-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Kosovo: Black Hole Regarding Human Rights
Date: Thu, 11 Jul 2002 05:05:20 -0700 (PDT)
From: Rick Rozoff

http://en.rian.ru/rian/index.cfm?prd_id=160&msg_id=2584240&startrow=1&date=2002-07-10&do_alert=0

INDEPENDENT LAWYER MAREK NOVICKI: HUMAN RIGHTS NOT
OBSERVED IN KOSOVO

-Marek Novicki sharply criticized the position of the
majority of the Albanian population and their
political representatives, laying on them
responsibility for the unseemly plight of Serbs and
other ethnic minorities in Kosovo. In his report the
international lawyer calls Kosovo a "black hole" in
Europe and the world as regards the observance of
human rights.



BELGRADE, JULY 10 /FROM RIA NOVOSTI'S ALEXANDER
SLABYNKO/ - Human rights are not observed in Kosovo,
said in Kosovo ombudsman Marek Novicki said in
Pristina Wednesday. He was presenting a regular report
on the situation in Kosovo.

Novicki accused Mihael Steiner, head of the United
Nations civilian mission, and his staffers of creating
a "surrogate state" in Kosovo. Since the establishment
of a provisional international administration in
Kosovo, the UN mission has not been sticking to
democratic principles, taking only decisions in favour
of its staffers, paying no regard to the needs of
citizens of Kosovo, he said.

To Novicki, the plight of ethnic minorities, above all
Serbs is particularly grave. Human rights, security
and freedom of travel are not guaranteed to them. At
the same time, responsibility for the situation will
gradually be transferred on the newly elected
government of Kosovo, believes the lawyer.

Marek Novicki sharply criticized the position of the
majority of the Albanian population and their
political representatives, laying on them
responsibility for the unseemly plight of Serbs and
other ethnic minorities in Kosovo. In his report the
international lawyer calls Kosovo a "black hole" in
Europe and the world as regards the observance of
human rights.

===*===

Nowicki says Steiner created surrogate state

PRISTINA, July 10 (Tanjug) - Kosovo ombudsman Marek Nowicki said in
Pristina on Wednesday that basic international standards in the field
of
human rights were not observed in Kosovo and accused UNMIK head Michael
Steiner and his associates of creating a "surrogate state" in the
province.
Ever since the provisional international authorities were set up in
Kosovo, UNMIK has been passing decrees protecting only its own staff,
without paying any attention to Kosovo citizens, Nowicki said and
stressed
the unenviable position of minorities, primarily Kosovo Serbs, who do
not have elementary human rights, are neither secure nor free to move.
UNMIK does not observe democratic principles, Nowicki said during the
presentation of his latest report on the situation in the province.
He also criticized the majority ethnic Albanian population of Kosovo
and their political representatives by saying that they were
responsible
for the unenviable position of Serbs and other minority communities.

Nowicki says Kosovo's future is hopeless

KOSOVSKA MITROVICA, July 10 (Tanjug) - In his second annual report,
presented in Kosovska Mitrovica, Kosovo-Metohija ombudsman Marek Antoni
Nowicki said that the future of Kosovo seemed hopeless and that Kosovo
was a human rights black hole in Europe and the world.
He said that the future of Serbs in Kosovo would certainly depend on
the political situation in the province and that it would not be easy
to
find the "right place" for Serbs.

===*===

Subject: Jiri Dienstbier: Terrorism Is Not A Good Thing But A
Bad Thing
Date: Thu, 21 Mar 2002 09:02:12 -0800 (PST)
From: Rick Rozoff

[As best a balanced mind and honest person can make
sense of the following appeal by former UN Human
Rights envoy for Kosovo, the nations of the NATO
Alliance should now combat everything they've been
supporting for the past 12 years.
Yugoslav government and military officials, past and
present, including Slobodan Milosevic, should be tried
in the Netherlands for exactly what Dienstbier now -
horribly belatedly - failed to accomplished when he
was in a position to do so and which he now forcefully
advocates: The uprooting of the Western-backed
international terrorist and narcotics-trafficking
so-called KLA nexus.
And this at the very moment that CIA station chief
John David Neighbor is caught on film passing $1,000
to a former Yugoslav general for state security
secrets, including current plans for contending with
the KLA in Serbia's Presevo valley and adjoining
areas.
Within days of the Macedonian governent caving in to
the relentless economic and military blackmail of NATO
Secretary General George Robertson and former U.S.
Balkan Envoy James Pardew and granting blanket amnesty
to over 3,000 UCK-KLA invaders from Kosovo.
NATO "has cut down the number of terrorist attacks in
Southern Serbia and Macedonia."
By simply labeling the attackers 'civil rights
activists' and granting them full legitimacy.
Though he doesn't say it, the same could be claimed
for Dienstbier's own former territory, Kosovo, where
terrorist attacks have also diminished in direct
proportion to available targets, as thousands of
innocent civilians have been murdered and kidnapped
and hundreds of thousands ethnically cleansed.
A modest proposal: Free those former Yugoslav
officials languishing in Dutch prisons and replace
them with the Richard Holbrookes, Madeleine Albrights,
Bernard Kouchners, Bill Clintons, Tony Blairs and -
not to overlook them - Jiri Dienstbiers that have
aided and abetted at every turn the horror that is
engulfing the Balkans.]



Thursday, March 21st, 2002
w w w . t a i p e i t i m e s . c o m

Fight Balkan terrorism now

Within the global terrorism chain Balkan terrorism
remains a small but vital link, one which has
continued to flourish right under the eyes of NATO and
the UN
By Jiri Dienstbier

Slobodan Milosevic's trial in the Hague is a timely
reminder of just how devastating terroristic violence
can be. President Bush may or may not have been
careless in portraying Iraq, Iran and North Korea as
an "axis of evil," but he was correct in pointing out
the many hidden links in the global terrorism chain.
Within that chain Balkan terrorism remains a small but
vital link, one which has continued to flourish right
under the eyes of NATO and the UN.
Osama bin Laden established his presence in the region
through a series of so-called "humanitarian"
organizations in Bosnia and Albania sometime around
1994. Some of the fighters in Bosnia, Kosovo and
Macedonia during the Balkan wars included mujahidin
from many countries who had trained in Afghanistan.
Local terrorist centers were also important. Indeed,
in Albania terrorists were trained on the property of
former Albanian President Sali Berisha near the town
of Tropoje.
Beyond this powerful hint of local support for
terrorists, there was an economic infrastructure. Two
tons of heroin per month passed from Asia to Europe
through Kosovo during the rule of Slobodan Milosevic.
Instead of diminishing since Milosevic's fall, drug
smuggling has increased. Last year, five tons of
heroin was smuggled through the lands now overseen by
the United Nations and NATO. Interpol says that
Albanian gangs now control 70% of heroin trafficking
in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Scandinavia.
Cooperation over the last few years between the UN
Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK), the
NATO-led multinational Kosova Force (KFOR), and local
governments -- boosted by the arrival of a democratic
government in Serbia -- has cut down the number of
terrorist attacks in Southern Serbia and Macedonia.
Yet this cooperation has failed to stymie the fusion
of terrorist and criminal activity. Indeed, due to the
wealth of terrorist groups engaged in drug dealing,
Erhard Busek, the Coordinator of the EU's Stability
Pact for the former Yugoslavia, thinks that the chance
of peace in Macedonia will be a mere 50 percent once
this winter's snows thaw.
Calm will not return to the Balkans so long as the UN
and NATO fail to destroy extremism's base in Kosovo.
For the criminal/terrorist heart of the supposedly
disbanded Kosovo Liberation Army continues to fortify
its power and to expand into Macedonia, Southern
Serbia and Montenegro. Some less careful commanders of
the KLA even talk about the 100,000 Albanians in
Greece as an ultimate target for their irredentist
goals. The goal of a "Greater Albania," has not been
forgotten.
Instead of suppressing the terrorists, they have been
treated as part of the solution to instability in the
Balkans. NATO Secretary General Lord Robertson did
call Albanian terrorists in Macedonia "a bunch of
murderous thugs," yet those same thugs were holding
public press conferences in Pristina under the noses
of UNMIK or KFOR. So solicitous of the terrorists'
desires are some countries that America's
representative to the Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) conducted negotiations
with Macedonian politicians and terrorist commanders
not in Skopje or Tetovo but in Prizren, a Kosovar city
where they are influential.
Over the last few years Kosovo has been ethnically
cleansed of a quarter of a million people. One hundred
churches and monasteries have been razed. Ethnically
motivated murders are less common of late, but this
cannot be deemed a success so long as Kosovo's
non-Albanians remain isolated in enclaves protected by
KFOR.
Recent elections have confirmed the general aversion
to violence of the local population. But elections are
a democratic instrument only if all parties accept
their results. Real power in Kosovo, however, remains
in the hands of those with kalashnikovs.
The international forces in Kosovo are strong enough
to cut the Balkan link in the global terrorist chain.
If the will is sufficient, that is. The Balkan
traffickers in drugs, arms, women, and refugees -- the
underground criminal trades that fund the terrorists
-- can be closed down. But to do this, the
international bodies that control Kosovo must dissolve
any organization that relies on violence.
Known criminals should not sit in Kosovo's Parliament,
but in prison. The worst of them don't belong in
Kosovo's government but on trial with Milosevic in the
Hague. Fearful of challenging the armed terrorists,
the international bodies that govern Kosovo prefer to
appease them.
Frustrated international administrators, indeed, have
forced Albania's political parties to form a
coalition. This, however, may result in eviscerating
the power of Ibrahim Rugova, finally confirmed as
President earlier this month, while the extremist's
parties transformed from the Kosovo Liberation Army
are admitted into government.
The goal behind the bombing of Yugoslavia, of Security
Council resolution 1244 and today's provisional
constitutional framework for Kosovo, was the creation
of the pre-conditions for the democratic development
of a multiethnic society. As this remains the only
worthwhile and workable goal, the only viable solution
to Kosovo's future is a coalition of moderate
Albanians and the parties of Kosovo's ethnic
minorities. But pragmatic cynics have been arguing for
three years that such a solution is impossible. By
appeasing the terrorists in this way, the most
powerful states in the world give a green light to
terrorists not only in the Balkans but all over the
world.
Kosovo is a territory far smaller than Afghanistan. If
the world fails to eliminate terrorists from politics
in Kosovo, what hope does it have of defeating
terrorism elsewhere? So, before the anti-terror
campaign seeks other terrorist bases to destroy, it
should eliminate terror in a place where the UN itself
is ruling. If not, the UN, NATO and the European Union
will discredit themselves as well as the humanitarian
values they use to justify their ``humanitarian´´
interventions.
Jiri Dienstbier was until recently UN Special Human
Rights envoy for former the Yugoslavia and is a former
Foreign Minister of Czechoslovakia. Copyright: Project
Syndicate

URL=[http://www.taipeitimes.com/news/2002/03/21/story/0000128619%5d