined which money went for what purpose? Second, I categorically reject any suggestion that Vladika Artemije, Fr. Simeon, or any of the monastics and laity associated with him would perform any clearly improper action, financial or otherwise. If, on the other hand, we are talking about questions of judgment, that should be left to the Bishop's discretion. For example, if Vladika Artemije decides that instead of spending a dollar to help restore a damaged church (so the Albanians can attack it again) it would be better to spend it to help ensure churches won't be destroyed, who better than he to be the judge of it?

In any case, such questions can be asked in a reasonable and humane way. That is not, however, what we see before us today, which can only feed the sense that something else is at work. It is hard to escape the conclusion that what really is unfolding is a political agenda reminiscent of the Milosevic era, to silence Vladika Artemije's courageous and irreplaceable voice that is so offensive to some in Washington, Brussels, and Belgrade.

In closing, I note that the item posted on the "new" Eparchy site accuses me not only of hypocrisy but of attacking the Holy Synod. To appeal respectfully but firmly is not to attack. So, once again, I appeal to His Holiness, Patriarch IRINEJ, to the Holy Synod, and to the whole Serbian people, that this unjust and unjustified persecution of Vladika Artemije stop at once and that he be restored to authority over his Diocese.

Prof.Dr.Rajko Dolec(ek,DrSc.-TALKS WITH GENERAL MLADIĆ

2010-02-08T10:56:00.000-05:00

Prof. Dr.Rajko Doleček,DrSc. Ostrava, 16.12.09.

TALKS WITH GENERAL MLADIĆ

Dear Reader,

My wife Dobra and I had the privilege to meet general Ratko Mladić repeatedly and to discuss with him many problems of Yugoslavia, especially of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BaH) and the dirty anti-Serb involvement of the official West and its media during the dismemberment of Yugoslavia in the civil-ethnic-religious war that they had fomented . The West increased the inter-ethnic and inter-religious hatred in the former Yugoslavia. After each encounter with Mladić, I made short notes of the topics discussed. At that time I was the president of the Czech Foundation of friends of Serbs and Montenegrins. In 1996 we met Dr.Radovan Karadžić, the president of Republika Srpska in BaH, a well-known poet and psychiatrist. He gave us two books of his poetry. When speaking about today´s shameful approach of the West to its trusted friends and allies, the Serbs, Dr.Karadžić said:

-„It is unbelievable how the western media described us in their absolutely one-sided, tendentious reports: out of ignorance and for money."

„Talks with General Mladić" is not a General´s Biography. It covers the topics discussed with him, with some explanatory and complementary notes added.

I was upset because the official West had made his friends and protégés out of those who had fought to the bitter end on the side of the nazis and fascists (1941-45): the Croats from the ustasha fascist Independent state of Croatia (NDH), a part of the Muslims from BaH, and the Kosovo Albanians. On the other side, the official West and its powerful propaganda machine, a big part of its media, made villains out of its staunch allies, the Serbs, who had fought gallantly on their side during two big wars (1914-18 and 1941-45) with a loss of almost a third of Serbia´s population. The US journalist Peter Brock called it in his book (2006) „the dirty reporting".The main culprit for that switch was Kohl´s Germany, whose foreign minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher, with the help of Vatican, compelled the venal European Community (later the European Union, EU) to recognize at Maastricht (Dec.17, 1991) Croatia and Slovenia as sovereign and independent states, thus paving the way for recognition of Bosnia and Herzegovina and for bloody inter-ethnic and inter-religious wars. The final act of Helsinki (1975) about the non-interference in internal affairs of sovereign states was ruthlessly violated by the West. According to the French general P.M.Gallois, Germany took revenge on Serbia because it fought in two wars when Germany was defeated. In 1941 the Serbs compelled Hitler to postpone his attack on USSR for 5-6 weeks and it was one of the reasons why the Germans lost the war. The US foreign secretary W.Christopher accused (1993) Germany of responsibility for the war in the Balkans.

After the collapse of the bipolar world, when the USSR lost its supremacy in the eastern bloc, a majority of its people thought that they entered a free world, but it was just an illusion where the media played a big part in manipulations and disinformations of the public. The governments of the so called „free world" and its media showed a moral decadence in spreading their selfish interests and fabrications, shouting down critics.

I was very eager to hear the opinions of general Mladić whom the western officials and a part o media started unjustly to brand him as a war criminal, without enabling him to defend himself and shouting down any positive informations from the Serb side. It is necessary to explain why the phenomenon Mladić appeared, under which circumstances this talented, honest and brave officer became, not by his will, one of the leaders and protectors of his people in mortal danger. He became an epic hero for ordinary people, for his troops, when they had been abandonned by all. To understand this phenomenon, one must know at least some features of the Serbian history of the last 100 years, including the genocide of Serbs (700-800 000 assassinated) in the fascist ustasha state of Croatia (1941-1945) and the cruel German regime in the occupied Serbia at that time. General Radovan Radinović, a teaching professor in the Military Academy told about his „student„ Mladić:

-„In my opinion and experience, he is the most talented officer we had since 1918...His greatest handicap was the fact, that he was the best warrior who was not allowed to win the war…"

During our first meeting, general Ratko Mladić told us with a sad smile:

-„I am the third generation of Serbs who did not know their fathers, because they had been killed in wars when their sons were too young." General´s father Nedja, a peasant from Bosnian mountains, was killed in 1945 in the fight with the ustashas, when Ratko was only two years old.

Colonel Mladić was sent in june 1991 to the Serb Krajina in Croatia, to help reorganize the 9th corps of the Yugoslav army (JNA) weakened by desertions of Albanians, Croats, Muslims from BaH and Slovenes, while the Macedonians, Montenegrins and Serbs stayed. He renewed the discipline and stopped the advance of the Croatian paramilitary groups which had started to expel and even to assassinate the Serbs in Krajina, as they had done during 1941-45. But he was not able to stop the inter-ethnik clashes. Later, he was unanimously chosen (already as a general) on May 12, 1992, to be the commander in chief of the newly created Bosnian Serb Army (VRS).

When speaking about the ICTY Tribunal in The Hague, Mladić said with defiance:

-„I´ll come personally to The Hague, as soon as the American generals from Vietnam and the Britisch from the Falkland Islands will be there…"

He told it when we spoke about the illegally created Tribunal by the Security Council of UNO (1993), because it had no mandate for such an action. It was the German foreign minister Klaus Kinkel who had suggested its formation and it was Madeleine Albright who had strongly supported its creation. From its very beginning, it became a one-sided court, a sort of a „kangaroo court" with double standards, „a prolonged arm of the USA interests", very unfavorable to Serbs. Diana Johnstone described it in one of her papers „Selective justice in The Hague – The war crimes Tribunal on former Yugoslavia is a mockery of evidenciary rule" (The Nation, Sept.22, 1997). There are many examples corroborating it. Nasir Orić, the Muslim commander of Srebrenica, whose men looted and destroyed up to 100 Serb villages in eastern Bosnia, killing and injuring thousands of Serbian villagers, was given a prison sentence of only TWO years. General Rasim Delić of the Bosnian Muslim army got only THREE years, while the mujaheddins under his command decapitated many Serb (and initially even Croat) prisoners. Three Kosovo Albanians, well known killers of Serbs, Romanies and pro-Yugoslav Albanians, Ramush Haradinaj (for some time the Prime Minister of Kosovo) and his brother Daut, Fatmir Limaj (a member of Kosovo Parliament) were not even sentenced. The witnesses of their crimes were either assassinated, or just disappered, or refused to witness. Carla del Ponte, the ICTY prosecutor general, wrote about it in chapter 11 of her book (2008). Most generals of the VRS were sentenced to 20-30 years imprisonment. The well known British journalist J.Laughland called the ICTY „Rogue Court with Rigged Rules" (The Times, June 17,1999). The high UNO representative C. Thornberry described openly the immoral one-sidedness of ICTY in his article „Saving the War Crimes Tribunal" (Foreign Policy, Fall, 1996). Mladić was happy when I showed him those papers. –„Thank God, after all there are some honest journalists and media in the West!"

General Mladić was absolutely devoted to his Serbian nation and to his troops, his popularity was tremendous. My wife and I spent a very friendly afternoon chatting at the HQ of VRS at Han Pijesak in eastern Bosnia with his top commanding officers, drinking coffee and sipping „frontovača", a 50% plum brandy, with them.

We had a talk with the blue-eyed general about „the meaning of the Serb history"

-„As a whole, but there were some exceptions, the Serbs are honest, fair and gallant, knightly, you could say. Without those features they would not fight for 500 years against the Turkish invaders with unbelievable sufferings, when it was so easy to convert to Islam and to become „a sultan´s son", with all accompanying privileges…"

The first two big victories in the war against Germany and Austria-Hungary (1914-1918) were won by the Kingdom of Serbia in 1914, the battle of Cer (august) and the Kolubara-Suvobor battle (november-december). The latter was won by general Živojin Mišić, who was promoted to vojvoda (field marchall) after the battle.

-„Those victories have been studied even in western Military academies, as examples of a brilliant military strategy. My cap has the same form as the cap of vojvoda Mišić," said Mladić proudly. In a few minutes he explained how the battles were going on. Mladić hated the war, with its killings and destructions, with its disregard for human life and with its consequent revenge and hatred. When we spoke about the famous Chinese Master SUN and his book „About the Art of Warfare" (from the 4-5.centuries B.C.) I found in its first chapter a perfect description of the brilliant military leader Mladić:

-„The profession of a military leader means prudence, reliability, humanity, courage and hard resolutness."

General Mladić could not understand the hypocrisy of the West, its unhumane approaches in many events, its tendency to disinform or to overtly lie.

-„In summer 1992 the western part of Republika Srpska (RS) was cut from its eastern part, from the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, FRY (Serbia+Montenegro). In the Banja Luka hospital suddenly no oxygen in cylinders was available. The local authorities asked the West to allow the oxygen cylinders from FRY or from the West to be sent to Banja Luka. It was not allowed and 12 newborn babies suffocated…The supplies arrived when my heroic Krajina and Drina corps after severe fighting opened a corridor at Brčko, in northern Bosnia…. A group of four British parlamentarians visited (1993) RS and found an appalling health service situation. Two boys, Siniša (9 yrs) and Dejan (10 yrs), had been severely wounded by a Muslim shell at the Serb held town of Doboj. The local doctors were not able to help them. They asked the West to transport them to a western well equipped hospital in Germany, France or Italy, as it was done when Croat or Muslim children were critically injured. This urgent appeal was rejected and both boys died soon…" The report of the four MPs was written in September 1993.

But one of the western crimes against humanity upset general a lot. It was the suspension of FRY from the World Health Organisation on May 3, 1993. It was initiated by Danmark and WHO thus became an instrument of punishment and not of help. As a consequence, thousands of babies, children, elderly people and chronically ill died in FRY, in Republika Srpska, in Republika Srpska Krajina. Infectious diseases spread.

As provocations, the Muslim government in Sarajevo organized three big explosions in Sarajevo (the bread queue massacre on May 27, 1992; the Markale I massacre on February 5, 1994; the Markale II massacre on August 28, 1995), with heavy loss of life, and accused the Serbs as perpetrators. The official West, its media (but not all of them) accepted „joyfully" that fabrication and severe sanctions were imposed thereafter on FRY and RS by the UNO. But the honest western journalists exposed that ploy: L.Doyle "Muslims slaughter heir own people – Bosnia bread queue massacre was propaganda ploy, UN told"(The Independent, Aug.22, 1992); B.Volker, a French TV TF1 journalist: „The mortar bomb which killed 68 people in a Sarajevo marketplace and evoked a NATO ultimatum against the Bosnian Serbs was fired from Muslim positions, according to a UN report" (Feb.5, 1994); HughMcManners: "Serbs ´not guilty of massacre´- Experts warned US that mortar was Bosnian" (The Sunday Times, Oct.1, 1995). At that time, the US lt.colonel John Sray (military inteligence) published his report „Selling the Bosnian Myth to America: Buyer Beware!"(Foreign Military Studies Office, Oct.1995), exposing many western lies and fabrications. Mladić was enthusiastic to hear it. He knew from the Serb intelligence, that explosions were organized by the Muslim authorities, the latest („Markale II") with the knowledge and approval by the official West because NATO needed a pretext to start the air raids on RS and to become practically an official ally of Croats and Muslims.

In spring and summer 1995 a powerful Croatian army was concentrated near the borders of RS. In may and in august 1995, the Croatian Army (about 140 000 troops), well equipped by Germany, Argentina and others, attacked the Republika Srpska Krajina (about 20-30 000 troops). The planners of that aggression were the US retired mercenary generals C.E.Saint, H.Soyster and C.E.Vuono (the Professional Military Resources,Inc). The Croatian attack was supported by the Bosnian Muslim army and by NATO planes (intelligence, supplies). About 250 000 Serbs were robbed and expelled from their ancient homes, over 1 000 of them were assassinated. Serb Krajina in Croatia was devastated, its towns heavily bombarded by artillery and planes. Krajina became ethically „clear" of Serbs. The Croatian attack happened during Croat-Serb negotiations, under UNO protection. There were no resolutions of UNO, no sanctions, there was only some sporadic official criticism. The Czech president Havel, obedient to his western mentors, did not use his phrases about truth and love against lies and hatred in the case of Serbs from Krajina.

-„We have been in an awkward situation. A huge Croatian army and tens of thousands of Muslim troops, with NATO support, were there. The 28th Muslim division at Srebrenica (it was not demilitarized !) was a knife in our back. We had to take Srebrenica…The West used Srebrenica to divert world´s attention from the horrible crimes of Croats against the 250 000 expelled and looted Serbs in Krajina. It was Mrs Albright´s cover-up that created the fantastic fabrication, the alleged Srebrenica massacre…During the 3 years of fighting around Srebrenica we lost about 1 200 men, while the Muslims about 2 000…Our VRS had strict orders to behave according to the international laws. There were absolutely no mass murders or mass executions. But I cannot exclude personal revenges of some of our troops from this area when they recognized among the Muslim troops the killers of their families, who had devastated their villages…

We used our buses to transport about 30 000 civilians who wanted to leave, and Muslim soldiers who surrendered, to the position of the Muslim army near Kladanj or Tuzla. Was this a genocide? Maybe 10 000 of Muslim troops fought on trying to break through to Tuzla. Oddly enough, their commanders withdrew well in advance. Was it planned? Muslims suffered heavy losses in fighting, but thousands of them reached Tuzla. The West and the Sarajevo authorities made out of this losses during fighting a genocide.

The Dutch troops (the Dutchbat of appr.450 men) stationed at Srebrenica, including their commander Lt.Colonel T.Karremans and the Dutch Chief of Staff general Hans Cousy negated the official western version about genocide of Muslims in Srebrenica (H.Hetzel, Die Welt, July 12, 1996). While the Dutch defence minister J.Voorhoeve talked about more thousands of Muslim victims, the Dutch troops talked about more hundreds, up to one thousand, of Muslim troops killed in fighting. A group of the western experts (Y. Bodansky, G.Copley, P.Corwin, Sept.18, 2003) declared that the independent forensic analyses found the 7 000 or even 8 000 alleged Muslim dead a very inflated figure, the real losses were in the range of hundreds. About 3 000 of those allegedly „killed" Muslims took even part in BaH elections in 1996 !!! Their names were on the voting lists.

When the Serb ex-president S.Milošević was tried (2004) in The Hague for the alleged war crimes, the French general P.Morillon (ex-commander of UNPROFOR) said that the Serbs wanted a revenge in Srebrenica for those Serbs murdered by the Muslims earlier. His statement made the Muslim regime furious. Before the war (1941-45), about 50% of inhabitants of Srebrenica were Serbs, in 1991 only about 29% of them, because thousands of them had been expelled or murdered by the Croatian ustashas and the local Muslims during the war. When the VRS entered Srebrenica in 1995, no Serbs lived there any more.

One day general Mladić told us with some sadness in his voice:

-„I know, that both the Muslims from BaH and the Croats hate me, especially their mothers because they see behind my name their dead sons, soldiers and, unluckily, civilians as well. And their destroyed houses, lost property. But they must realize, that THEY wanted and started to dismember this country in defiance to constitution, that they started all those destructions and killings. What could I do? Had I to allow them to kill the Serbs, as they did in the ustasha state of Croatia in 1941-45? We, the Serbs, as well as many Muslims and Croats with a pro-Yugoslav ideology did not want a war, did not start it. We did not want to secede from Yugoslavia. It was terrible that many of our pro-Yugoslav bothers, Croats and Muslims, found themselves unintentionally behind hostile barricades, driven there by their leaders and fanatic fellow believers. Many Muslims knew that they had been originally the Serbs, before they converted to Islam.There were many Muslim prominent men, poets, writers who declared that they were the Serbs of Muslim faith.

„Do you imagine what an orgy of brutal murder brought to Bosnia the mujaheddins from Irak, Chechnya, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, etc.? They taught our Muslims how to kill in a more brutal way. They even decapitated their prisoners, the Serbs and even the Croats when they waged a very bloody and cruel Croat-Muslim war (mainly in 1993).

Generally speaking, general Mladić felt that he was a Yugoslav, he declared it during a population census in 1991. He was very angry with the Slovenes, about their dirty role in the dismemberment of Yugoslavia and their very anti-Serb attitudes.

-„The Slovenes have forgotten how they and Croats implored the Serb royal authorities in Belgrade at the end of 1918, to be accepted by the victorious Serbia to become a part of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (SHS) and how the SHS saved the Slovenes from a final germanization and italianization. As a member of a victorious country, neither the Slovenes nor the Croats were obliged to pay reparations, otherwise they would be obliged to, because they were a part of Austria-Hungary during the war…Finally the Serb army expelled the Italians who started to occupy Slovenia, Dalmatia and parts of Croatia.Both in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and in Tito´s Yugoslavia, the Slovenes had the highest living standard in our country", said Mladić angrily.

But even Warren Zimmermann, the last US ambassador in Belgrade, who behaved in an anti-Serb, pro-Slovene way, made a few caustic remarks about the Slovenes in his article „Origins of a Catastrophe" (Foreign Affairs, March/April, 1995): -„Their virtue was democracy and their vice was selfishness. In their drive to separate from Yugoslavia, they simply ignored the 22 million of Yugoslavs who were not Slovenes…Contrary to the general view, it was the Slovenes who started the war…"

One event, among others, made general Mladić sad. His memory about it recurred again and again.

-„I am sorry about the fact that nobody in the West mentioned how the Serbs from VRS saved 40-50 000 fleeing Croats pursued (in 1993) by the"bloodthirsty" mujaheddins. We defended them, fed them, treated them in our hospitals, we shared our food with them as their brothers, although we ourselves suffered a lot od deprivations. Their troops, including officers, solemnly promised to me, even swore, not to use arms against their Serb brothers any more. But they did not keep their word. It made me really sad. Otherwise, my personal bodyguard was a young Croat, a sergeant of our VRS, whom I trusted completely. He was a good Yugoslav. Well, I must tell you, that we saved occasionally the Muslims as well. Usually it was from their fanatic fellow Muslims…"

There was another aspect of the mujaheddin activities that must be mentioned. They did not want only to defend their brothers in faith from the infidels, „giaours", but they wanted to keep the local Muslims „on the right side of the traditional Islam", to compel them, even by force, to conform to the ancient islamic laws and traditions. Mladić told us how some of his „normal" muslim acquaintances were shocked to hear about all those limitations the mujaheddins wanted to impose on the muslim women. They would not be allowed to meet alone any men not related to them, they would not be allowed to show their face and hair when out of doors. –„It seemed as an anti-propaganda for Islam," said Mladić

To stop the hostilities in BaH, a summit was held in Athens (May 1-2, 1993), chaired by the Greek Prime Minister K.Mitsotakis. The Presidents of Serbia S.Milošević, of FRY D.Ćosić and of RS Dr.R.Karadžić were present. They supported the Vance-Owen plan, even Dr.Karadžić accepted it with some reluctance, only when a corridor was promised connecting the Serb cantons through the northern Bosnia. The plan divided BaH into 9 cantons (for each nation three), the tenth would be Sarajevo under a joint administration. The Parliament of RS had to ratify it on May 15th at Pale. And it was there that general Mladić addressed the guests and the RS Parliament. His speech was fascinating, it would deserve to be in textbooks of history.

-„This war was forced upon the Serbs, it is a civil, ethnic and religious war, we were expelled to a place of windstorms and we were branded as „criminals" to the world… And the same world and the same international community did not condemn the inhuman and cruel acts by the Slovene and Croatian secessionists…We, the military, have serious worries that the international community made out of Srebrenica an international stage spectacle…All the humanitarian agencies appeal to supply Srebrenica with water without admitting that we were informing the world a whole year through that the Serbs were without water, without electricity, without the posibility to produce food…Our people breathes through a straw, we are under blockade, we cannot import drugs or oil for our agriculture.

Gentleman, on the heroic Ozren (mountain range between Tuzla and Doboj) live more than 100 000 Serb refugees from Tuzla, from the central Bosnia, Zenica, Vareš… There was no war between the Muslims and Croats as long as they did not sign the Vance-Owen plan. Do you know that our holy place, the abyss GOLUBINKA, is in Croat hands? In 1941 the ustashas threw into it, dead or half dead, 2 000 Serbs from surrounding Serbian villages and Mostar. Their bones were lifted on Aug.4, 1991, on the anniversary of the 1941 massacre. The orthodox graveyard, church and the war memorial here were destroyed by the Croatian troops and paramilitaries in 1992, when the JNA had withdrawn…Our RS, if devided according to the V-O plan, would become undefensible…"

After hearing general´s speech, the RS Parliament rejected almost unanimously the Vance-Owen plan. It was rejected overwhelmingly as well in a later referendum. This caused a hostile reaction by president Milošević (the support of FRY to RS almost stopped), by the western politicians and media. Karadžić-Mladić relations deteriorated for some time. But later, when the US ex-president Jimmy Carter visited at the end of december 1994 Pale in RS, they were already much improved.

-„We have not been aggressors. It was our own country, where we have lived for many centuries together with Croats and Muslims. I am not a war criminal. The Serbian people suffered a lot, unluckily nowadays from its former friends and allies (Britain, France, USA), on whose side we fought in two big wars. Almost nobody did understand the suffering of our people, its just struggle here in Bosnia. Only the US ex-president Jimmy Carter said, during his visit to Pale, when he was sitting between Karadžić and me, that the US public is quite insufficiently acquainted with our Serb problems in BaH. But, I am proud, that the army under my command prevented the repetition of the Serb genocide in the fascist ustasha state of Croatia during 1941-1945…"

There was one thing that neither general nor I could understand: the colossal and arrogant fabrications of the West and of their Yugoslav „clients" (Croats, Muslims from BaH, Slovenes) regarding the alleged systemic raping of Muslim women by the Serb military, as a part of their war strategy. It was actually started by the Bosnian (Muslim) foreign minister Haris Silajdžić in autumn 1992 in Geneva, when he announced in cold blood that the Serbs have raped 30 000 Muslim women. Since that time the figure has been rising steadily. A Czech journalist Jitka Obzinova was probably a „record holder" with her 100 000 raped women (Czech TV2, December 5, 1992, 22,00 „Don´t Divide Bosnia"). Another prominent record holder was a US professor of law Catharine MacKinnon with her over 50 000 raped. A crazy (one mut say so) American Judy Darnell in 1993 stated that the Serbs in BaH ran 47 „rape camps". Even the CIA and the International Red Cross looked for them and did not find them. The Europe, including the Czech republic, was prepared to accept the „epidemic" of thousands of poor children (they are called sometimes devil´s children) born by those raped women. But no children appeared. Prominent newpapers, periodicals (e.g.,Newsweek) published that arrogant propaganda stupidity that caused a lot of problems to the Serbs. Even the European union swallowed the bait. The numbers were poorly documented and absolutely unproven.It was finally found, by a OUN commission, that the numbers of officially accepted rapes of those ill-fated women of all three warring nations were very very much less. The Dutch professor of state law Fric Kalshoven said:

-„People tell horrible stories because someone has told them to tell it for propaganda objectives – or because everyone is telling horrible stories…" Professor Kalshoven wanted proof, not propaganda…

When we talked with general Mladić about the „rape propaganda", he laughed at the stupidity of those who believed it, but he admitted that the „rape campaign of the West" caused a lot of harm to the Serbs, that it was actually just a goofy, but unluckily a successful, but very dirty ploy organized by the West and its clients from BaH and Croatia.

-„Good heavens! If it were true, my 80 000 boys would not fight, but just chase the Muslim or Croat women. What a nonsence ! But, to be true, rapes were reported as mostly coward and hidious atrocities, that must be exemplary punished. But punished must be all those as well who fabricated and abused it for propaganda purposes, stimulating hatred…"

General Mladić liked the US four-star general Charles Boyd, after I read him his paper „ To make peace with the guilty" (Foreign Affairs, september/october 1995). We just discussed the bizarre disinformations spread by the West and its clients about the casualties, about the numbers of those killed during the war in Bosnia. General laughed when I told him, that the record holder in this respect was again our journalist Jitka Obzinova. She informed, as a reporter from BaH (Czech Radio, July 11, 1993) that the number of those killed in BaH (casualties ?) was just 500 000! But the official figure as quoted by the US and western politicians and the Sarajevo government, was 250 000, even 300 000. Nobody from the West did question the Sarajevo or Zagreb authorities, where did they got those figures from. General Boyd, the deputy commander of the US forces in Europe, put the death toll between 60-100 000. He informed that the Sarajevo authorities „decreased" in spring 1995 the death toll to „only" 145 000, while George Kenney, an ex-member of the State Department put the losses in BaH (1992-95) at 25-60 000 („The Bosnian Calculation", The NYT Magazíne, Apr.23,1995). The CIA analyses were about tens of thousands. The big disinformer Bill Clinton told Americans on Nov.27, 1995. about the 250 000 killed, while the US defence secretary W.Perry told the US Senate (July 7, 1995) that there were 130 000 dead in BaH in 1992, 12 000 in 1993, and 2 500 in 1994 (130 000 + 12 000 + 2 500 = 144 500). Who did actually lead by the nose the Americans and the world? Finally a later study from Norway put the number of dead in BaH at 80 000, the study of ICTY at 102 000. But I was not able any more to discuss it with Mladić, because he had to disappear, to hide. Two booklets were published (2005) in Belgrade: „The Book of the Dead Serbs from Sarajevo" with 5 515 names, and „The Book of the Dead Serbs from Srebrenica-Bratunac" with 3 262 names. It included 344 names from Hadžići, 110 from Olovo and 89 from Kladanj.

Mladić was satisfied that his American „colleague", the four-star general C.Boyd was a fair man, who did not hesitate to tell the truth and that he had made some caustic words about the western media anti-Serb reporting and about their window-dressing.

Some Serb paramilitary groups caused many sleepless nights to both Mladić and Karadžić. Not all of them were helpful and welcome. Some of them included even criminal elements, psychopaths. The others treated the Croat or Muslim civilians too heavy-handedly, but it could be understood to some extent, but not permitted, even if some of them had seen their families assassinated by the Muslims or the Croats. President Karadžić issued many orders to protect Muslims from those irregulars. I have seen many relevatnt documents about it. On the other side, some Serb paramilitaries helped a lot the unprepared and undefended Serb settlements that had been at the berginning an easy prey to the organized and trained Croat and Muslim bands, e.g.,in the northrern and eastern Bosnia.

During our last meeting Ratko was very mad at the European union, when we talked about the criminal NATO aggression on FRY in spring 1999, with all those daily bombing raids lasting for 78 days:

-„I cannot understand the hypocrisy of those EU countries. Their words about humanism are just a fake because they used their bombers without any UNO mandate and under fabricated pretext killed and destroyed in Serbia and collaborated with the UÇK criminals in Kosovo and Metohija. How is it possible that the Germans were killing in Serbia again? Why were the American, Belgian, Dutch, etc. goody-goodies killing our children? How is it possible that the EU democratic and liberal parliament did not stop it?

The Czech ex-president Václav Havel had shown his face not only in BaH, but later in Kosovo and Metohija as well, promoting the independente of it. In January 2010 he was awarded the Golden Medal of Ibrahim Rugova by the president of the quasi-state of Kosovo. He was rewarded for the support of the Kosovo Albanians and obviously for his term „the humanitarian bombing" in 1999, and for the treason of the Serbian people, if you like.

When writing the above I was very sorry that I was not able to talk to Ratko later, to tell him e.g., about those Germans who „waged a war" against the lies and fabrications of their own government and against NATO because of their involvement in the dirty, criminal military action against the FRY. I am sure that Mladić would hear with enthusiasm what the German publicist Jürgen Elsässer wrote in his two books about the incredible lies of his government: War Crimes – The Mortal Lies of the Federal Government and Their Victims in the Kosovo Conflict (2000); The War Lies – From Kosovo Conflict to Milošević Trial (2004). He knew how the German writer Handke liked and defended Serbs in his novels.

Very interesting was general´s attitude to various UNPROFOR commanding generals.

Some of them general even befriended, liked them (the Indian Satish Nambiar, the Swedish Lars-Eric Wahlgren, the Belgian Francis Briquemont, to some extent the Canadian Lewis MacKenzie). The French general Philippe Morillon was not close to Mladić, even though he showed repeatedly courageous firmness. As for the elite British Michael Rose, he was not close to general´s heart. He probably did not realize enough the Serb problems in BaH, the Serb tragedy in ustasha Croatia. He did not put himself in the Serb position, he was just an elite, aristocratic (may be too aristocratic?) British general, with a responsible task. He did not meet somehow the expectations of Mladić. The first meeting with the US general Wesley Clark in Banja Luka (Aug.27, 1994) was rather friendly, with some jokes and innocent teasing. Mladić reminded Clark that the Serbs never were at war with Americans, British, French and Russians. He told him that the Serb army of general Mihailović, itself in a critical position, saved over 500 American pilots shot down by Germans during the war 1941-45 and enabled their return home in the grandiose „Operation Halyard", at the end of 1944. Clark expressed his admiration to Mladić for his courage and patriotism. Mladić remembered that Clark had paid him a compliment:

-„You are the only commander who does not say to his men FORWARD, but FOLLOW ME!"

Clark, in a friendly talk, explained to Mladić, that he was on duty in many (17?) countries. Mladić answered that he was on duty and that he is still fighting in one country only, in his native country, which he was just now defending. They even exchanged their military caps. Clark said with enthusiasm: -„It is great that you allowed me to put your cap on my head!" Later, Clark had to explain it to the State Department. When parting, Mladić tapped in a friendly way Clark on his shoulders, as a sign of mutual trust, confidence. People allegedly heard that he called him „Wesley"… Regrettably, Wesley commanded NATO during its criminal aggression against FRY in 1999.

There was one general that Mladić did not like, even detested. It was the French general Bernard Janvier who knew or surely anticipated the planned Croat massacres of the Krajina Serbs and did not prevent them. In an angry letter Mladić made him responsible for all the crimes committed by the Croat forces in the UNPA zones, in Krajina, in may and august 1995. Mladić did not like the British general Rupert Smith either. He signed the results of a superficial investigation, that the Serbs had caused the Markale II massacre (Aug.28, 1995), although other experts denied it. He was thus responsible for the immediate (in less than two days) massive air raids of NATO planes against RS, with a lot of destructions and killing, without any detailed investigation. Two papers were published about that fraud by Hugh Mc Manners (see earlier) on Oct.1, and by David Binder (The Nation, Oct.2,1995).

General Ratko Mladić is a very prominent, positive personality of the Serbian history. He defended his Serb people in the most gloomy days with courage, unselfishly and successfully. He was not afraid even when he was confronted with the most powerful military organization of the world, with NATO, representing over half a billion richest people. He knew that he was right and that NATO behaved in Yugoslavia (1995, 1999) in a very criminal way. The North Atlantic Treaty, Article I, of Apr. 4, 1949. and how it was violated, will remind you of that:

„The Parties undertake, as set forth in the Charter of the United Nations,

to settle any international dispute in which they may be involved by

peaceful means in such a manner that international peace and security

and justice are not endangered, and to refrain in their international

relations from the threat or use of force in any manner inconsistent

with the purposes of the United Nations…"

Ratko Mladić, this very talented and gallant military leader, honest Serb and brave officer, was slandered by a dirty propaganda campaign both from the West and from its client states in the former Yugoslavia (the Muslim-Croat Federation of BaH, Croatia, Slovenia). Even some members of his own nation were slandering him, most of them in their endeavour to show how they obey and how they are loyal to their foreign lords in the West.

But one historical fact mustn´t be forgotten. The tandem Karadžić-Mladić, in spite of all those innumerable injustices and malices of the West, in spite of the Dayton dictate and its terrible consequences for hundreds of thousands of Serbs in BaH, managed to create against all odds a Serb State (Republika Srpska), in BaH.

I think that the time has come to give the name of Ratko Mladić to important streets, squares, parks in Serbia, and to decorate the walls or writing desks in apartments with his photos.

The book was not written because the autor´s mother was a Serb. It was written to hear the other side of the civil-ethnic-religious war in the former Yugoslavia, in BaH, that was shouted down by western mafia, politicians and media, who thought that they were right because of their money and powerful armies. And I lived for 20 years in the former Yugoslavia.

Nobody was absolutely innocent in the tragedy of Yugoslavia, but the Serbian people is not responsible for the dismemberment of Yugoslavia which they did not want, and the Serbs did not begin all those killings and destructions. NATO behaved in Yugoslavia like a criminal organization, killing and destroying without any UNO mandate, and increasing the inter-ethnic and inter-religious hatred.

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BRIC will rule the world, but not that soon – former WB boss

2010-02-07T23:20:00.001-05:00

BRIC will rule the world, but not that soon – former WB boss

08 February, 2010, 03:19

For 40 years the US was the dominant economic power, but today China and India are emerging and there is a complete change internationally, former World Bank president James Wolfensohn told RT at Davos.

"If you take a view in 10-20 years, there is no question that China and India will become dominant powers, China first and later India. By 2030-2040 the US will rank, perhaps, #3 to those two. But the US is still a hugely important power, not just because of the economics, but because of technology and income per capita, which is still far in excess to China and India, and because of its political leadership," stated Wolfensohn. "We are not going to see a change that is too dramatic. But you certainly will find the emerging powers will want a greater share of discussion in the global scene and in particular the BRIC countries, and of the BRIC countries in particular, China and India."

Answering a question about the role of the IMF and the World Bank in helping smaller countries overcome the great economic downturn, Wolfensohn stated that these organizations were "giving a great deal of money to come and help to solve the problem."

"I rather feel the IMF and the World Bank emerge stronger as a result of this, because people came to realize you cannot live without them," he said.

Wolfensohn believes the management of these organizations is already changing due to the fact that "it is no longer the US-dominated World Bank and the EU-dominated IMF. All this is now subject to examination, and in particular, the role of China and India, Brazil and Russia are becoming very important."

Wolfensohn thinks it would be hard for emerging economies to pick up the slack from the US and EU economies, but that this would change rather quickly.

"All BRIC countries, China, India, Russia and Brazil together, are less in terms of GDP than the United States, maybe less than half of the US," explained Wolfensohn. So "China and India alone cannot rescue the world economy at the moment."

As for the probability of Russia becoming Europe's biggest economy by 2020, Wolfensohn said it takes "the government and the Russian people to understand that to compete internationally, it is not enough just to have hydrocarbons, timber and natural resources. That gets back to the educational system, to the management system, to the system of incentives, to the move away from centralized government to a more diversified structure."

Though Russia [in comparison to China and India] has some intellectual advantages it should pursue, said Wolfensohn, "high tech does not create lot of employment."

Besides the issue of employment in the world's biggest country, Wolfensohn also named such problems as ageing population, educational system, the incentives system, the judicial system and corruption as issues that need to be addressed urgently.

http://rt.com/Politics/2010-02-08/bric-economy-wolfensohn-interview.html/print

Europeans broadly satisfied with their lives, but...........

2010-02-06T13:10:00.001-05:00

Brussels, 2 February 2010

Europeans broadly satisfied with their lives, but survey highlights concerns over the future of the economic and social situation

Europeans are on average broadly satisfied with their personal situation, but less satisfied when it comes to the economy, public services and social policies in their country, according to an opinion survey released today. The Eurobarometer on the social climate in the EU also found large differences between countries, with people in the Nordic countries and the Netherlands generally most satisfied with their personal situation. The survey forms part of the European Commission's Social Situation Report, also released today, which examines social trends in Europe, this year focusing on housing.

"It is comforting that despite the difficult economic situation, most Europeans remain satisfied with their lives, although there is some apprehension about the future," said Vladimír Špidla, EU Commissioner for Employment, Social Affairs and Equal Opportunities. "Today's report shows once again the importance of our efforts to promote jobs and growth in Europe so as to guarantee people's social well-being in the future. We must continue these efforts as part of our future 2020 strategy to make the EU a smarter and greener social market economy."

According to the Eurobarometer survey, a majority of Europeans are satisfied with life in general, giving an average score of +3.2 points (on a scale of -10 to +10). But there are big differences between Member States: the highest level of satisfaction was reported in Denmark, (+8.0), with Sweden, the Netherlands and Finland also having high levels. The lowest levels of satisfaction were reported in Bulgaria (-1.9), followed by Hungary, Greece and Romania.

When it comes to public services, Europeans are on average quite dissatisfied with the way their public administrations are run (-1.2 points). In every country, apart from Luxembourg and Estonia, Europeans feel that this has worsened over the last five years and expect it to continue to get worse (in all countries except Luxembourg).

When asked about specific public policies, Europeans are broadly satisfied with healthcare provision (+1.3 points), with people in Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg most satisfied (over +5 points) and those in Bulgaria, Greece and Romania least satisfied (-3 points or less).

Europeans were most dissatisfied with the way inequalities and poverty are addressed in their country (-2 points). Only respondents in Luxembourg and the Netherlands awarded a positive score, while respondents in Latvia and Hungary were the most strongly dissatisfied (-5 points or worse).

Housing

The European Commission's latest annual Social Situation Report shows that Europeans now spend more of their income on housing costs than they did ten years ago (almost 4 percentage points more), while mortgage debt has increased sharply across the EU.

On average, Europeans spend one-fifth of their disposable income on accommodation. Rent and mortgage payments only make up 30% of total housing costs in the EU while the other 70% pays for repairs, maintenance and fuel. Following housing privatisation, most people living in countries from the central and eastern EU Member States own their own homes, and charges for repairs, maintenance and fuel make up around 90% of total housing costs.

The report also looks at quality of housing and finds that many Europeans report living in sub-standard accommodation and that more people on low incomes report housing problems.

Social impacts of the crisis

While it is still too early to assess the full social impact of the crisis, the report investigates what lessons may be learned from the experience of past recessions. It shows that social expenditure has played a role in protecting those affected during recessions but that the likelihood that an unemployed person will receive income support varies across the EU.

Background

The Special Eurobarometer survey on the social climate is the first in a series of annual surveys to monitor European citizens' subjective well-being and was conducted in May-June 2009 among citizens in the 27 EU Member States. It asks people their opinions about their personal situation, the national economic and social situation, and their feelings about policies of their governments in various areas, including health care and pensions.

The Social Situation Report is an annual report by the European Commission that takes a closer look at long-term social trends in the EU in order to provide up-to-date, reliable and comprehensive information on the social situation. This year, it focuses on two key issues in public policy: housing (including ownership status and costs), and the possible effects of the recession including results from the Eurobarometer survey on social climate.

MEMO/10/27

For more information:

Special Eurobarometer survey on the social situation

Full report

http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/ebs/ebs_315_en.pdf

Summary

http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/ebs/ebs_315_sum_en.pdf

European Commission Social Situation Report

http://ec.europa.eu/social/main.jsp?catId=675&langId=en

http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=IP/10/114&format=HTML&aged=0&language=EN&guiLanguage=en

Norway Time Hole "Leak" Plunges Northern Hemisphere Into Chaos

2010-02-06T10:43:00.001-05:00

Norway Time Hole "Leak" Plunges Northern Hemisphere Into Chaos

Written by (Author ) World Jan 8, 2010

Russian scientists are reporting to Prime Minister Putin today that the high-energy beam fired into the upper heavens from the United States High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP) radar facility in Ramfjordmoen, Norway this past month has resulted in a "catastrophic puncturing" of our Plant's thermosphere thus allowing into the troposphere an "unimpeded thermal inversion" of the exosphere, which is the outermost layer of Earth's atmosphere.

To the West's firing of this 'quantum' high-energy beam we had previously reported on in our December 10, 2009 report titled "Attack On Gods 'Heaven' Lights Up Norwegian Sky".

To how catastrophic for our Planet this massive thermal inversion has been Anthony Nunan, an assistant general manager for risk management at Mitsubishi Corporation in Tokyo, is reporting today that the entire Northern Hemisphere is in winter chaos, with the greatest danger from this unprecedented Global event being the destruction of billions of dollars worth of crops in a World already nearing the end of its ability to feed its self.

So powerful has this thermal inversion become that reports from the United States are stating that their critical crops of strawberries, oranges, and other fruits and vegetables grown in their Southern States, are being destroyed by record cold temperatures. The US is further reporting record amounts of snowfall in what they are now warning may be their worst winter in 25 years.

Reports from the United Kingdom today are, likewise, showing a Nation in chaos as brutal cold temperatures continue to batter the British people suffering under the worst snow blizzards to hit them in almost 50 years. So dire has it become in the UK that their National Grid yesterday issued only its second warning in its entire history stating that their Nation's gas supply was running out due to this unprecedented event.

Not just to the UK, but also to the entire European Union has this thermal inversion been affecting as reports from that region show continued chaos is occurring due to plunging temperatures and snows. In the UK, also, reports are showing that the military has been called out to rescue over 1,000 stranded vehicles.

Though the Motherland, and its people, are some of the best equipped in the World to handle such severe winter conditions, the Russian island of Sakhalin was inundated this past week by a rare Snow Cyclone setting off no less than avalanches.

But to the worst affected region of the Northern Hemisphere no one has been hit harder than China, where in what is being described as a "soul-destroying snowstorm" this Asian Nation has been plunged into such havoc the entire country has been brought to a standstill. China further reports that the massive snowstorms hitting them are their worst in 60 years and necessitating their military forces to save over 1,400 people trapped when their train became covered in snow. So overwhelmed by this unprecedented event has China become that they have ordered all of their citizens to help with snow removal too.

South Korea has not been spared either as reports from that Nation are reporting their worst snow storms in their modern history of recording these events.

Reports from Japan are also reporting record snowfall in their Northern Regions, where according to one unnamed Kushiro resident, "Snow falls hard here in Kushiro, but this is the most I have ever seen. The snow's piling up and we're running out of places to dump it."

Canada, another Nation used to extreme winter events, reports that the storm that had hit their maritime provinces this past week was so powerful buildings were knocked off of their foundations in what one resident, Tom Jardine, described as being "worse than a hurricane".

To the long-term consequences of this thermal inversion caused by the West, these reports further warn that by the puncturing of our atmosphere by the HHARP radars our Planet has, also, been "needlessly exposed" to the growing threat posed to us by the giant mysterious object currently approaching us (named by NASA as G1.9) which we had previously reported on in our January 3rd report titled "Russia Prepares For Asteroid Strike As New Comet Nears Sun", and which has been blamed for the rapid shifting of our Earth's North Pole that was first documented in 2005.

But to the most critical aspect of these events it surely lies with the Western World's continued arrogance in regards to experimenting on both our Planets natural species and human beings, and though who may think that they are 'gods', are continuing to give evidence that they are acting more like devils.

http://www.daily.pk/norway-time-hole-%E2%80%9Cleak%E2%80%9D-plunges-northern-hemisphere-into-chaos-14311/

DISCLAIMER: Pakistan Daily News does not necessarily agree witht he views set forth by the Author of this article.

Large mineral reserves exist in Albania and Kosovo

2010-02-04T16:05:00.000-05:00

Large mineral reserves exist in Albania and Kosovo worth hundreds of billions of dollars.

Created by Sahit Muja

The potential in minerals in Albania and Kosovo is more than anyone has ever imagined. This would create a powerful economic growth in Albania, Kosovo and the entire Balkans

The price of metals was up again , helped by the recent good news on US manufacturing and the US gross national product.

March copper was up a cent to $3.09 per pound in New York trade, while three-month contracts for the metal added $29 to $6,820 per tonne on the London Metal Exchange. price of ferro chrome is up 10% this month.

Among other base metals, zinc added about $15 to around $2,160 per tonne in London, while aluminium was up $35 to $2,120 per tonne, lead was $73 higher to $2,118 per tonne and tin and nickel each added $300 on the session, to $16,450 per tonne and $18,,300 per tonne respectively.

Precious metals were higher in New York trade as April gold added $13 to $1,118 per troy ounce, March silver was up $8 cents to $16.74 per troy ounce, and April platinum gained $39.50 to $1,578.80 per troy ounce.Large mineral reserves exist in Albania and Kosovo worth hundreds of billions of dollars. The most significant in Kosovo is coal deposits largest in Europe, gold, silver, arsenic, thallium, bismuth and iron. types of Pb and Zn and other metals .

In Albania there are large deposits of chrome ore, bauxite,copper,nickel, quartz,magnesium,cobalt. In the last two years huge explorations have taken place in Northern Albania, especially Tropoje and Kukes. According to Albanian Minerals & Bytyci Shpk engineer geologist , there have been 100 new locations of chrome ore in Tropoje.

Recently huge deposits of chrome ore have been found in . Vlad, Pac, Zogaj, Kam, and Lugu i Zi.The body of this large chrome ore extends a hundred kilometers long from Lugu i Zi, Tropoje to Vlahen, Kukes and 50 miles wide from Zogaj to Tpla,Tropoje. Albanian Minerals and Bytyci Shpk has intensified exploration and started mining in Zogaj, Pac, and Vlad.

According to Italian and American engineers, working for Albanian Minerals and Bytyci Shpk this huge area from Tropoje to Kukes my have more than 500 million tons of chrome ore. New geological surveys and chemical results done by Albanian Minerals have shown an amazing amount of minerals in Northern Albania and Kosovo. There are also large amounts of magnesium and nickel.

The Albanian government has done an amazing job building roads where minerals are found. The value of already discovered minerals in Albania and Kosovo exceeds 100 billion dollars as a raw material. Albanian Minerals in New York has increased the work done in building infrastructure and amount of money invested and is planning to triple the amount of investments in the region.

We have created a partnership and joint venture with the worlds largest business to business marketing companies. The potential in minerals in Albania and Kosovo is more than anyone has ever imagined. This would create a powerful economic growth in Albania, Kosovo and the entire Balkans.

Albania's economic growth over the last four years has been higher than at any time in the last 100 years - with projected growth for 2010 the highest in the Europe - due to a series of government initiatives in recent years that have helped Albania to cope with the impact of the world recession.

Albanian economy has been able to progress despite a number of significant shocks in the world's economy
Albanian GDP growth has averaged 10% percent annually. Projected GDP growth for 2010 is the highest in the Europe and follows its peak growth rate in 2007-2008.

The Albanian economy has done very well under Prime Minister Sali Berisha, and government policy has been key. These economic gains are a big part of the reason he win re-election in 2009. Billions of dollars are currently being invested in all sectors.

Mr Berisha has doubled the budget, raised salaries, lifted Albanians from the poverty line and done an amazing job on the education system. Albanian tourism and investments is flourishing.Albania recently witnessed an impressive growth in tourism this year.

The government of Albania announced that there was a 42 percent increase in the number of tourists visiting the country compared to last year. With new hotels, resorts, bars and restaurants, the Albanian private sector in tourism has been growing an average of 30 percent for five years.

The Albanian economy had the best growth in Europe last year, and this trend is expected to continue this year as well. Foreign investments in Albania have increased 59 percent in 2009.

The Albanian government under Prime Minister Berisha, has created an excellent environment to attract investors to Albania. Special emphasis was paid on constructions of roads and improving infrastructure. The efforts on improving the legal system to protect investors also proved significant. Also that many Western European companies have chosen to escape the high taxes in Europe by investing in Albania as the latter offers the best tax system in Europe with a 10 percent flat tax

Albania is one of the wealthiest lands in natural resources per square mile in the world. With amazing mountains, beaches, lakes, rivers, forests, and rich soil. Underneath this land lies billions of prooven barrels of oil, natural gas, gold, platinum, copper, the largest chrome reserves in Europe, bauxite, nickel, cobalt, magnesium, ores, marbel, granite,coal and much more. Albania is rapidly building its infrastructure.

Albania In the near future it will be the only country in the world to produce 100% of its energy from Hydropower, Windpower and Solar Power. Billions of dollars are being invested there presently. This almost free enviermently friendly energy will create opportunities to mine and process billions of tons of minerals. Albania was one of the countries in the Europe with economic growth and real estate appreciation in 2009

http://online.wsj.com/community/groups/economy-large-mineral-reserves-east-europe-795/topics/large-mineral-reserves-exist-albania

Blair’s Monstrous Consistency

2010-02-01T23:14:00.001-05:00

Blair's Monstrous Consistency

Posted on January 30th, 2010 by Daniel Larison

But the failure to achieve a second, explicit, U.N. resolution was a political problem, not a legal obstacle. Few of the anti-war movement care to recall that the Kosovan War was, if anything, predicated upon a flimsier legal case than the Iraqi intervention. ~Alex Massie

One of the reasons why I keep revisiting the illegality and immorality of the intervention in Kosovo long after most people have forgotten about it is precisely because so many opponents of the Iraq war don't want to acknowledge that Kosovo was every bit as unjustifiable and wrong as Iraq was. By endorsing the war in Kosovo even now, as Obama did again in Oslo, many opponents of the Iraq war have opened themselves up to the attack that Iraq hawks were using from the beginning. If someone pointed out that invading Iraq would violate international law and not have U.N. sanction, the hawks would throw the precedent of Kosovo in his face. Unless he was a principled progressive or antiwar conservative, the opponent of the invasion was always at a loss to respond. If invading Iraq was based on phony or exaggerated intelligence about WMDs, Kosovo was based on lies about preventing genocide and protecting human rights. Unless you are among the fairly small percentage that opposed both, the odds are that you are outraged over invading Iraq in inverse proportion to how outraged you were over bombing Serbia.

Inexplicably, Kosovo is remembered across much of the spectrum, especially the center-left, as a great success, despite having been disastrous for the very people it was supposed to help and despite being based on lies every bit as blatant and outrageous as the invasion of Iraq. As it hapened, Blair was Prime Minister during Britain's participation in both wars of aggression. As far back as 1999, he has been the chief proponent of liberal interventionism aimed at subverting the normal protections of international law afforded to sovereign states, and he continues to be an outspoken advocate for killing foreigners for their own benefit. What is disheartening about all this is not just that Blair will never be held to account for his responsibility for the war in Iraq, but that he has never had to answer for or defend his decision to support an unprovoked, unnecessary war of aggression against Serbia.

Even though the air war led to the expulsions of Albanians from Kosovo it was meant to prevent, and even though the "negotiations" at Rambouillet involved delivering an intolerable ultimatum designed to start a war, this criminal operation continues to enjoy support or indifference from most Westerners. There were no allied casualties, and the war was brief, so there was little time for the publics in NATO nations to grow weary and disgusted with their criminal leaders. The war was over relatively quickly, so the media lost interest in the false atrocity stories that the Clinton administration used in its war propaganda, and the previous decade of constant anti-Serb coverage made the public receptive to whatever lies the administration wanted to tell.

What I can say about Blair is that he has been quite consistent. State sovereignty and international did not matter to him in 1999, and they didn't matter to him later in 2002-03. Given his remarks at the Chilcot inquiry about Iran, I am quite sure that he would have no difficulty supporting and even joining in an illegal attack on Iran were he still a minister in the British government. This makes him one of the most unabashed, unapologetic advocates of aggressive war alive today, and I'm not sure that this requires much courage when there have been and continue to be absolutely no consequences, legal or otherwise, for his actions.

Filed under: foreign policy, politics

7 Responses to "Blair's Monstrous Consistency"

NauticalMongoose, on January 30th, 2010 at 10:52 pm Said:

I am finding it unusually difficult to find a good source discussing the Kosovo War (I am woefully ignorant about this event). Does anyone have any suggestions? I would prefer a 'just the facts' account from which I can draw my own conclusions.

David Tomlin, on January 31st, 2010 at 1:34 am Said:

[The Kosovo intervention was] disastrous for the very people it was supposed to help . . .

I was always opposed to the Balkan interventions, but I am at a loss as to what this is about. Do you mean the ethnic cleansing of the non-Albanians?

For the Kosovo Albanians, we might speculate on whether they would have fared better absent the intervention. I don't know of any facts that would remotely justify describing their present situation as 'disastrous'.

David Tomlin, on January 31st, 2010 at 1:51 am Said:

Sorry, I wrote the previous comment before finishing the post. My curiosity was piqued by the quoted sentence, and I was assuming it referred to the outcome of the intervention rather than events during the intervention itself.

Brett, on January 31st, 2010 at 2:36 am Said:

I always figured the intervention was basically the US and European way of trying to avoid letting "humanitarian intervention" completely die on the vine. It had already taken body blows from the 1994 Rwandan genocide that they'd ignored, as well as the Bosnian civil war that they ignored until multiple massacres later – hardly signs of people supposedly dedicated to intervening to stop such things. One more blow, or perceived blow (since that was what it was) might have irrevocably damaged it, and that was unacceptable to that crowd.

herb, on January 31st, 2010 at 1:44 pm Said:

Please expand on the "lies" NATO used to illegally fight an air war against Serbia.

I know a lot about this subject, and it's only in the last year or so that I've heard any of this "Kosovo was illegal" stuff, mostly from you.

You mentioned "false atrocity stories that the Clinton administration used in its war propaganda." Do you have any examples?

I know for a fact that "false atrocity stories" were used by all sides in the Yugoslav conflict, but I also know that there are many very true atrocity stories that came out of Vukovar, Srebrenica, Osijek, and Sarajevo.

Daniel Larison, on January 31st, 2010 at 2:08 pm Said:

The "massacre" at Racak was a key part of Clinton's justification for intervening. The massacre was staged by the KLA. It never happened. There is no evidence that there was a systematic or extensive policy of ethnic cleansing in the works. The Serbs had been fighting a low-level counterinsurgency against a rather nasty gang of criminals for a year, and that was it. The administration had even labeled the KLA a terrorist group the year before it took their side, because this is what it was.

Clinton portrayed intervention as something he did grudgingly to halt genocide, but there was no genocide to halt. He had given the Serbs an ultimatum to let NATO have the run of their country, and like any self-respecting state they refused. Then the bombing began shortly afterwards. If you have never heard arguments that bombing Serbia was illegal until the last year, I submit that you haven't followed the discussion about it very closely.

As for the remark about being a disaster for the people it was supposed to help, I was referring to massive refugee crisis that the war created as hundreds of thousands of Albanians were driven out of Kosovo by a combination of the air campaign and Serbian military units. The mass expulsions that the campaign was designed to prevent were the very things that the campaign hastened and facilitated. Soon thereafter, the Albanians returned to Kosovo, but I would call the effort a pretty dramatic failure if the goal was to prevent the mass expulsion of Albanians.

What bombing Serbia achieved was to detach part of its own territory by force and establish a de facto partition that Western powers then formalized with their recognition of Kosovo's unilateral declaration of independence in early 2008. That in turn contributed to the escalating conflict between Russia and Georgia, as Russia aimed to exact some revenge on one of our satellites for what we had done to one of theirs. All in all, Western policy on Kosovo has been appalling, and it has created a horrible precedent for the future. Of course, it was precisely that precedent that Russia exploited in the 2008 war with Georgia.

Serbia was penalized for attempting to suppress a separatist rebellion inside its own borders. It was a purely internal affair, and no state or alliance of states had any right, legal or otherwise, to launch military strikes against Serbia. It was never sanctioned by the Security Council in any way, and the war violated both the U.N. Charter and had no authorization under the North Atlantic Treaty. In addition, the President had no constitutional authority to wage war against Serbia, but why get hung up on technicalities like that?

David Tomlin, on January 31st, 2010 at 3:45 pm Said:

Forensic teams from various countries went in right after the NATO forces, counting bodies and exhuming mass graves (defined as any grave with more than one body). Within months it was clear that the death toll was a fraction of that claimed by the KLA, and repeated uncritically by the Clinton administration and the media.

In one case a disused mine allegedly used to dispose of bodies was examined, and no bodies nor any trace of decomposition fluids was found.

The Kosovo 'genocide' was as thoroughly debunked as the Iraqi WMD, but, as Larison noted, by then media interest had moved on.

If anyone wants sourcing, Google is your friend.

http://www.amconmag.com/larison/2010/01/30/blairs-monstrous-consistency/

Kosovo - okay, really, what next?

2010-02-01T21:28:00.001-05:00

Kosovo - okay, really, what next?

With 2009 having ended much as it began, the international community must continue to pursue a peacekeeping approach to the north in order to keep alive the possibility of a negotiated outcome.

By Gerrard Gallucci

Keywords: Serbia, Kosovo, EULEX, ICJ, Ahtisaari

Za tekst na srpskom jeziku, pogledajte ovde

Over the last few months, I have tried to present various facets of the difficult question of what to do about north Kosovo within the context of an overall status settlement. I have emphasized the continuing need to take a peacekeeping approach to the north – e.g., not seeking to settle political issues through force – to keep the door open for a negotiated outcome. Such an outcome might include a differential approach to implementing the Ahtisaari Plan, i.e., vigorous implementation of decentralization (plus allowed links to Belgrade) for Serb-majority municipalities south of the Ibar and an "Ahtisaari Plus" framework for the north (as an alternative to outright partition).

However, on the ground, 2009 ended much as it began. Having assumed the status-neutral mantle of the UN in November 2008, EULEX failed to act to implement the UN Secretary General's proposed six-point plan for addressing practical issues – such as courts, customs and transportation links – by implementing practical, non-political measures. EULEX decided it was better not to offend the Albanian majority by reaching accommodations with local Serb institutions and communities that appeared to accept the status quo of continued deep divisions over Kosovo independence. Indeed, EULEX stood back from, and in some cases assisted, Albanian efforts to bully the Serbs into accepting the Kosovo institutions that they dominate. EULEX allowed electricity blockages of southern Serbs and facilitated a forced, unilateral return of Albanians to a sensitive area (Brdjani) of north Mitrovica. Results were mixed. Under pressure, enough southern Serbs voted in the 2009 municipal elections to give them minimal credibility. But in the north, turning off the electricity simply led to "electricity partition" with Serbia stepping in to fill the gap and now even to start collecting fees.

Instead of seeking to work out status-neutral practical arrangements on customs and the courts, EULEX placed officers at the northern customs gates and in the Mitrovica court with the intention of introducing there Kosovo law, staff and links to Pristina. Urged on by the Albanians, EULEX and KFOR threatened use of force to implement such plans. However, EULEX in December formulated a strategy for winning space in the north for rule from Pristina (http://outsidewalls.blogspot.com/2010/01/kosovo-eu-strategy-for-north.html) that appears more political. It assumes that the northern Serbs have grown tired of resistance to Kosovo independence and will come to accept Pristina as they are freed from the baleful influence of "radical" local leaders. The EU also appears to be relying on President Tadić, eager for the political benefits of entering the EU, to help by removing the "radicals" and acquiescing to the gradual transition of the north to EULEX and then to Pristina. Both seem questionable assumptions. Serb resistance to Kosovo independence is deep and near universal and unlikely to disappear soon. The southern Serbs may be more accommodating as they have no alternative. But the northern Serbs have the alternative of remaining part of Serbia – as they functionally are – and Tadić is in no position to be seen giving them up. But at least the EU looks to be trying.

So, despite all the huffing and puffing from Pristina about "illegal" and "parallel" institutions and a commitment to "dissolve" them, in 2009 Kosovo remained divided at the Ibar. What about 2010? The watershed event may be the ICJ decision on the legality of independence. This could offer Pristina some benefit as anything less than an outright rejection of the declaration as illegal – unlikely – will help free up a second wave of recognitions; countries sympathetic but reluctant to recognize as long as a decision against independence remains possible will be able to move forward. However, a significant number will continue to refuse for their own reasons, probably including at least some of the EU holdouts. Thus the final status issue and the question of the north are unlikely to be settled by the ICJ decision alone. This will only get done by an eventual new round of negotiation. It could be that Pristina and friends seek a final solution in the north through the use of force. But as this would risk provoking a wider crisis, we can expect the EU to hold back as long as the northern Serbs themselves do not outright surrender. So, the status quo may continue in the north. This is not all bad as it also allow for the possibility of a negotiated outcome.

Negotiations will not come easy. Both sides will have to give up something. Carefully calibrated compromise could leave the north nominally in Kosovo but substantially in Serbia. But this may be beyond the parties and the mediators. Partition would be the less elegant solution. But it would have the virtue of requiring both sides to give up something they value: Serbia would of course lose Kosovo but the Albanians would have to accept loss of the north.

2010 may be the year that Kosovo status, and that of the north, really gets settled. Or maybe it will just be more of the same divided status quo. Either would be better than renewed conflict but negotiations would be best and everyone may come to see this after some further theatre.

http://www.transconflict.com/News/2010/January/Kosovo_Okay_Really_Whats_Next.php

Jasenovac – Holocaust promoted by Vatican

2010-02-01T16:36:00.000-05:00

Jasenovac – Holocaust promoted by Vatican

1/27/2010

Author : Ari Rusila

Jasenovac was third biggest extermination camp during WWII and probably the cruelest. The brutality may be explained with its more religious aspect that others. Vatican played important role during events involving afterwards money laundry and covering up war criminals.

The UN General Assembly chose January 27 as the official day for the commemoration, as it was on this day in 1945 that Soviet troops liberated the Auschwitz extermination camp, the last such camp still functioning. Throughout Europe, tributes will be paid to the 53 million people who died during World War II, of whom 31 million were civilians. Commemoration has linked usually also to International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

Auschwitz-Birkenau was the largest extermination center created by the Nazis. It has become the symbol of the Holocaust and of willful radical evil in our time. Few people know that 3rd biggest extermination center was Jasenovac. Two reasons maybe explain this: 1st it is located in Croatia and 2nd the main part of victims were Serbs. The death tolls in extermination centres vary but rough estimations are following (source Wikipedia):

Auschwitz II 1,400,000

* Belzeg 600,000

* Chelmno 320,000

* Jasenovac 600,000

* Majdanek 360,000

* Maly Trostinets 65,000

* Sobibor 250,000

* Treblinka 870,000

Background

Upon the occupation of Yugoslavia, the German Nazis and the Italian Fascists formed an "independent" state in Croatia, which was basically a Nazi puppet state. Immediately upon the establishment of its puppet government, the Ustashe set up militias and gangs that slaughtered Serbs, Jews, Romas and their political foes. Catholic priests, some of them Franciscans, also participated in the acts of slaughter. The cruelty of the Ustashe was so great that even the commander of the German army in Yugoslavia complained. The partisans, led by the Croat Communist Josip Broz Tito, and the Chetniks - Nationalist Serb royalists - fought the Ustashe.

Under the leadership of the Ustasha leader Ante Pavelic's right-hand man Andrija Artukovic, who earned the nickname "the Himmler of the Balkans," the Ustashe set up concentration camps, most notably at Jasenovac. According to various estimates, about 100,000 people were murdered at the camp, among them tens of thousands of Jews (it is interesting to note that some of the heads of the Ustashe were married to Jewish women). Throughout Croatia about 700,000 people were murdered.

Jasenovac

Located in Croatia 62 miles south of Zagreb, Jasenovac was Croatia's largest concentration and extermination camp. Jasenovac, was a network of several sub-camps, established in August 1941 and dissolved in April 1945. Jasenovac was not the only place where Serbia's neighbour Croatia ran several concentration camps where Jews, Serbs and Roma have been murdered. Bosnian Muslims and Kosovo Albanians were allies of Hitler as well. (More about Jasenevac in my document library under headline Croatia )

In April 1945 the partisan army approached the camp. In an attempt to erase traces of the atrocities, the Ustaša blew up all the installations, killed most of the internees and tried to hide all evidence about brutalities in Jasenovac, all material evidence disappeared as if there had not been any camp in that place. Later – during Tito's time – the state and the authorities tried to implement "Brotherhood and Unity" motto, with the aim of creating tolerance between the nations and the crime had to be forgotten as soon as possible.

Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, edited by Yisrael Gutman, vol. 1, 1995, pp. 739-740 gives following description about problems to find exact numbers:

"It is difficult to establish the number of victims killed in the Jasenovac concentration camp, since many documents were destroyed. The prisoners' files were destroyed twice (at the beginning of 1943 and in April, 1945) and even if they had been preserved, they would have been of little help discerning the truth, because the Ustasha often killed the newly arrived prisoners immediately, without putting their names into the files. This is particularly true of those who arrived from Slavonia, Srem and Kozara, because it was only noted down that 9,830, or 155 wagons had arrived. For instance, a very small number of Gypsies was filed, only a few hundred, while it is known that all 25,000-35,000 of them from the NDH were killed in Jasenovac. The Jewish community in Yugoslavia has established the number of 20,000 Jews that were killed in Jasenovac. The numbers of killed Serbs are truly varied. The sources from abroad mention numbers from 300,000 to 700,000. Be that as it may, most of the people killed in Jasenovac were Serbs. Exact number being still unknown, but it surely amounts to several hundreds of thousands. The National Committee of Croatia for the investigation of the crimes of the occupation forces and their collaborators stated in its report of November 15, 1945 that 500,000-600,000 people were killed at Jasenovac. "

The Yad Vashem center claims that over 500,000 Serbs were killed in the NDH (now Croatia), including those who were killed at Jasenovac, where approximately 600,000 victims of all ethnicities were killed.

A documentary film "Jasenovac - the cruellest death camp of all times" can be found from here!

Religious aspect

While for Nazi-Germany Jasenovac was more a tool for ethnic cleansing for Ustashe religious aspect played crucial role. The aim and its implementation efficiency is described differently by people who actually were in Balkans during that period. Ustashe leaders declared they would slaughter a third of the Serb population in Croatia, deport a third and convert the remaining third from Orthodoxy to Roman Catholicism. Anyone who refused to convert was murdered.

One may claim that the religious motivation and the brutality of butchers were leading principles in Jasenovac. The fact that 743 Roman Catholic priests were members of the Ustashi and personally murdered Serbs, Jews and Gypsies. Jasenovac was for a time, run by Fr. Filipovic-Majstorovic, a Catholic priest who admitted to killing "40,000 Serbs with his own hands." So at one point, a Franciscan monk was camp commandant of what the second largest concentration camp of the war.

The Jasenovac system of Croatian camps also included a camp for children run by Catholic nuns who used toxic soda to save bullets.

Roman Catholic priests who participated in the killing of tens of thousands of Serbs, Jews and Gypsies and the running of Jasenovac escaped Europe through the "Vatican Ratline" run by Fr. Draganovich, a Croatian Catholic priest who helped morons like Clause Barbe escape from Europe. Those Catholic priests escaped to Argentina where they also escaped justice.

Vatican connection

In 1999 a class action law suit was filed at a court in San Franciso against the Vatican Bank (Institute for Religious Works) and against the Franciscan order, the Croatian Liberation Movement (the Ustashe), the National Bank of Switzerland and others to recover $100 million in damages for the Vatican's participation in these war crimes and money laundering the proceeds from their Serb, Jewish and Roma victims. The suit was filed by Jewish, Ukrainian, Serb and Roma survivors, as well as relatives of victims and various organizations that together represent 300,000 World War II victims. The plaintiffs demanded accounting and restitution.

Franciscans in Rome helped smuggle the Ustasha Tresury and assisted Ustasha war criminals in escaping justice. The Vatican Bank is alleged to have laundered a portion of the Ustasha Treasury. The Vatican not only hoarded the gold the Croats looted, it also helped them escape - with a nod and wink from the OSS and MI6. In 1986 for example, the US government released documents that revealed the Vatican had organised the Ustasha leader Ante Pavelic's safe-flight from Europe to Argentina, along with 200 senior officials of his regime. Pavelic was given refuge by the Vatican, fascist Spain, and Peronist Argentine. The Ustasha Minister of the Interior, Artukovic, lived openly in California from 1949-1986 when he was finally deported to Yugoslavia and convicted of murder. Thousands of Ustasha escaped justice for their crimes due to their wealth and influence and the backing of the Roman Catholic Church and who along with certain rogue elements in the US and UK governments portrayed these war criminals as anticommunist freedom fighters.

As the war ended, it is now known that the Vatican Bank and other world banks helped to launder and transfer funds out of the Reich, and helped many war criminals to escape justice in what is now nicknamed the "Vatican Ratline"

The Vatican Bank has claimed ignorance of any participation in Ustasha crimes or the disappearance of the Croatian Treasury. The Vatican has refused to open its wartime records despite requests from the US government, Jewish and Roma organizations. My main source about Vatican connection has been "Vatican Bank Claims"

A class action law suit against the Vatican Bank to recover $100 million in damages for the Vatican's participation in these war crimes and money laundering the proceeds from their Serb, Jewish and Roma victims is still ongoing. Vatican lawyers have three times tried to get this case thrown out of court. The Supreme court has rejected their claims.

In US District Court the case against the Vatican Bank (but not the Franciscan Order) was dismissed on grounds the Vatican Bank is an organ of a sovereign entity, the Vatican, which is immune from lawsuits. The just filed appeal however argues that the Vatican Bank is not sovereign and engages in commercial activity in the United States and therefore should be held accountable in a United States Federal Court.

Memory today

On Summer 2008 Israel's ambassador to Croatia, Shmuel Meirom, harshly criticized the funeral given to a head of a WWII Jasenovac concentration camp in Zagreb, saying also that it insulted the memory of those killed in the camp run by Croatia's Nazi-allied Ustasha regime. "I'm convinced that the majority of the Croatian people are shocked by the way the funeral of the Jasenovac commander and murderer, dressed in an Ustasha uniform, was conducted," ambassador Meirom said in a written statement. "At the same time, I strongly condemn the inappropriate words of the priest who served at the funeral and said that Sakic was a model for all Croats" Meirom said. (More about this in my article "Nazi's funeral shadows Croatias past")

Yearly commemoration is important remainder for fair picture of history. At least one day per year is good to think what ultra nationalism can be at its worst level, what kind of interests, power game, attitudes and hidden motivations are creating possibilities for murdering civil populations or ethnic groups.

Ari Rusila is a development project management expert and freelancer from Finland with a special interest in the Balkan region.

Keyword search

Croatia, Jasenovac, Holocaust, Vatican, BalkanBlog-EUROPE

http://www.europesworld.org/NewEnglish/Home_old/PartnerPosts/tabid/671/PostID/1087/Default.aspx

Blair the dictator bulldozed us into war

2010-02-01T16:25:00.001-05:00

<> There was one revealing moment in Mr Blair's evidence. He said that
he had taken Britain to war on four occasions. As he said it, he seemed
to realise it was not a popular claim. He paused, and then gave his
list: Sierra Leone, Kosovo, Afghanistan and Iraq. The question of
legality arises both in respect of Kosovo and Iraq. Like Lord Goldsmith,
Mr Blair regards the lawfulness of the Iraq action as turning on the
absence of a second UN resolution, and the reliance on Resolution 1441.<>

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/william_rees_mogg/article7010321.ece

From The Times
February 1, 2010

Blair the dictator bulldozed us into war

Not since Churchill was a leader so determined to get his own way. But
he was fatally misguided

William Rees-Mogg

We have been told by Sir John Chilcot himself that the Chilcot inquiry
is not a trial, and that nobody will be either acquitted or found
guilty; we all know that is not true. A public judgment is being made as
each section of evidence is given. In particular a quiet judgment has
been made of Tony Blair's conduct. It may never lead to his being tried
in any court, but there is nevertheless a public verdict of his
responsibility for the British action in Iraq.

It was Mr Blair who was responsible; his evidence shows it. He was the
Prime Minister who had won two landslide elections. He could cajole,
coax, threaten, anger and flatter to get his own way, a war leader who
was the nearest thing to a parliamentary dictator since the wartime
Winston Churchill.

Mr Blair's major speeches, among which his Chilcot evidence must be
judged, tend to follow the same pattern. As one listens for the first
time one is likely to find a speech convincing. Yet there are always
loose threads, and one is likely to start picking at them in one's mind.
In his Chilcot evidence, there were arguments that seemed convincing on
Friday, but became more doubtful as the weekend passed. He has certainly
raised more doubts than certainties in my mind.

I would accept Mr Blair's important assurance: "I believed beyond doubt
that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction." He supported this with the
argument that "no one disputed that Saddam had WMDs". Even that needs
scrutiny, since Saddam himself was claiming to have got rid of his WMD
capacity. On the historic record, it was natural for British
Intelligence to discount any claim made by Saddam.

At the time the Western governments, including those most opposed to the
use of force, assumed that Saddam still had his chemical weapons. It
would have been natural for Mr Blair to share that belief, though he
seems to have relied on low-grade intelligence sources, without being
frank with his Cabinet, Parliament or the public about the possible
weaknesses. He should have corrected the report of a 45-minute missile
threat more promptly.

However, this does not answer the question: "Why Iraq?" Mr Blair argues
that the previous policy of containing Iraq, enforced by sanctions and
overflying, had been overtaken by the attack on the twin towers. He
expressed his argument in a passage that itself calls for analysis. "Up
until 9/11, [those pursuing the policy of containment] were doing their
best"; after 9/11 "the calculus of risk had changed. Over 3,000 were
killed, an horrific event. If these people could have killed 30,000,
they would have done." Mr Blair went on to say that 9/11 "completely
changed our perception of where risks lay".

It is obvious at this stage of his evidence that he still does not
answer the central question: "Why Iraq?" It is true that al-Qaeda had
murdered 3,000 people in the United States; it was honestly but
mistakenly believed that Iraq possessed WMDs that might be a threat to
Western nations. There was no evidence that "these people" who would
have liked to kill 30,000 Americans had anything to do with Iraq or with
Saddam himself. Historically the secular Baath party had seen Islamic
fundamentalism as one of its chief enemies.

Later, Mr Blair made the reasonable point that one should look at the
character of the regime and not just at the nature of the weapons. The
Blair doctrine is that "the assessment of security intimately relates to
the nature of the regime". He believed, justifiably, that Saddam was a
"profoundly wicked, almost psychopathic, man". It is an unacceptable
risk to leave weapons of mass destruction in the hands of such a person.
That is true, but it was equally true before 9/11. It is not clear that
9/11 altered the calculus of risk. If anything it put greater pressure
on Iraq to make concessions.

Mr Blair also applied his doctrine to the current issues of Iran, where
he sees the same dangerous conjunction of WMDs and a "highly repressive
or failed" state. He does not specify the policy he would adopt towards
Iran. He did state that his judgment is "we don't take any risks with
this issue". He does not tell us which are the greater risks, taking
action against Iran, if feasible, or taking no action. Iran is more
powerful than Iraq.

There was one revealing moment in Mr Blair's evidence. He said that he
had taken Britain to war on four occasions. As he said it, he seemed to
realise it was not a popular claim. He paused, and then gave his list:
Sierra Leone, Kosovo, Afghanistan and Iraq. The question of legality
arises both in respect of Kosovo and Iraq. Like Lord Goldsmith, Mr Blair
regards the lawfulness of the Iraq action as turning on the absence of a
second UN resolution, and the reliance on Resolution 1441.

Broad questions of international law are also involved.

They concern the monopoly of the use of force given to the United
Nations in the UN Charter. Since 1945, the conventions on torture and
genocide have opened a wider right to use force; there is a general
right to arrest those responsible for torture or to intervene to prevent
genocide. That was the justification for the Nato intervention in Kosovo.

There are still too many failures of the Iraq policy that have not been
justified. Saddam was deposed, but at high cost in allied and Iraqi
lives. We did remain loyal allies, but to an increasingly unpopular
American administration. International law has not been clarified. Brave
troops were not given the right equipment. As General Douglas MacArthur
told the US Senate in 1951: "In war, there is no substitute for
victory." In the end, Iraq was no victory for Britain.

What is NATO?

2010-01-23T18:32:00.001-05:00

What is NATO?

19.01.2010

Source: Pravda.Ru

URL: http://english.pravda.ru/hotspots/conflicts/111727-what_is_nato-0

Why doesn't NATO take Russia's approaches on a new security pact seriously? Because the Freedom, Democracy, Stability and Prosperity labels attached to the Organization are no more than outer packaging which hides the reality within: NATO is no more and no less than an instrument which serves the interests of the arms lobby.

Russia's approaches for a bilateral security treaty, which would inevitably pass by a serious and long-standing binding bilateral agreement on friendship and non-aggression, will not be accepted by NATO for one reason alone: NATO is not about collective security any more and has not been since the Warsaw Pact was disbanded on July 1, 1991.

Last month, Andres Fogh Rasmussen, the non-elected Danish Secretary-General of the non-elected NATO (which nevertheless still dictates the foreign policy of its member states), declared "There can be no doubt whatsoever that NATO will remain our framework for Euro-Atlantic security". In a nutshell, there is no space for collective agreements with Russia because NATO continues to focus its attention on the Western Europe-Atlantic space common to the Cold War.

It is old hat. NATO has not moved on. It is an anachronism. NATO provides jobs for the boys. NATO serves the interests of the arms lobby which gravitates around the Pentagon and which has its tentacles deep within US foreign policy. NATO is a stone around the neck of the taxpayers not only of the United States of America but also of its member states. Who, after all, funds its operations? Just in Afghanistan and Iraq, the operations of NATO countries have cost almost one trillion dollars (one thousand billion, or 1,000,000,000,000). How many hospitals and schools could be bought with that?

Where NATO could move forward, reinventing itself and including Russia would be by respecting its pledges over the years not to expand (yet NATO's word means nothing), by fighting international terrorism, by fighting piracy and by fighting international crime, including trafficking of drugs, human beings and weapons, side by side with Russia or any other nation wishing to modernise its objectives and fight what exists, instead of inventing ghosts to justify the self-perpetuation of the anachronism.

Yet while NATO likes to mention these areas, it maintains its Euro-Atlantic stance, freezing Russia out, not paying attention to Russia's concerns and all the time aiming for an expansion into central and Eastern Europe, where there are plenty of customers for weaponry. And why should NATO reinvent itself when all it is today is the instrument to implement the policies of the arms lobby?

NATO's strategy is clear in its breach of a pledge given to Russia in 1998 not to station "substantial combat forces" on territory formerly belonging to the Warsaw Pact. Why then did it expand? Who can give one single military reason for the expansion onto territory the Organization promised not to enter?

And what is NATO doing in Afghanistan? Today, Afghanistan produces twice as much heroin as the entire world produced in the year 2000 before the military invasion, by NATO, against the Taliban. Given that the cultivation of the opium poppy funds the Taleban and Al-Qaeda, what exactly is NATO doing? In recent years, instead of diminishing, the heroin production on Afghanistan has grown not two-fold. Not three-fold, not ten-fold, not even by twenty times. Today, the heroin production from Afghanistan is 40 times higher than it was in 2000.

In 2009, heroin produced in Afghanistan killed over 90.000 people around the world. Everybody knows that NATO pays the Taliban not to attack, so is the priority to allow them to produce heroin so that they can afford to pay, to keep NATO's losses down?

In which case, what is NATO?

Timothy BANCROFT-HINCHEY

PRAVDA.Ru

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http://english.pravda.ru/hotspots/conflicts/19-01-2010/111727-what_is_nato-0

Ethnic Lobbies in America: Outsourcing U.S. Foreign Policy?

2010-01-23T13:49:00.001-05:00

Eugene IVANOV (USA)

Ethnic Lobbies in America: Outsourcing U.S. Foreign Policy?

It's fashionable to say these days that the world is entering the era of post-Americanism. Few can explain what that means in reality, but the gist is that U.S. influence in world affairs is gradually declining, and sooner or later, another country – most likely, China – will become the only world superpower.

We shall see. However, today it's hard to think of any major global problem – be it climate change or aid to poor countries – can be solved without at least the financial involvement of the United States. Besides, should the U.S. screw up big time – a number of great examples are available over the past decade – no one would be immune.

This keeps making Washington DC a natural target of numerous ethnic lobbies trying to promote their agendas through U.S. foreign policy institutions. According to John Newhouse¹, "nearly one hundred countries rely on lobbyists to protect and promote their interests [in the U. S.]."

As Zbigniew Brzezinski explains², the influence exerted by ethnic lobbies originates from the very nature of the U.S. foreign policy decision-making process. It's generally believed that the president has the upper hand in designing and implementing foreign policy. However, the entire executive branch of the U.S. government lacks a central planning organ responsible for this task. Theoretically, this role should be played by the National Security Council, but in practice, the NSC is so busy with day-to-day coordination of policy (between the presidential administration, Department of State, Department of Defense, CIA, etc.) that it simply has no time for strategic planning, resulting in a decentralized and fragmented decision-making process that is open to external influence.

Besides, presidential prerogatives to direct foreign policy are often challenged by Congress. Due to its composition and structure, Congress is especially susceptible to the influence of special interests, including ethnic lobbies. This is reflected in countless congressional resolutions and legislative amendments introduced and lobbied by special ethnic interests (which, in the process, have become very skillful in using campaign funds to win congressional support for their causes). A common place is congressional caucuses identified with specific ethnic interests; so are congressmen and senators serving as spokesmen for specific ethnic lobbies. For example, the Congressional Caucus on India and Indian Americans, one of the largest of this kind, includes over 150 members, none of them being Indian. Secretary of State Hillary R. Clinton, in her days as U.S. Senator, used to co-chair the Senate India Caucus.

In their daily activities, ethnic lobbies perform a number of functions. First, they serve as subject-matter experts and sources of information to members of Congress and other branches of government. Second, they participate in drafting legislation and providing policy oversight. Third, they organize media and public campaigns to advertise and promote their pet issues. Naturally, special attention is being paid to providing campaign contributions to elected officials through political action committees (PAC).

It's important to point out that not every ethnic group living in the U.S. forms a functional lobby. Addressing this issue, James Lindsay³ identified a number of factors that could predict a transformation of an immigrant group into a bona fide ethnic lobby. First, immigrants who came to the United States as political refugees (e.g. Cubans) are more likely to be politically active than those who came for "purely" economic reasons (e.g. Italians). Second, immigrants whose homelands are threatened by their neighbors (e.g. Armenia or Israel) are more likely to lobby for their homeland than those who came from "un-threatened" countries (e.g. Norway, Sweden, or Germany). Third, the most efficient ethnic lobbies are formed by economically successful ethnic groups (such as Jewish, Armenian, Cuban, and Greek Americans). Fourth, ethnic lobbies are the most successful in their activities when the issues that they promote are supported by U.S. political elites. Obviously, they are least successful if their issues go against of what is perceived as American national interest.

In their influence exerted on contemporary American political life, no ethnic lobby can rival the Jewish-American lobby (The Israel Lobby, as John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt call it in their highly-publicized 2007 book⁴). Many consider its power comparable with that demonstrated by such titans of American lobbyism as National Rifle Association (NRA) and American Association of Retired Persons (AARP).

Thanks to the tireless efforts of Jewish-American lobby (organized under the aegis of American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC)), Israel has been the largest recipient of U.S. economic and military aid since WWII: over $140 billion in 2004 dollars. Israel receives about $3 billion in direct assistance each year, roughly one-sixth of the total U.S. foreign aid budget and worth about $500 a year for every Israeli – not a bad deal for a wealthy industrial state with a per capita income in the top 30 countries in the world.

In addition, the U.S. provides Israel with consistent diplomatic support: between 1972 and 2006, the U.S. has vetoed 42 of the U.N. Security Council's resolutions critical of Israel. What makes the Jewish-American lobby so successful is its commitment, unity, resources, and political skills. (The last two factors, when combined, are especially powerful: it is said that presidential candidates from Democratic Party depend on Jewish support for as much as 60% of campaign contributions). The "ideological" unity obviously distinguishes the Jewish lobby from the Arab-American lobby, which has been hurt over the years by national and religious divisions. However, one cannot also discount the fact that the Jewish lobby faces almost no opposition to its actions because it advocates policies that are considered (rightfully or not) as fully aligned with American national interests.

Recent years have witnessed the impressive rise of the India lobby, whose influence may one day become comparable to that of the Jewish lobby. Perhaps, non-coincidentally, both ethnic groups share a number of similarities: Indian Americans are also well educated, financially successful, and strongly inclined toward political activism. (Add the real or perceived military threats to India from Pakistan and China). The India lobby also benefits from strong ties to the U.S.-India Business Council, an umbrella organization for 200 companies doing business with India or otherwise having Indian connections. (As pointed out by John Newhouse, 20% of all companies in Silicon Valley are owned by Indian Americans).

So far, the most visible demonstration of the strength projected by the India lobby has been last year's congressional approval of the U.S.-India "123 Agreement" on civil nuclear cooperation. Concerns were raised in the arms control community that the agreement will increase India's ability to produce fissionable material for its nuclear weapons program. To ensure the passage of the controversial deal, the lobby joined forces with the U.S.-India Business Council, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and two U.S. companies producing nuclear reactors, General Electric and Westinghouse.

Speaking of successful ethnic lobbies one must mention two more: Cuban and Armenian.

The power wielded by the Cuban exile lobby (associated with the Cuban American National Foundation, CANF) in Washington is even more impressive given that Cubans are concentrated primarily in only one location: Miami, FL. However, the special role played by Florida in the politics of presidential elections has allowed a bunch of noisy but politically savvy anti-Castro immigrants to completely hijack – and for decades dominate – the U.S. policy debates on Cuba.

The Armenian lobby (and its flagship group, Armenian Assembly of America) has made Armenia one of the highest per capita recipients of U.S. aid – thanks largely to Sen. Mitch McConnell, the Republican Senate minority leader and a ranking member of the Senate Appropriations Committee responsible for the distribution of foreign aid. On the other hand, the lobby has so far failed to reach its most cherished goal: a congressional resolution condemning Turkey for the 1915 Armenian genocide. In 2007, the victory was close, as having secured support of the House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the lobby almost succeeded in setting up the vote for a genocide resolution. However, prodded by the furious Turkish government, the White House intervened and persuaded Pelosi to shelve the resolution. Naturally, in its communication with the Bush administration, the Turks used some help too: former heavy-weight Congressmen Bob Livingston and Dick Gephardt lobbied on Turkey's behalf.

Among other ethnic groups, the Central and Eastern Europeans do possess a significant voting strength (for example, there are more than 10 million ethnic Poles in the United States), but their lobbies lack the financial resources available to their Jewish or Armenian counterparts. Nevertheless, the Polish lobby (through the Polish American Congress) or the Baltic lobby (represented in part by the Baltic American Freedom League (BALF) and the Joint Baltic American National Committee (JBANC)) have been instrumental in promoting the admission of their respective countries in NATO (Poland in 1999; Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania in 2004). It is a little secret to anyone in Washington that the noisy anti-Russian hysteria fueled by the Polish and Baltic lobbies is partly responsible for the negative image of Russia in the United States and worsening of U.S.-Russia relations.

Experts disagree on whether ethnic lobbies have positive or negative impact on U.S. foreign policy. Some⁵ consider ethnic lobbies as a welcomed sign of "globalization" of U.S. national politics and believe that ethnic lobbies will help spread "American values" around the globe. Others are not so sure expressing the concern that "privatization" (as John Newhouse puts it) of the U.S. foreign policy further corrupts American political system and diminishes its attraction to the rest of the world. An even more extreme point of view was expressed by Mearsheimer and Walt, who asserted that due to the actions of the Jewish lobby, U.S. policy in the Middle East serves the national interest of Israel rather than that of the United States.

In their turn, American politicians are mum on the subject. Used to campaign contributions from various special interests – the pharmaceutical lobby, the energy lobby, the agribusiness lobby, etc. – they don't seems to be concerned with taking money from their ethnic counterparts. And is there any difference, anyway?

______________________

¹ John Newhouse, "Diplomacy, Inc. The Influence of Lobbies on U.S. Foreign Policy", Foreign Affairs, May/June 2009.

² Zbigniew Brzezinski, "The Choice: Global Domination or Global Leadership" (2004) Basic Books, New York.

³ James Lindsay, "Getting Uncle Sam's Ear", Council on Foreign Relations (Winter 2002).

⁴ John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt, "The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy" (2007) Farrar, Strauss, and Giroux.

⁵ Yossi Shain, "Marketing the American Creed Abroad (Diasporas in the U.S. and their Homelands" (1999) Cambridge University Press.

http://en.fondsk.ru/article.php?id=2711

Recasting Serbia’s Image, Starting With a Fresh Face

2010-01-16T11:22:00.001-05:00

Recasting Serbia's Image, Starting With a Fresh Face

Christoph Bangert for The New York Times

"When you're young, and when you come and they see you for the first time, a lot of them are just kind of surprised. They say, 'Who's this kid?'"

By NICHOLAS KULISH

Published: January 15, 2010

BELGRADE, Serbia

THE public face of Serbia for years has been that of a wizened war criminal in the dock in The Hague. Now, as the once-outcast country presses for membership in the European Union, it is increasingly represented by the gap-toothed grin of its energetic young foreign minister, Vuk Jeremic, all of 34 and a graduate of Cambridge and Harvard.

It is not just appearances. He is a minister in the most westward-leaning government Serbia has ever had, one that is aggressively pursuing membership in the European Union and good relations with the United States. Yet at the top of his agenda stands the issue that brought so much trouble to Serbia: the breakaway province and self-declared nation of Kosovo.

To the consternation of powerful supporters of Kosovo's independence, including the United States, the Serbian obsession runs much deeper than a handful of ultranationalists from the generation of Slobodan Milosevic. Even young liberals like Mr. Jeremic, whose fluent English sounds more Bronxville than Belgrade, cannot let go of Kosovo, though it could endanger Serbia's chance to move beyond its recent troubled past.

"The fact that this kind of fervent, pro-European politician in Serbia happens to have this position on Kosovo confuses a lot of people," Mr. Jeremic said in an interview on the eve of the Orthodox Christmas here last week.

"This place, Kosovo, is our Jerusalem; you just can't treat it any other way than our Jerusalem," he said.

As if to underscore the point, his mentor and psychology teacher two decades ago at the First Belgrade High School, the current Serbian president, Boris Tadic, spent the holiday at the Visoki Decani monastery in Kosovo, under guard amid protests by local ethnic Albanians.

Mr. Jeremic quickly added that Serbia was not pressing its case through the use of arms, directly or in the form of paramilitary groups, but through institutions like the International Court of Justice, which will rule on the manner in which Kosovo declared independence. But the stakes are different, with vastly improved relations with the European Union and an end to Serbia's isolation on the line.

Mr. Jeremic is at pains to explain to Western audiences that Serbia's reputation from the Milosevic years had overshadowed the reality that it is now a democracy, and one whose voters twice chose pro-Western candidates in the presidential and parliamentary elections in 2008 — despite the inflamed nationalist sentiment in the wake of Kosovo's secession.

He was appointed foreign minister at 31, too young and inexperienced in the eyes of many Serbs to be trusted with their most important national issue — the impending secession of Kosovo. Yet, he has fought hard for Kosovo, lobbying governments around the world against recognizing its independence and becoming along the way one of Serbia's most popular politicians.

Mr. Jeremic's stridency on Kosovo has led his opponents to charge that he was a closet nationalist, talking one line when he was abroad and quite a different one at home in the Balkans. "Personally, I don't think I'm a nationalist," he said. "I'm half Bosnian and half Serb."

Mr. Jeremic's great-grandfather on his mother's side was Nurija Pozderac, a prominent Muslim politician before World War II who joined Tito's Partisans to fight the Nazis and was killed in 1943. His paternal grandfather was an officer in the king's army and spent much of the war as a prisoner at Dachau. Once he was liberated by the Allies, he returned to Serbia on foot, Mr. Jeremic said.

HE described a normal childhood in Belgrade, including a close relationship with his psychology teacher, Mr. Tadic. But his father, who worked for the state-owned oil company, and his mother went into exile after running afoul of the regime, and Mr. Jeremic finished high school in London before moving on to Cambridge, where he studied theoretical physics.

His time at Cambridge, which coincided with the war in Bosnia, helped him to understand Serbia's image abroad in a very personal way. "It was hard to explain that you come from Serbia and you're not a children-eating radical," said Mr. Jeremic, who had family members fighting on both sides of the war in Bosnia.

Mr. Jeremic opposed the regime of Mr. Milosevic and was a founder of the Organization of Serbian Students Abroad in 1997, but it was during the NATO bombing of Serbia that he hardened his resolve to work for his country. He said he had high school friends who were also opposed to Mr. Milosevic's reign but were called up for compulsory army service at the time of the airstrikes in 1999. Once they were wearing their uniforms, they were "legitimate targets," as he put it ruefully, and some were killed.

He recalled thinking at the time: "This regime, this government, this guy, Slobodan Milosevic, he has to be removed, because he's going to get us all buried. If he stays, he's going to get us all buried."

Mr. Jeremic traveled to Serbia to support the student movement there, known as Otpor, the Serbian word for resistance. After Mr. Milosevic's ouster Mr. Jeremic followed Mr. Tadic through a succession of ministries as an adviser, taking a break for a degree from Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, before himself becoming foreign minister.

With Serbia's scant resources and tattered public image, his options for fighting the diplomatic might of countries supporting Kosovo, like the United States, Germany and Britain, seemed limited. But Mr. Jeremic, who still looks and sounds a bit like an overachieving college class president, turned himself into a one-man road show, traveling to 90 countries in the two years since becoming foreign minister. Last year alone he spent 700 hours in the air, or roughly 29 days, much of that in a 30-year-old French-built Falcon 50 jet that was bought for Tito.

MR. JEREMIC sees his age, which many consider a weakness, as one of his assets. "When you're young, and when you come and they see you for the first time, a lot of them are just kind of surprised. They say, 'Who's this kid?'

"That's actually a good thing because it opens up their minds. They're curious. They want to hear what you have to say to them because you're different," he said. An afternoon with Mr. Jeremic, whose wife, Natasa Lekic, is a news anchor on Serbian public television, is a pleasant but intense experience, not complete without a glass of Serbian Carigrad red wine and a stream of articulate defenses of the country's claim to Kosovo.

Smoking a cigar and sipping his wine, Mr. Jeremic refused to say what Serbia would demand if it managed to force Kosovo back to the negotiating table by winning its case before the International Court of Justice. He insisted that the mistake the United States and its allies made before Kosovo's declaration was dictating rather than discussing terms.

Their other big mistake, he said, was expecting Serbia simply to acquiesce to the loss of the province, cowed in the face of American and Western European recognition for Kosovo. "This energy we invested, you know, in going around the world, has surprised a lot of people," Mr. Jeremic said. "A lot of people didn't expect us to dare to try."

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/16/world/europe/16jeremic.html