Informazione
The US-Al Qaeda Alliance: Bosnia, Kosovo and Now Libya. Washington’s On-Going Collusion with Terrorists By Prof. Peter Dale Scott | |
Global Research, July 29, 2011 | |
Twice in the last two decades, significant cuts in U.S. and western military spending were foreseen: first after the fall of the Berlin Wall, and then in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis. But both times military spending soon increased, and among the factors contributing to the increase were America’s interventions in new areas: the Balkans in the 1990s, and Libya today.1 Hidden from public view in both cases was the extent to which al-Qaeda was a covert U.S. ally in both interventions, rather than its foe. In virtually all the wars since 1989, America and Islamist factions have been battling to determine who will control the heartlands of Eurasia in the post-Soviet era. In some countries – Somalia in 1993, Afghanistan in 2001 – the conflict has been straightforward, with each side using the other’s excesses as an excuse for intervention. But there have been other interventions in which Americans have used al-Qaeda as a resource to increase their influence, for example Azerbaijan in 1993. There a pro-Moscow president was ousted after large numbers of Arab and other foreign mujahedin veterans were secretly imported from Afghanistan, on an airline hastily organized by three former veterans of the CIA’s airline Air America. (The three, all once detailed from the Pentagon to the CIA, were Richard Secord, Harry Aderholt, and Ed Dearborn.)2 This was an ad hoc marriage of convenience: the mujahedin got to defend Muslims against Russian influence in the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh, while the Americans got a new president who opened up the oilfields of Baku to western oil companies. The pattern of U.S. collaboration with Muslim fundamentalists against more secular enemies is not new. It dates back to at least 1953, when the CIA recruited right-wing mullahs to overthrow Prime Minister Mossadeq in Iran, and also began to cooperate with the Sunni Muslim Brotherhood.3 But in Libya in 2011 we see a more complex marriage of convenience between US and al-Qaeda elements: one which repeats a pattern seen in Bosnia in 1992-95, and Kosovo in 1997-98. In those countries America responded to a local conflict in the name of a humanitarian intervention to restrain the side committing atrocities. But in all three cases both sides committed atrocities, and American intervention in fact favored the side allied with al-Qaeda. The cause of intervention was fostered in all three cases by blatant manipulation and falsification of the facts. What a historian has noted of the Bosnian conflict was true also of Kosovo and is being echoed today in Libya: though attacks were “perpetrated by Serbs and Muslims alike,” the pattern in western media was “that killings of Muslims were newsworthy, while the deaths of non-Muslims were not.”4 Reports of mass rapes in the thousands proved to be wildly exaggerated: a French journalist “uncovered only four women willing to back up the story.”5 Meanwhile in 1994 the French intellectual Bernard-Henri Lévy (BHL) traveled to Bosnia and fervently endorsed the case for intervention in Bosnia; in 2011 February BHL traveled to Benghazi and reprised his interventionist role for Libya.6 In all of the countries mentioned above, furthermore, there are signs that some American and/or western intelligence groups were collaborating with al-Qaeda elements from the outset of conflict, before the atrocities cited as a reason for intervention.. This suggests that there were deeper reasons for America’s interventions including the desire of western oil companies to exploit the petroleum reserves of Libya (as in Iraq) without having to deal with a troublesome and powerful strong man, or their desire to create a strategic oil pipeline across the Balkans (in Kosovo).7 That the U.S. would support al-Qaeda in terrorist atrocities runs wholly counter to impressions created by the U.S. media. Yet this on-going unholy alliance resurrects and builds on the alliance underlying Zbigniew Brzezinski’s 1978-79 strategy of provocation in Afghanistan, at a time when he was President Carter’s National Security Adviser. In those years Brzezinski did not hesitate to play the terrorist card against the Soviet Union: he reinforced the efforts of the SAVAK (the Shah of Iran’s intelligence service) to work with the Islamist antecedents of al-Qaeda to destabilize Afghanistan, in a way which soon led to a Soviet invasion of that country.8 At the time, as he later boasted, Brzezinski told Carter, “We now have the opportunity of giving to the USSR its Vietnam War.”9 CIA Director William Casey continued this strategy of using terrorists against the USSR in Afghanistan. At first the CIA channeled aid through the Pakistani ISI (Interservices Intelligence Service) to their client Afghan extremists like Gulbeddin Hekmatyar (today one of America’s enemies in Afghanistan). But in 1986, “Casey committed CIA support to a long-standing ISI initiative to recruit radical Muslims from around the world to come to Pakistan and fight with the Afghan Mujaheddin.”10 CIA aid now reached their support Office of Services in Peshawar, headed by a Palestinian, Abdullah Azzam, and by Osama bin Laden. The al-Kifah Center, a U.S. recruitment office for their so-called Arab-Afghan foreign legion (the future al Qaeda), was set up in the al-Farook mosque in Brooklyn.11 It is important to recall Brzezinski’s and Casey’s use of terrorists today. For in Libya, as earlier in Kosovo and Bosnia, there are alarming signs that America has continued to underwrite Islamist terrorism as a means to dismantle socialist or quasi-socialist nations not previously in its orbit: first the USSR, then Yugoslavia, today Libya. As I have written elsewhere, Gaddafi was using the wealth of Libya, the only Mediterranean nation still armed by Russia and independent of the NATO orbit, to impose more and more difficult terms for western oil companies, and to make the whole of Africa more independent of Europe and America.12 Support for the mujahedin included collusion in law-breaking, at a heavy cost. In the second part of this essay, I will show how government protection of key figures in the Brooklyn al-Kifah Center left some of them free, even after they were known to have committed crimes, to engage in further terrorist acts in the United States -- such as the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993. The U.S.-al-Qaeda Alliance in Libya The NATO intervention in Libya has been presented as a humanitarian campaign. But it is not: both factions have been committing atrocities. Thanks in part to the efforts of the well-connected p.r. firm the Harbour Group, working on behalf of the Benghazi opposition’s National Transitional Council [NTC], Americans have heard many more press accounts of atrocities by pro-Gaddafi forces in Libya than by the Benghazi opposition.13 But in fact, as the London Daily Telegraph reported, Under rebel control, Benghazi residents are terrorized, many "too frightened to drive through the dark streets at night, fearing a shakedown or worse at the proliferating checkpoints." Moreover, about 1.5 million black African migrant workers feel trapped under suspicion of supporting the wrong side. Numbers of them have been attacked, some hunted down, dragged from apartments, beaten and killed. So-called "revolutionaries" and "freedom fighters" are, in fact, rampaging gunmen committing atrocities airbrushed from mainstream reports, unwilling to reveal the new Libya if Gaddafi is deposed.14 Thomas Mountain concurs that “Since the rebellion in Benghazi broke out several hundred Sudanese, Somali, Ethiopian and Eritrean guest workers have been robbed and murdered by racist rebel militias, a fact well hidden by the international media.”15 Such reports have continued. Recently, Human Rights Watch accused the rebels of killing Gaddafi supporters who were just civilians and looting, burning and ransacking pro-Gaddafi supporters' houses and areas.16 Americans and Europeans are still less likely to learn from their media that among the groups in the Benghazi transitional coalition, certainly the most battle-seasoned, are veterans of the Al-Jama'a al-Islamiyyah al-Muqatilah bi-Libya (Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, or LIFG). The importance of the LIFG contingent in the TNC has been downplayed in a recent issue of the International Business Times:
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Peter Dale Scott, a former Canadian diplomat and English Professor at the University of California, Berkeley, is the author of Drugs Oil and War, The Road to 9/11, and The War Conspiracy: JFK, 9/11, and the Deep Politics of War. His most recent book is American War Machine: Deep Politics, the CIA Global Drug Connection and the Road to Afghanistan. His website, which contains a wealth of his writings, is here.
Peter Dale Scott is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG)
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• Peter Dale Scott, Rape in Libya: America’s recent major wars have all been accompanied by memorable falsehoods
• Peter Dale Scott, The Libyan War, American Power and the Decline of the Petrodollar System
• Peter Dale Scott, Who are the Libyan Freedom Fighters and Their Patrons?
• Herbert P. Bix, The Middle East Revolutions in Historical Perspective: Egypt, Occupied Palestine, and the United States
Notes
1 Cf. Telegraph (London), “Defence Cuts in Doubt over Libya, Says Military Adviser,“ April 7, 2011, “The Libyan crisis has raised doubts about the Coalition’s defence review and could force ministers to reverse cuts including the scrapping of Britain’s Harrier jump jets, a senior military adviser has said,” (link).
2 Scott, The Road to 9/11, 163-65.
3 Scott, The Road to 9/11, 44-45; citing Robert Dreyfuss, Devil’s Game, 109-11; Saïd Aburish, A Brutal Friendship, 60-61; Miles Copeland, The Game Player, 149-54. Cf. Ian Johnson, “Washington’s Secret History with the Muslim Brotherhood,” New York Review of Books, February 5, 2011.
4 John R. Schindler, Unholy Terror: Bosnia, Al-Qa’ida, and the Rise of Global Jihad, 71, 81. According to Schindler, “CNN repeatedly showed images of ‘dead Muslims’ killed by Serbs that were actually Serbs murdered by Muslims” (92).
5 Schindler, Unholy Terror, 91.
6 Schindler, Unholy Terror, 179-80; Christian Science Monitor, March 28, 2011. In 1994 BHL presented Bosnian leader Izetbegovich to French President Mitterand; in 2011 BHL arranged for three Benghazi leaders to meet French President Sarkozy. Cf. “Libyan rebels will recognise Israel, Bernard-Henri Lévy tells Netanyahu,” Radio France Internationale, June 2, 2011, “Libya’s rebel National Transitional Council (NTC) is ready to recognise Israel, according to French philosopher Bernard-Henri Lévy, who says he has passed the message on to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu,” (link).
7 For Big Oil’s complaints with Gaddafi, see Peter Dale Scott, "The Libyan War, American Power and the Decline of the Petrodollar System", Asian-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, April 27, 2011.
8 Scott, Road to 9/11, 77; citing Diego Cordovez and Selig S. Harrison, Out of Afghanistan: The Inside Story of the Soviet Withdrawal (New York: Oxford University Press, 16), 16.
9 Scott, Road to 9/11, 72-75; quoting from "Les Révélations d'un Ancien Conseilleur de Carter: ‘Oui, la CIA est Entrée en Afghanistan avant les Russes...’" Le Nouvel Observateur [Paris], January 15-21, 1998: “B[rzezinski]: [On Jul 3, 1979] I wrote a note to the president in which I explained to him that in my opinion this aid was going to induce a Soviet military intervention.… Q: And neither do you regret having supported Islamic fundamentalism, which has given arms and advice to future terrorists?
B: What is more important in world history? The Taliban or the collapse of the Soviet empire? Some agitated Moslems or the liberation of Central Europe and the end of the cold war?”
10 Ahmed Rashid, Taliban, 129. According to the Spanish author Robert Montoya, the idea originated in the elite Safari Club that had been created by French intelligence chief Alexandre de Marenches in 1976, bringing together other intelligence chiefs such as General Akhtar Abdur Rahman of ISI in Pakistan and Kamal Adham of Saudi Arabia (Roberto Montoya, El Mundo [Madrid], February 16, 2003).
11 Scott, Road to 9/11, 139-40; citing Steven Emerson, American Jihad, 131-32.
12 Peter Dale Scott, "The Libyan War, American Power and the Decline of the Petrodollar System", Asian-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, April 27, 2011.
13 “PR firm helps Libyan rebels to campaign for support from US,” The Hill.com, April 12, 2011.
14 Rob Crilly, Daily Telegraph (London), March 23, 2011; quoted in Stephen Lendman, “Planned Regime Change in Libya,” SteveLendmanBlog, March 28, 2011. Cf. Los Angeles Times, March 24, 2011.
15 Morris Herman, “Rebel Militias Include the Human Traffickers of Benghazi,” Foreign Policy Journal, July 28, 2011, quoting Thomas C. Mountain.
16 Anissa Haddadi, “Does the Transitional Council Really Represent Libyan Democracy and Opposition to Gaddafi?” International Business Times, July 20, 2011.
17 Haddadi, “Does the Transitional Council Really Represent Libyan Democracy and Opposition to Gaddafi?” International Business Times, July 20, 2011.
18 Center for Defense Information, “In the Spotlight: The Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG),” January 18, 2005. That the LIFG is pursuing its own goals may explain the rebel seizure of anti-air force missiles from captured Gaddafi armories: these missiles, useless against Gaddafi (who no longer has an air force) are apparently being shipped out of Libya for sale or use elsewhere (New York Times, July 15, 2011).
19 December 2007 West Point Study, quoted in Webster Tarpley, “The CIA’s Libya Rebels: The Same Terrorists who Killed US, NATO Troops in Iraq,” Tarpley.net, March 24, 2011.
20 Daily Mail (London), March 25, 2001, link; cited in Lendman; “Planned Regime Change in Libya.”
21 Akhtar Jamal, “US UK, French forces land in Libya,” Pakistan Observer, February 2011.
22 Gary Gambill, "The Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), Jamestown Foundation," Terrorism Monitor, May 5, 2005; citing Al-Hayat (London), 20 October 1995 [“communiqué”]; "The Shayler affair: The spooks, the Colonel and the jailed whistle-blower," The Observer (London), 9 August 1998; Jean-Charles Brisard and Guillaume Dasquié, Ben Laden: La Verite interdite (Bin Ladin: The Forbidden Truth). Cf. also Annie Machon, Spies, Lies and Whistleblowers: MI5, MI6 And the Shayler Affair (Book Guild Publishing, 2005) [Shayler].
23 E.g. Washington Post, October 7, 2001: “Over the years, some dissidents suspected by foreign governments of involvement in terrorist acts have been protected by the British government for one reason or another from deportation or extradition.... In the past, terrorism experts say, Britain benefited significantly from its willingness to extend at least conditional hospitality to a wide range of Arab dissidents and opposition figures .... Mustafa Alani, a terrorism expert at the Royal United Services Institute for Defense Studies, a London think tank, said [Anas] al-Liby was probably left in legal limbo by the British government, allowing him to be used or discarded as circumstances permitted.”
24 “Sahelian Concern Deepens over Libya, AQIM,” Sahel Blog, May 2, 2011. According to the Los Angeles Times, AQIM vowed on February 24, 2011 to “do whatever we can” to help the rebel cause. (Ken Dilanian, “US Finds no Firm Al Qaeda Presence in Libya Rebellion,” Los Angeles Times, March 24, 2011). Cf. “Libya rebels not anti-West, but Qaeda a worry-group,” Reuters, March 29, 2011; “The Evolving Threat of al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb,” Strategic Forum, National Defense University; CNN World, February 25, 2011.
25 Andre Lesage, “The Evolving Threat of al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb,” Strategic Forum, National Defense University; CNN World, February 25, 2011, 6. Cf. “Rogue planes flying drugs across Atlantic; Al-Qaeda Links;,” National Post, January 14, 2014; “Latin drug lords find allies in African Islamists,” Washington Times, November 17, 2009.
26 A story in the New York Times (“Exiled Islamists Watch Rebellion Un
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LA GRAN BUFALA DI WIKIPEDIA (scrivo per fatto personale).
Wikipedia, enciclopedia in rete che viene considerata da tutti come il punto primo per avere delle informazioni “sicure”, per fare delle ricerche quando si deve parlare o scrivere di un argomento qualsiasi, Wikipedia che chiede contributi economici per fare sempre meglio il suo lavoro, Wikipedia che si vorrebbe far dichiarare addirittura dall’Unesco “patrimonio dell’umanità” (!): Wikipedia, mi si consenta, è una gran bufala.
Ovviamente parlo per esperienza personale, ma dato che l’argomento che meglio conosco sono io, ritengo di essere la persona più adatta per dire che, quantomeno per ciò che su di me sta scritto in Wikipedia, la medesima è una gran bufala (auspico peraltro che gli altri argomenti vengano trattati con più cognizione di causa di quanto non si sia fatto con me).
E che non sia solo una bufala ma sia in malafede è dimostrato dal fatto che più di una volta ho inviato correzioni e precisazioni, oltre a smentite, delle cose che su di me si scrivono e Wikipedia, imperterrita, ha continuato a propagare le sue bufale sulla sottoscritta e sul suo lavoro di ricerca.
Va detto che dopo avere comunicato ai gestori del sito che intendevo adire le vie legali se continuavano a scrivere falsità sul mio conto, oggi in Wikipedia appare parte della mia “biografia autorizzata”, cioè quella che io stessa ho messo in rete e che dovrebbe descrivere me stessa e la mia attività al di là del gossip che gira sul mio conto.
Però esiste tuttora, rintracciabile in rete con il mio nome e cognome, una “discussione” sulle foibe:
( http://wikipedia.virgilio.it/wikipedia/wiki/Discussione:Massacri_delle_foibe )
della quale dico, prima di tutto, che mi pare allucinante che alcune persone, anonime, si permettano di scrivere pagine su pagine su un argomento che non conoscono (per loro stessa ammissione) trinciando sentenze su quello che hanno scritto altri, sputando giudizi e critiche che vanno anche a volte oltre il concetto giuridico di “continenza”, senza neppure comunicare alle persone che vengono vivisezionate in tal modo in pubblico se intendono intervenire per far valere le proprie ragioni (considerando che, quantomeno nel caso che mi riguarda, molte delle affermazioni che mi vengono attribuite NON SONO cose che ho detto io).
Cito innanzitutto un tale “presbite” (ottima la scelta del nickname, dato che da quanto scrive evidentemente deve avere dei problemi di vista se non ha capito quanto ho scritto, ma se è presbite si metta gli occhiali prima di interpretare distorcendo gli scritti altrui, altrimenti si potrebbe pensare che sia in mala fede) che ha profuso a piene mani note biografiche sulla mia persona che andrò a smentire pezzo a pezzo (scusate la lunghezza, ma non è piacevole vedere come persone sconosciute e per di più anonime si permettano di scrivere colossali bufale su di te in rete, visibili a tutto il mondo).
Inizio da questa “leggenda metropolitana”:
“la Cernigoi se n\'è andata sbattendo la porta da Rifondazione Comunista, dopo aver espressamente accusato i vertici del partito di partecipare ad una campagna internazionale di rivalutazione del fascismo e del nazionalismo, contro le forze partigiane comuniste”.
Falsità pura. Non sono uscita sbattendo la porta, semplicemente non ho rinnovato la tessera dal 2001 (molto prima che Rifondazione iniziasse a parlare di foibe), pur continuando a collaborare con il partito, prova ne sia che sono stata più volte candidata nelle loro liste, sia pure come indipendente, ed ho partecipato ad un convegno a Verona l’11/5/2002 organizzato da Rifondazione sulle foibe. Non ho mai accusato il partito di quanto sostiene il presbite, si veda il mio intervento agli atti del convegno di Venezia sulle foibe del 13/12/2003.
Prosegue il sedicente ipovedente:
“La Cernigoi partecipa attivamente alle attività di CNJ, un\'associazione a difesa della memoria storica della Jugoslavia di Tito, che fra l\'altro ha appoggiato a tutta forza Milosevic, anche quando Milosevic era già a L\'Aja con varie e terrificanti imputazioni sul capo. Perché questo? Perché Milosevic si presentava esteriormente non tanto come paladino della \"serbitudine\", quanto come ultimo difensore della Jugoslavia socialista”.
Preciso: sono socia e collaboro con il Coordinamento Nazionale per la Jugoslavia (CNJ), e non mi vergogno a dire che sono “jugonostalgica” nel senso che reputo positiva e valida l’esperienza della Jugoslavia socialista (esperienza fallita per tanti e tali motivi che non sono ricostruibili in poche righe ed io, a differenza di chi scrive nei blog per sputtanare la gente, sono restia a sputare sentenze solo per far vedere che mi esprimo), soprattutto se raffrontata alla situazione attuale degli staterelli in cui la Jugoslavia si è dissolta. Quanto a Milosevic, è vero che il CNJ collaborava alla sua difesa dato che le “varie e terrificanti imputazioni” erano in gran parte calunnie, ed è vero che abbiamo espresso dubbi sulle modalità del suicidio di Milosevic, al quale erano state tolte alcune medicine indispensabili. Il presbite si metta gli occhiali e legga (e riporti) tutto ciò che riferisce ad un argomento di cui intende parlare. Mezza verità è mezza bugia, si dice.
Andiamo avanti, perché qui si va nella diffamazione bella e buona.
“ La Cernigoi è quella che afferma che la caccia al Ciellenista (membro del Comitato di Liberazione Nazionale) di Trieste da parte degli jugoslavi era cosa buona e giusta, così come sono giustificabili le varie fucilazioni di questi antifascisti. Qual era il loro peccato mortale, aggiungo io? Quello di non aver aderito immediatamente all\'autoproclamazione di annessione della Venezia Giulia alla Jugoslavia, fatta ancora nel 1943 dalle forze partigiane di Tito”.
Lasciando da parte l’aggiunta del presbite (che se pensa in tal modo non vedo perché debba pretendere di coinvolgere anche la sottoscritta nei suoi pensieri) sfido chiunque a trovare mie affermazioni del tono di quelle sopra descritte.
Il concetto, che io ho affrontato storicamente e che ho espresso non solo nei miei scritti ma in dibattiti pubblici (come quello seguito alla presentazione del libro di Raoul Pupo “Trieste 1945” svoltosi il 21/4/2010) è che l’esercito jugoslavo, essendo uno degli eserciti alleati contro l’Asse (l’Italia era solo “cobelligerante”, ricordiamo), aveva tutto il diritto, sancito dalle regole dell’armistizio firmato dall’Italia, di chiedere “collaborazione” (nel senso che dovevano porsi a loro disposizione) alle forze armate presenti sul territorio dove arrivavano. A Trieste il Corpo Volontari della Libertà (CVL), dipendente dal CLN (che già era uscito dal CLN Alta Italia perché si rifiutava di collaborare con la resistenza jugoslava: e qui va ribadito un concetto che spesso viene presentato capovolto: quando si dice che a Trieste il Partito comunista non faceva parte del CLN, bisognerebbe specificare che era stato per primo il CLN triestino a porsi fuori dal CLNAI che aveva dato come direttiva quella di allearsi con gli Jugoslavi, e per questo il PC triestino, che lavorava assieme al Fronte di Liberazione – Osvobodilna Fronta non faceva parte del CLN), forse per un malinteso senso di patriottismo, o forse per altri motivi, non volle consegnare le armi all’esercito jugoslavo, così come le guardie di finanza (incorporate all’ultimo momento nel CVL) in alcuni casi non si misero a disposizione degli jugoslavi o addirittura spararono loro contro, probabilmente perché ordini sbagliati erano stati loro impartiti dall’alto (e qui potremmo aprire tutta una lunga dissertazione sul “piano Graziani” che teorizzava le provocazioni contro gli Alleati in modo da creare disordini ed incidenti). Va considerato che si era alla fine di un conflitto mondiale dove sostanzialmente i combattenti erano divisi in due gruppi: quelli che combattevano con l’Asse e quelli che combattevano con gli Alleati. Se all’arrivo di un esercito alleato alcuni armati non si ponevano a loro disposizione, venivano logicamente considerati come “nemici”, con le conseguenze del caso, e ciò vale sia per chi non si consegnava agli angloamericani che per chi non si consegnava agli jugoslavi. Ciò significa valutare i fatti storici e non “ragionare come nel 1945” quando si “eliminava tutti coloro con cui non ci si trovava d’accordo”, accusa che Pupo ha mosso alla sottoscritta nel corso del convegno, e che trovo piuttosto pesante ed offensiva, oltre che fuori luogo nell’ambito di un dibattito storico. L’interpretazione del presbite può andare di pari passo con quella del professor Pupo, ma si tratta di valutazioni politiche e non storiche, ribadisco. Ed a questo proposito rimarco che nel link di Wikipedia, pure rimaneggiato in base alle mie informazioni, , è rimasta questa frase:
“Sulla medesima falsariga, ritiene giustificata la persecuzione jugoslava dei membri del Comitato di Liberazione Nazionale di Trieste che, secondo la Cernigoi, avrebbero agito in chiave anti-comunista e anti-jugoslava”.
Affermazione che rimanda al mio scritto “Luci ed ombre del CLN triestino”, che se letto fa comprendere che non si tratta di interpretazioni personali ma di riscontri storici sull’operato del suddetto CLN. Che io ritenga “giustificata” qualsivoglia persecuzione è invece una interpretazione del tutto fuorviante del mio scritto, per la quale mi riservo di adire le vie legali, in quanto diffamatoria.
Proseguiamo con l’intervento del presbite
“Impiegata pubblica, la Cernigoi è una ricercatrice storica dilettante (come moltissimi altri: questo non è sicuramente un problema: serve solo per capire da dove viene fuori) che ha scritto un libro sulle foibe a Trieste”
Il fatto che sia un’impiegata dell’Agenzia delle Entrate non è sicuramente cosa di cui mi vergogni o che nascondo, ma dato che la mia immagine pubblica non si basa sul fatto di dove lavori ma sulle cose che scrivo, e che dal fatto che il mio lavoro “ufficiale” (cioè quello che mi dà da vivere) sia nel pubblico impiego e non come giornalista, è servito negli anni ai miei detrattori per sminuire il valore di ciò che scrivo, come se Kafka (mi si consenta il paragone ardito) potesse essere meno Kafka per il fatto che viveva con un lavoro da impiegato. Ma è evidentemente funzionale per alcuni scrivere che dato che sono un’impiegata pubblica ciò inficia la mia credibilità come giornalista e ricercatrice, e se non si considera che sono iscritta all’Albo dei giornalisti dal 1981, quindi da ben prima di andare a lavorare per il Ministero delle Finanze (di nuovo la mezza verità) e che il valore di ciò che scrivo è dato da quello che scrivo e non da dove lavori, le precisazioni di persone come il presbite, ma anche del dottor Giorgio Rustia che per primo ha messo in evidenza il mio posto di lavoro per dimostrare la mia inattendibilità, possono influenzare chi non ha letto i miei studi ma per sapere di me va in Wikipedia. Del resto gli stessi dibattenti di Wikipedia si autodefiniscono “dilettanti”: il che però non pare ispirare loro l’idea di tacere riguardo le cose che non conoscono.
Tratto ora brevemente il discorso del presbite delle polemiche sorte sul mio libro (ma le polemiche non le ho create io…)
“Per cui - incredibilmente - addirittura Claudia Cernigoi venne chiamata da alcune giunte di sinistra a parlare in occasione del Giorno del Ricordo, scatenando baraonde a non finire”.
Come se la colpa delle “baraonde” fosse della vittima delle contestazioni e non di chi la contesta… ma qui va detto che il discorso è del tutto sballato, perché dove sono andata a parlare non s’è mai svolta alcuna “baraonda” (e sfido il presbite a dimostrare il contrario) mentre è vero che all’Università di Roma alcuni neofascisti provocarono degli scontri per contestare il fatto che doveva svolgersi una presentazione del mio libro (senza la mia presenza, tra l’altro).
Va qui riportato un passo del link riguardante i “massacri delle foibe” in Wikipedia
http://wikipedia.virgilio.it/wikipedia/wiki/Discussione:Massacri_delle_foibe
riguardante le presunte “testimonianze” dei “sopravvissuti”.
Leggiamo:
“Furono poche le persone che riuscirono a salvarsi risalendo dalle foibe comunque tra questi Graziano Udovisi, Giovanni Radeticchio e Vittorio Corsi hanno raccontato la loro tragica esperienza a storici e/o emittenti televisive”.
Questo passo, che prosegue con la “testimonianza” di Udovisi, è copiato pari pari da un articolo di Paolo Granzotto, la cui biografia (http://www.zam.it/biografia_Paolo_Granzotto ) lo definisce “polemista”.
Dunque, al polemista Paolo Granzotto Wikipedia riconosce competenza storica tale da riportare papale papale un suo articolo (non un saggio, si badi bene), mentre Pol Vice, che ha, con fior di documenti, sbugiardato la storia di Udovisi viene così descritto:
“Pol Vice, un saggista di ispirazione marxista, ha pubblicato un saggio critico all\'interno del quale sottopone il testo di Udovisi ad una serrata critica, giungendo ad affermare che siamo in presenza di un falso testimone”.
Ed in nota leggiamo: “Pol Vice, Scampati o no. I racconti di chi \"uscì vivo\" dalla foiba, Edizioni Kappa Vu, Udine 2005. Il libro è stato scritto in collaborazione con Claudia Cernigoi, accusata dallo storico Raoul Pupo di far parte del gruppo di autori \"riduzionisti o negazionisti\" delle foibe”.
Insomma si sputtana il Pol Vice, non solo perché di “ispirazione marxista”, ma anche perché avrebbe scritto il suo libro con una “riduzionista o negazionista delle foibe” (fatto oltretutto inesatto, perché Pol Vice si limita a ringraziarmi per l’aiuto che gli ho fornito, ma il libro è tutto farina del suo sacco), così accusata da uno “storico” come Raoul Pupo del quale nessuno dice che è stato l’ultimo segretario della DC triestina prima che essa si sciogliesse, eppure, chissà perché, essere stati esponenti di spicco democristiani non comporta la stessa schedatura di “storici di parte” come l’avere idee di sinistra.
Tornando alla sottoscritta, accenno ancora alle frecciatine gratuite, dove di un sito in cui appaiono centinaia di articoli si va a cercare un unico articolo (scritto molti anni fa in cui ipotizzo che la Sars (qualcuno si ricorda ancora della Sars?) possa essere derivata da una mutazione genetica causata dalla manipolazione della soia (sulla quale esiste fior di documentazione), per dire che è un’ipotesi del tutto assurda, senza peraltro spiegarne il motivo (io non sono biologa, ma ho riportato alcuni dati che possono far riflettere, cosa che non hanno fatto invece i “dilettanti” che mi criticano).
Del resto le spiegazioni non sono il forte del dibattito in Wikipedia, dato che un non meglio identificato “Inglig” ha scritto che “Cernigoi ha un peso nel mondo accademico pari a zero virgola” e “nessuno se l’è filata la Cernigoi, per cui nessuno l’ha nemmeno ritenuta degna d’una smentita argomentata”.
Ad Inglig non viene forse in mente che le smentite argomentate non sono arrivate perché non era possibile trovare gli argomenti per smentirmi, dato che il “mondo accademico” in realtà ha preso in considerazione i miei scritti (non solo quelli sulle foibe, come dirò poi) ed infatti Pupo e Spazzali si sono limitati ad inserirmi nelle “tesi militanti” del loro testo del 2003, ma non hanno in alcun modo portato documentazione per smentire le mie ricerche?
Il lato che potrebbe essere divertente, non fosse che è insultante per il mio lavoro, è che io sono l’unica ricercatrice che ha presentato fior di documentazione nuova ed inedita a comprova di quanto ha scritto (ed infatti io ho scritto in base alla documentazione che ho trovato e non alla mia “militanza”, che si esplica in modo diverso) ed in effetti sono l’unica ad essere tacciata come “militante”. E poi, piccola polemica personale: se nessuno mi fila, se conto zero virgola eccetera eccetera, come mai sono state riempite tante e tali pagine con informazioni sulla mia vita privata, chi ha fatto queste ricerche su di me, perché si è andato così a lungo avanti a litigare sul mio valore di ricercatrice (senza prendere contatto con me, ribadisco, nonostante io abbia una mail indicata nel mio sito), perché ancora oggi il mio profilo su Wikipedia è stato proposto per la cancellazione (censuriamo la persona sgradita?). Considerando che in Wikipedia vi è di tutto e di più, ed anche persone che hanno pubblicato molto meno di me, il fatto mi pare particolarmente interessante. Finché ciò che stava nel profilo poteva servire a sminuirmi, poteva stare. Adesso che hanno messo almeno una parte di verità andrebbe cancellato. Wow! Orwell avrebbe avuto di che scrivere in merito.
Voglio infine rilevare come gran parte del mio lavoro, delle mie ricerche storiche, non verta solo sulle foibe, come appare invece dal mio profilo su Wikipedia. Io non ho la monomania delle foibe (comportamento piuttosto ascrivibile ad altri, questi sì, pseudo studiosi dell’argomento), faccio ricerche ed ho scritto su molti altri temi, dalla storia della Resistenza e del collaborazionismo al confine orientale, alla strategia della tensione e del neofascismo, come si può agevolmente vedere visitando il mio sito.
Infine, a proposito del fatto che “nessuno mi filirebbe”, mi si consenta di far notare che il mio studio, pubblicato nel 2003 dal titolo “1972. Ricordi della strategia della tensione” è stato più volte citato da storici che si occupano dell’argomento ed è oggi reperibile in moltissimi siti. Non in Wikipedia, però…
Claudia CERNIGOI
agosto 2011
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International Criminal Law - From Justice to Oppression
The Nuremberg Trials of 1946 advanced international law in a fundamental way. For the first time in history the victims of aggressive war brought their attackers to justice and aggression was defined as the ultimate war crime from which all others flow. Today, international war crimes trials are used by the aggressor to persecute the victims of their aggression. International law has turned full circle from justice to oppression, from justice to revenge.
By Christopher Black (*)
What can better illustrate this than the one-sided justice at the ad hoc tribunals, the ICTY and ICTR, where the victims of western aggression are accused of the grossest slanders and crimes in order to obscure the real facts of those wars under a cloud of darkness and confusion. What can better illustrate this than the statement by the judges of the ICTR in the case of General Ndindiliyimana, in its judgement in the Military II case, just released, at paragraph 2191, that “The Defence submits that the indictment and arrest ‘were motivated by political reasons’. The Chamber recalls that before this Chamber, the Defence stated that the prosecution made every effort to encourage Ndindiliyimana to testify against Colonel Bagasora, but Ndindiliyimana refused. The Prosecution did not deny this. Following his initial refusal, the Prosecution produced a far-reaching indictment charging Ndindiliyimana with a number of crimes….Most of those charges were eventually dropped.”
Political reasons
As the judges of the ICTR revealed that the court’s prosecutor indicted people for political reasons, the ICTY demanded that Serbia hand over General Mladic for allegedly engaging in a “joint criminal enterprise” to kill Croats and Bosnian Moslems. General Mladic maintains that he defended Serbs from the criminal actions of the Croat and Bosnian Moslem forces attacking his peoples, for which there is abundant evidence. Yet the victim once again is the accused and the witnesses brought against him are from the party of the aggressor.
Now we have the absurdity of the International Criminal Court issuing criminal indictments against various Africans whose common connection is to be in the way of western interests in Africa. The latest indictment against Colonel Ghaddafi, made because his country resists the aggression and war crimes of the USA and its satellites in Europe and Canada shows, even to the blind, that control of the ICC has been seized by the USA, even as that country refuses to be subject to its jurisdiction.
Shocking aspect
Never in history has “criminal justice” been perverted to such criminal ends. The most shocking aspect is the complete acquiescence of the nations of the world in this charade. Members of the Security Council, apart from the United States, have the power to annul the ad hoc tribunals but they do not. They have the power to refuse to refer clearly political accusations to the ICC. But they do not. It is they who are in charge and who are responsible, just as much as the USA.
General Mladic would have good reason to tell the ICTY judges that since they are a proxy for the Security Council, he wants to be tried by the Security Council itself, and then he could see who he was really up against and why. Colonel Gaddafi would have the same right to demand to be brought face to face with his real accusers in the Security Council so he could reveal to the world their true interests. But this right to face one’s accuser, this right to honesty, will not be allowed. Instead they are faced with a theatre troop acting out a macabre play, a show for the public.
So corrupted
Indeed, the entire structure of “international justice” since 1946 has become so corrupted that it is difficult to see how it can be transformed into a vehicle to stop aggression as it was intended, instead of a propaganda tool justifying it. The rot has spread everywhere.
The nations of the world must once again stand up and demand that the principles of the United Nations Charter be adhered to. They were thought important once. They are important now. They must demand that this architecture be dismantled, that international justice be restored in the true sense of the phrase, and that the sovereignty of nations and self-determination of peoples be inviolate principles once again. But this architecture cannot be dismantled until the Security Council is abolished and the United Nations General Assembly represents the true interests of the peoples of the world in complete equality.
(*) Christopher Black, International Criminal Lawyer Toronto, Canada. The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect the views of Radio Netherlands Worldwide.
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Language: ENGLISH, SERBOCROATIAN
The film began with production in late 2009 in several cities throughout Canada including Ottawa, Montreal and Toronto, continued in early 2010 in the United States - Columbus, Dayton, New York and Washington, and was finalized in the Summer of 2010 in Slovenia - Ljubljana; Croatia - Vukovar, Djakovo, Jasenovac, Zagreb, Gospic, Knin; Bosnia-Herzegovina - Sarajevo, Trebinje; Serbia - Belgrade, Subotica, Kosovska Mitrovica, Trepca, Pristina, Orahovac, Prizren and Strpce. "The Weight Of Chains" was completed in October 2010.
The director of this film, Boris Malagurski, has made several films to date, the last one being ìKosovo | Can You Imagine?î, a controversial documentary exposing how remaining Serbs in Kosovo have little or no basic human rights, which won several awards on film festivals around the world and was broadcasted as well. ìThe Weight Of Chainsî presents a Canadian perspective on Western involvement in the division of the ethnic groups within Yugoslavia and show that the war was forced from outside ñ regular people wanted peace. However, extreme fractions on all sides, fuelled by their foreign mentors, outvoiced the moderates and even ten years after the last conflict ñ the hatred remains and people continue spreading myths of what really happened in the 1990s. Why did all this happen?
This film will also present positive stories from the war ñ people helping each other regardless of their ethnic background, stories of bravery and self-sacrifice. The aim is to come up with a powerful weapon that people who are against war and hatred can use as a collection of good arguments in their favor. The disunity among peoples populating the Balkans have marked the last couple of centuries. Letís start a new page, today, in the 21st century.
Born in Subotica, Yugoslavia in the late 1980s. In 2005, Boris immigrated to Canada and immediately gained professional recognition for his work. His film "The Canada Project" (2005) won Best Film at the First Take International Student Film Festival in Toronto, and was shown on Serbian National Television several times. His subsequent productions were showcased on several other film festivals worldwide, including the International Film Festival in Palic, Serbia, while he was still in highschool.
"Kosovo: Can You Imagine?" (2009) was Malagurski's first political documentary which won him a Silver Palm at the Mexico International Film Festival, Best Film at the BC Days Documentary Film Festival in Vancouver and was broadcasted on Russia's first all-digital English-language TV channel Russia Today in over 60 countries worldwide.
Canadian economist and professor of economics at the University of Ottawa. He is also Director of the
Centre for Research of Globalization.
Prof. Chossudovsky acted as economic adviser to governments of developing countries and has worked as a consultant for international organizations including the UN Development Programme, the African Development Bank, the UN African Institute for Economic Development and Planning, the UN Population Fund, the International Labour Organization, the World Health Organisation, the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean.
JOHN PERKINS
American economist and author, best known for his book "Confessions of an Economic Hit Man" (2004), an insider's account of the exploitation or neo-colonization of Third World countries by what Perkins describes as a cabal of corporations, banks, and the United States government.
His 2007 book, The Secret History of the American Empire, provides more evidence of the negative impact of global corporations on the economies and ecologies of poor countries, as well as offering suggestions for making corporations behave more like good citizens.
SUNIL RAM
Professor of military history and land warfare at American Military University, where he also teaches peacekeeping.
He is also the author of the UNITAR training program for peacekeeping in the Balkans and is currently revising the
UNITAR program on the modern history of peacekeeping. A former Canadian soldier, he holds a UN Global Citizen Award for furthering awareness of peace and peacekeeping.
JAMES BISSETT
Former Canadian diplomat. He was High Commissioner to Trinidad and Tobago and later
Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to Yugoslavia, Albania (1990-1992), and Bulgaria.
He worked for the Departments of Citizenship and Immigration and Foreign Affairs and was later appointed the head of the Immigration Foreign services. Amb. Bissett also served as Canadian High Commission in London, England, and later became he assistant undersecretary of state for social affairs in the Department of External Affairs.
SCOTT TAYLOR
Canadian journalist specializing in military and war reporting.
His coverage has included wars in Cambodia, Africa, the Balkans, and Iraq. Taylor is a former private in the Canadian Forces, and is now the editor and publisher of Esprit de Corps military magazine. In his book "Inat: Images of Serbia and the Kosovo Conflict" he argues that NATO involvement in that conflict was unnecessary and that Western media coverage of the conflict was biased against the Serbs.
LEWIS MACKENZIE
Retired Canadian Major-General, author and media commentator.
He established and commanded Sector Sarajevo as part of the United Nations Protection Force UNPROFOR in Yugoslavia in 1992. Using the media as a means of trying to help restore peace, MacKenzie became well-known worldwide. He is a recipient of the Vimy Award, which recognizes a Canadian who has made a significant and outstanding contribution to the defence and security of their nation and the preservation of democratic values. In 2006, he was made a Member of the Order of Canada.
BRANISLAV LECIC
Serbian actor, and politician.
After the victory of the DOS in the 2000 presidential elections in Serbia, he was named the Minister of Culture in the government of the late Zoran Djindjic. He later founded the "Moja Srbija" (My Serbia) movement, taking part in Serbian elections in 2008.
In early 2010 he and his party merged into the Christian Democratic Party of Serbia.
VERAN MATIC
Chief Executive Officer and one of the founders of B92, a Serbian broadcaster with national coverage headquartered in Belgrade.
At the World Economic Forum's Annual Meeting in 1999, he was proclaimed one of the year's top 100 Global Leaders for Tomorrow, along with Veton Surroi, the publisher of Koha Ditore, a daily newspaper in Kosovo, Serbia.
VLADE DIVAC
Retired Serbian basketball player (played in the NBA) also well known as a great humanitarian, helping children in his native country of Serbia, as well as in Africa.
In late 2007 Divac has founded a humanitarian organization, "You Can Too", with the goal of assisting refugees in Serbia.
In 2008, Divac was appointed as a government adviser in Serbia for humanitarian issues. Divac appears in the ESPN 30 for 30 documentary "Once Brothers", where he discusses the exploits of the Yugoslavia national basketball team in the late 1980s and early 1990s and how the Yugoslav Wars tore them apart.
MICHAEL PARENTI
Award winning, internationally known American political scientist, historian, and culture critic who has been writing on a wide range of both scholarly and popular subjects for over forty years.
He has taught at several universities and colleges and has been a frequent guest lecturer before campus and community audiences. In addition, he has played an activist role in political struggles, most notably various anti-war movements. Included among the subjects he addresses are American politics, Yugoslav and Balkan affairs, news and entertainment media, ideology, historiography, ethnicity, and religion.
SLOBODAN DRAKULIC
Professor of sociology at Ryerson University, before he passed away in October 2010.
He obtained his B.A. and M.A. at the University of Zagreb (Croatia) and his Ph.D. at the University of Toronto. He taught sociology and anthropology in Croatia and Canada for almost thirty years. Dr. Drakulic published extensively in the areas of social movements, education, urban guerrillas, nationalism and war. His most recent publications included an article on nationalism in Croatia (past and present).
GREGORY ELICH
American author of "Strange Liberators: Militarism, Mayhem, and the Pursuit of Profit".
He is on the Board of Directors of the Jasenovac Research Institute and on the Advisory Board of the Korea Truth Commission. His articles have appeared in newspapers and periodicals across the world, including the U.S., Canada, South Korea, Great Britain, France, Zimbabwe, Yugoslavia, Russia, Denmark, and Australia.
GEORGE BOGDANICH
American film director of "Yugoslavia: The Avoidable War" (2002), a 165 minute documentary which was broadcast on European and Canadian television with a well reviewed (NY Times, Chicago Tribune) and theatrical release in selected cities in the US.
He is also a film and video producer for GB communications and media consultant for Serafin Associates.
BARRY LITUCHY
Executive Director of the Jasenovac Research Institute, a non-profit human rights organization and research institute committed to establishing the truth about the Holocaust in Yugoslavia and dedicated to the search for justice for its victims.
Lituchy is a Jewish-American expert on Balkan affairs and professor of Modern World Civilization, Ancient World
Civilization, and US History at Medgar Evers College, located in Brooklyn, NY.
GEORGE KENNEY
Former Yugoslav desk officer at the United States State Department headquarters in Washington DC.
Kenney resigned his commission in 1991 over US policy towards the Yugoslav conflict. He had about 60 articles published in mainstream outlets, did hundreds of radio and TV interviews and talk shows, and traveled extensively through the US on speaking tours.
JOHN BOSNITCH
Canadian journalist, consultant and political activist of Serbian descent.
He's also Bureau Chief of The InterMedia Center News Agency located in Tokyo, Japan. Bosnitch helped famous U.S. chess player Bobby Fischer after he was detained in Japan in 2005, due to his outstanding arrest warrant for Yugoslavia sanctions violation, and managed to secure his safe leave to Iceland.
BOSKO CIRKOVIC "SKABO"
Serbian musician, founder of "Beogradski Sindikat" (Belgrade Union) rap group which advocates social and political change in Serbia.
During 2003 he was writing a column for Glas Javnosti daily newspaper. He is also one of the founders and a CEO of "Magmedia" company for protection and exploitation of intellectual property. In 2010, he sang in front of a 10,000 strong crowd at the "Family Walk" rally organized by "Dveri" in Belgrade.
JOHN HAWTHORNE
Canadian international lawyer, former United Nations Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) official.
Hawthorne starred in Malagurski's previous film "Kosovo | Can You Imagine?" (2009) and has stirred controversy by revealing delicate information concerning gross human rights violations of Serbs and other non-Albanians in Serbia's southern province of Kosovo which declared independence in 2008 with support of major Western powers.
ZVONIMIR TRAJKOVIC
Serbian political advisor to four Presidents, including Slobodan Milosevic (1990 ñ 1993) and Radovan Karadzic (1994 ñ 1997). He also worked for IBM for 14 years.
He was never a member of any political party, neither the Communist Party, nor Milosevicí Socialist Party, even while Trajkovic was advising the President.
JADRANKA REIHL-KIR
The widow of Josip Reihl-Kir, the tragically perished Croatian first chief of Police in Osijek, who was at the time also in charge of Police stations in nearby towns in Slavonia.
ZELJKO SABO
Current mayor of the town of Vukovar, Croatia.
Sabo talks about the circumstances in 1991 which lead to the destruction of Vukovar which lies in the Slavnonian region of Croatia.
ZELJKO PERATOVIC
Croatian journalist since June 1991.
Quickly after he started working in the Croatian daily "Vjesnik", he was sent to cover events in Vukovar and Gospic. Powerful impressions from the war and testimonies by fragments of stories, behind which backstage political games were hidden, essentially influenced on his decision to take up research journalism. Today his research interests are directed at activities such as weapons and drug trade, prostitution, war crimes, political murders, abuse of secret services, etc.
MARKO FRANCISKOVIC
Former Croatian presidential candidate.
He is an advocate against liberal democracy and is the author of ìCroatian book of survival: Study of statehood.î
JOZE MENCINGER
Slovenian lawyer and economist, who was Minister of Economy of the Republic of Slovenia and
Vice Minister of Slovenia.
He is a Member of the European Academy of Arts and Sciences and has received the Golden Order of Freedom of the Republic of Slovenia. Mencinger was also Member of the Slovenian State Council for 5 years.
ERIK VALENCIC
Slovenian journalist, currently working for Slovenian ìMladinaî magazine in Ljubljana.
He previously worked for ìRadio Studentî and has appeared on many talk-shows discussing political and economic topics in the former Yugoslavia.
VESNA LEVAR
Widow of Croat fighter Milan Levar, who was assassinated in front of his house for investigating crimes against Serbs in Gospic, Croatia.
RADE ALEKSIC
Father of Srdjan Aleksic, who noticed that the Serbian police in Trebinje, Herzegovina, was taking away a man for being a Muslim and acted against them, which resulted in tragedy.
VEDRAN MUJAGIC & ARMIN BUSATLIC
Members of the ìDubioza Kolektivî band, currently based in Sarajevo, originating from Zenica, Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Their music consists of various styles ranging from Reggae, Dub and Rock intermixed with political lyrics along with uplifting and melodic tendencies.
SRDJA TRIFKOVIC
Serbian-American writer who was foreign-affairs editor for the paleoconservative magazine ìChroniclesî.
He has a PhD in history from the University of Southampton. He was also director of the Center for International Affairs at the Rockford Institute. Trifkovic was also an unofficial spokesman for the Republika Srpska government in the 1990ís. Trifkovic is the author of Sword of the Prophet, a book on the history and doctrines of Islam. He comments on Balkan politics and is a regular columnist for several conservative publications in the United States.
BLASKO GABRIC
Founder and President of "Fourth Yugoslavia", the first mini-Yugoslavia in the Balkans, located in Subotica, Serbia.
Gabric argues that the Western world has taken away his "piece of heaven", after which he decided to take drastic action by declaring his property of 15 acres as a mini-Yugoslavia.
SLOBODAN SAMARDZIC
He was also the advisor for political issues to former Yugoslav president and Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica.
He headed the Serbian government's Committee for Decentralization and was coordinator of Serbiaís State Negotiating Team of the future status of Kosovo.
The Weight of Chains
An interview with documentary filmmaker Boris Malagurski
Gregory Elich: What led you to create The Weight of Chains? How did the idea for the film develop?
Boris Malagurski: After I initiated and organized protests against Kosovo's illegal secession from Serbia in February of 2008 in Vancouver, I was hoping that Canada, a country that has a lot of experience with separatism on its own soil, would not recognize the false state of Kosovo. When Canada, under U.S. pressure, recognized Kosovo as an independent nation, citing the "reality on the ground" as a reason for doing so, I decided to check out what the reality on the ground in Kosovo really was and filmed Kosovo: Can You Imagine?, a documentary about human rights of Serbs and other non-Albanians in the breakaway province. However, this film only analyzed the consequences of failed Western policies towards the Balkans, while I always wanted to get down to the bottom of why the West did what it did. This led me to start researching in 2009 not only why NATO entered Kosovo, but why Yugoslavia broke up -- who had an interest in the bloody dissolution of this once prosperous European state and what happened after the breakup. I knew that all these would be tough questions to answer for a 20-year-old film student, but with the help of experts on the topic, I was able to piece the information together and get a more complete picture of why Yugoslavia was killed and how it was colonized by the West.
GE: Your film does a marvelous job in unraveling the factors behind the breakup of Yugoslavia and exposing the interests that benefited from that tragedy. This is an important story that has not received the attention it deserves, and there are patterns that connect with more recent conflicts. But it is not a subject that could ever receive corporate funding. What obstacles or difficulties did you encounter in making this film? It was a very ambitious project to tackle without an ample budget.
BM: At first, I was very worried that we wouldn't have a big enough budget to complete this film, even considering that everyone in the film team worked for free. Then came one man who would change everything and help us find the funding we needed -- and this was Mr. Branislav Grbovic from Perth, Australia. He approached me via e-mail and offered his help in gathering public support for the project, which he did in a highly professional way. Thanks to him, but also many others, we were able to raise enough money to cover the expenses for making the film. Of course, every film can always be better when the budget is even bigger or when the film team includes more people, but I was happy that this project was funded through small donations of many people throughout the world who wanted this story told, who can today proudly say that this is their film as well that this is our film.
GE: In making this film you travelled to several countries, where you interviewed a diverse and interesting array of individuals. Was it difficult to track down or arrange meetings with some of your interviewees? Perhaps the heart of the film could be said to be the family relations of the little sung heroes who lost their lives in protecting those of another ethnic group. At the other end of the spectrum, you intended to interview former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright about negotiations at Rambouillet. That apparently didn't come off.
BM: I must say that I've had more than a pleasant experience with almost all those who were contacted for an interview for this film. I had help from Mr. Matt Mintz with arranging interviews in Canada and the U.S., while I arranged all the interviews in the Balkans myself. This largely consisted of contacting lots of people who maybe knew or knew someone who knew the person I was interested in interviewing, and the process took a while, but we haven't been refused by anyone -- except Madeleine Albright. Well, initially, she agreed to the interview, but when the time came to meet up in Washington, DC, she was too busy for an interview. This is a shame because I really wanted to confront her with certain issues that mainstream journalists never tackle, but perhaps she'll change her mind one day and decide to show she has nothing to hide. As for the family relations of the unsung heroes, I could sense a bit of distrust on their end when I met them, but that feeling quickly faded away as they saw that I really was passionate about telling the truth and they really opened up to me and my camera.
GE: Your passion for telling the truth about what happened in the Balkans comes across strongly in the film. You make striking use of archival footage in presenting this dramatic story. You obtained historical film clips from a variety of sources, and it seems that you had good cooperation from Radio Television Serbia. How did you go about exploring what was available, and choosing which footage to use? What was the process in working with Radio Television Serbia and others?
BM: I believe I had around 200 GB of archival footage on my computer before I started any editing. The process started with me writing a script based on research. This included information from various sources, descriptions of comments by the main political actors to the media, depictions of different images and such. Then I attempted to actually find the visuals for all that was written down on paper, and this was a difficult task because I first had to figure out where to look for these images, from which source, and only then start tracking them down. Of course, what would happen sometimes is that I would find what I need, but then find out that the license for the footage was too expensive, such as the case of the interview of Joe Biden on Larry King Live where he said that "all Serbs should be placed in Nazi style concentration camps," for which CNN asked $18,000 for 30 seconds. On the other hand, cooperation with Radio Television Serbia was more than fruitful and for this I have to thank the director of the program archive of Television Belgrade Mr. Mileta Kečina, who provided all the archival footage that we needed free of charge. This meant a lot to us, especially taking into consideration that almost everyone in the film team was under 25 years of age.
GE: This is a beautifully edited film. It is clear that a lot of time and thought went into its construction, and the way images are handled strongly supports the film's themes. This is also a briskly paced film, feeling much shorter than its two hours. Would you comment on your approach to editing? What sort of considerations played into your editing decisions?
BM: My main goal was to edit together something that would be interesting to watch even if the audience knows little to nothing about the issue. This meant that I didn't want to spend too much time on details that weren't interesting enough to cover and focus on the 'big issues', but from a different perspective. It's very fast paced and this is done for a reason -- people nowadays seem to not have the patience to hear all the arguments in a calm fashion, but prefer to be 'bombarded' with them and in an entertaining manner. There is also a dose of cynicism and black humor embedded in the film, which would cause some to compare the style with that of Michael Moore. However, I think my job is much harder than Michael Moore's, as he picks topics which are already attractive for Western audiences, while I attempted to create a spark of interest in Western audiences in the Yugoslav drama, to inspire people to think critically about the Balkans.
GE: It's a subject that is poorly understood in the West, but one that has had a wider impact than is commonly recognized. Yugoslavia provided the pretext for redefining NATO's mission as that of an offensive military arm of Western policy, able to operate beyond Western European borders. NATO is now engaged in military operations in Afghanistan and in bombing Libya. Intervention in the Balkans launched the West on the path of permanent warfare. Having divided Yugoslavia into small, weak, easily controlled states, the West imposed its economic vision on the region: privatization of state owned and socially owned enterprises, and IMF demands for laying off workers and slashing of wages, pensions and social services. It is a model that conservative forces are attempting to bring home to the U.S.
Your film has shown in Canada, Australia, and Serbia, and recently had its U.S. premiere in Washington, DC. What has been the reaction to your film in Serbia? These people lived through those events, and now they are in a very different society than before. I would also like to know if getting your film shown in the U.S. and Great Britain has presented special difficulties.
BM: It's interesting that the Serbian premiere of The Weight of Chains was supposed to be at the Kustendorf Film Festival in Drvengrad. Renowned Serbian filmmaker Emir Kusturica saw my film, liked it, and included it in the program of his festival. Unfortunately, due to unexplained reasons, the film was suddenly pulled from the program and was never shown there. After the incident, the first showing in Serbia was in my hometown, Subotica. I could barely break through the masses to reach my seat at the theater, people were very interested to see the "banned film" and the premiere was a great success. Viewers were impressed with the large amount of information divulged in the film, and it almost seemed that they wanted more -- even those who couldn't find a free seat and stood through the entire two hours of the film. I was glad that there were such positive reactions from the audiences, and I got the same impressions after film premieres in Belgrade, Novi Sad, and other Serbian cities. Even Eastern Sarajevo in neighboring Republika Srpska greeted the film with standing ovations.
As for showing the film in Western countries, I can't say that I encountered any difficulties, aside from gaining larger sponsors to show the film to a wider audience. However, I am confident that, as time goes by, more doors will open for this film, as it's in the American spirit to always ask questions and pursue the truth, regardless of what the government is attempting to sell as a reality.
GE: Finally, is there is anything else about your film that you would like our readers to know?
BM: I think it's important for everyone to know what happened to Yugoslavia, and, of course, why it happened, as it could very well happen to any country. Martin Luther King Jr. once said that everything that affects one directly, affects all indirectly. The West has had and still has a heavy involvement in Yugoslav affairs, so it's important for the citizens of Western countries to be aware of what their governments have done and what they're doing to this day, as we're all human and we all deserve to live in freedom and prosperity. I believe we should make a fresh start and turn a new page today, in the 21st century.
Gregory Elich is on the Board of Directors of the Jasenovac Research Institute and on the Advisory Board of the Korea Truth Commission. He is the author of the book Strange Liberators: Militarism, Mayhem, and the Pursuit of Profit.
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