* Verso un "nuovo Kosovo"... (Sabac Online)
* Armi USA per l'UCK (Tanjug / Emperors Clothes)
* 1995-1997: "preistoria" delle forniture di armi all'UCK... (BTA,
Albanian Daily News)
* Il terrorismo ceceno ha radici in Kosovo? (Albanian Daily News)
* BALKAN - ALBANIA - KOSOVO - HEROIN - JIHAD (Center for Peace in the
Balkans)
* Sui piani di stanziamento permanente USA in Kosovo (LA Times, Le
Figaro, SerbiaInfo)
* Un articolo sull'UCK da Foreign Affairs (link)
---
TOWARDS A "NEW KOSOVO"
http://www.sabac.co.yu/e-zine/social_politics/txt/english/n_arvanites_towards_new_kosovo_062000.html
Text: Nick Arvanites , expert for geopolitics
© Sabac OnLine, June 2000.
It started with the "ethnic cleansing" of the Kosovo Albanians[1], but
one year after the entry of peacekeeping forces into
Kosovo, the tables have turned.
The KFOR peace force entered Kosovo on the 13th of June 1999 with the
aim of guaranteeing peace and security to all the
citizens of the Serbian southern province with the support of the UN
civil authority as well as a number of humanitarian
and non-government organizations[2]. Since then over 180,000 Serbs and
other non-Albanians have fled or have been
driven out of the province, 3,688 terrorist attacks have been
perpetrated, 739 people have been killed, 611 injured, 688
kidnapped and over 70 Serbian Orthodox churches and monasteries
destroyed or damaged. According to journalistic data
the majority of Kosovo's towns have been all but cleansed of Serbs.
About 2,500 Serbs have remained in Orahovac and Velika Hoca, while from
the village of Brecja near Kosovo Polje, across
Drenica and Metohija to the Albanian border not more than a few tens of
Serbs remain. Around a hundred Serbian families
have remained in Prizren, six old women have found shelter in the
Djakovica church, and two women in the Pec
Patriarchy. A larger number of Serbs, about 100,000 have remained in the
Kosovo basin, the Morava valley of Kosovo and
in Sririnik region of the Sar mountains.[3]
Obviously, the state of affairs in Kosovo after the arrival of
peacekeeping forces has been deteriorating constantly. Some
of the UN representatives also think that there are no positive trends
in this region. For example, the German paper,
BERLINER ZEITUNG, quotes an active UN representative in Kosmet, Tom
Kenings, who says that "the murders of
Serbs and Romas have not stopped there" and concludes that "the idea of
the creation of multiethnic Kosovo has dismally
failed".[4]
Some[5] believe that Kenings' statements contradict statements issuing
from NATO's military and political leadership,
that the Alliance is presently the only credible and effective force for
the containment of conflict anywhere in the world
especially when having in mind that, as a the result of the same NATO
policy, the Albanian authorities in the region are
caving in under the pressure from the criminal clans of Hasim Taci and
other KLA leaders who receive extra profit from
narcobusiness and the arms trade.
Four months after the bombardment of Yugoslavia, secret documents,
signed by the general secretary of NATO, Javier
Solana, were leaked. These documents analyze the manner in which the KLA
is financed and comment on its Mafia
connections and the routes by which arms reach Kosovo. All NATO members
were familiar with the contents of the
documents dated 10.02.1999[6]. However, this did not stop them from
launching the air-campaign against Yugoslavia
only 45 days later.
According to the precise, secret data in the document, the KLA received
arms and financial support from the Albanian
Diaspora and different criminal groups. Traffic in narcotics provides
the basic part of income. A significant role is played
by the Mafia from Croatia, consisting of Croats who left Kosovo from
1989 to 1990. It controls the drugs traffic in
Zagreb and gives economic support to the KLA. The routes along which
arms travel to Kosovo are the same ones used by
humanitarian organizations, and arms are hidden in the same trucks
carrying food and medicine. Besides some
internationally known humanitarian organizations, this is true of
Albanian humanitarian organizations such as "Help for
Kosovo" with central offices in Tirana. According to a further NATO
report the largest help to the KLA comes from
Europe, but also from North America and the Middle East. The arms routes
go through Bosnia, Italy, Croatia, Macedonia
and Montenegro. The countries from which the KLA has bought arms are:
Rumania, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Turkey, Cyprus,
China, Israel, Bosnia, Croatia, South Africa and Switzerland. The
center of economic operations is in Switzerland and the
money is transferred further via banks. Bosnia has become the center of
arms trade due to its special position . After the
war in Croatia and Bosnia a large quantity of arms has remained there,
while SFOR "... allows smugglers freedom of
movement...". In one part, the report suggests measures to be used to
prevent the arms trade, arms delivery and financial
support to the KLA, but in the same breath it continues: "these measures
should be taken if this is the result we require".
The Kosmet "gray zone" which is more and more in the state of collapse,
due to the lack of infrastructure, political
corruption, the international community's lack of success and the loss
of legitimacy and control over certain factions, has
become the resort of criminal syndicates and terrorist groups which are
the centers of local power and money acquired
through smuggling, the development of low and middle level narcobusiness
and other illegal activities[7]. At the same
time a part of the KLA incorporates in the Albanian narcomafia[8] from
the harbor of Valona to Drac, the old training
centers of the KLA in northern Albania in Kukes, in Tropoja to the
Adriatic with transit zones through Prokletije or via
the Skadar lake channel. At the local level, former KLA structures aim
to create an ethnically cleansed Kosmet with the
forms of government of the Sicilian, Albanian or Colombian type, where
the Mafia controls local and other policies
primarily through influencing local administration and the management
of large firms, and by infiltrating the local
police and the UN and KFOR structures, primarily by means of supplying
luxury goods, drugs and prostitution[9].
More than 10,000 prostitutes are thought to be working in Kosmet,
recruited from Kosmet, Albania, Macedonia,
Bulgaria and the interior of Serbia and Montenegro with a calculated
profit of 600 to 700 million marks a year[10].
Counterfeit money and documents originating from Kosmet are also
expected to appear. It is clear that this is a highly
criminalized corner of southeast Europe, the potential victims of which
could also be the KFOR mission and the total
UN presence in Kosmet. The power of money can be used to bribe
influential individuals from the UN, OSCE, EU and
NATO administration.
According to the statements of OSCE mission co-workers in Kosovo, the
takeover of one of the largest energy
complexes, OBILIC, by the Kosmet Albanians the Thaci clan has secured
another source of riches. At this moment the
power station produces at least 700mWATTs of electrical energy, but only
150mWATTs reach the consumers. This
means that the rest of the energy is illegally exported to Macedonia,
Albania and possibly to Serbia, and the income thus
gained ends up in the pockets of the Thaci family. According to the UN
experts, this source of income is second in
importance after drugs trafficking but the present administration cannot
halt it due to an apparent lack of evidence. In the
UN and OSCE mission some believe that the UN mission chief Bernard
Koucner takes his cut of this profit, via Thaci.
Such rumors were be heard in Kosmet particularly after the release of
Thaci's brother who had been arrested at the
beginning of January this year because of illegal possession of arms and
released only a couple of hours later, following
the personal intervention of Kouchner[11].
Thus the Thaci clan and their associates can expand their influence on
political developments, the organization of local
government and the police, the distribution of humanitarian aid and the
expansion of crime while, at the same time,
carrying out terrorist acts against the non-Albanian population, thus
forcing them to flee the province. There are
additional indications that the KLA is preparing for the physical
liquidation of persons on the KLA lists[12]. Those
targeted would be politicians, journalists, members of the Yugoslav Army
and Police force, undesirable for the KLA but
also for the "underground diplomacy" of Albania and some countries of
the KFOR mission. Taci's intention seems to be to
launch terrorism within Serbia proper, everywhere where Albanians live,
primarily in Bujanovac, Presevo and Medvedja
where Albanians constitute a significant presence[13]. The resistance of
the Albanian village militias is also to be
expected, since they are against KLA plundering and enforcement of their
will in ethnically pure Albanian environments.
In this context the possibility of activating a part of the KLA in
Macedonia should not be excluded, and this would be
within "Brigade KLA 121"[14].
However, the Albanian "civil option" in Kosmet and other ordinary
citizens have reacted against the Thaci clan on a
number of occasions, some of them even say that "it was better at the
time of Serbs"[15], but those political players have
no room for maneuver at present. They are awaiting another phase with a
clearer form of KLA transformation and
probably a more stable picture of political actors in Belgrade who have
to understand that the solution exists only from
inside, and not outside, and that it is high time speeches about
Kosmet's and country's fate were delivered inside the
Serbian territory rather than in neighboring countries or luxurious
offices and hotels in abroad.
Nick Arvanites,
May, 2000.
© Saba c OnLine
[1] Raport mbi shkeljen e të drejtave e të lirive të njeriut në Kosovë
gjatë vitit 1999: DHUNA E TERRORI I
INSTITUCIONALIZUAR SERB MORI DIMENSIONIN E HAPUR SHFAROSËS GJENOCIDAL TË
SHQIPTARËVE
[2] Joska Fiser, Kosovo: Izazovi i Sanse, autorski tekst za BLIC,
24/3/2000- Ambassador Alexander Vershbow , European Security Post-Kosovo
,
Oxford's Konigswinter Conference 23/3/2000.
[3] Crucified Kosovo, Destroyed and Desecrated Serbian Orthodox Churches
in Kosovo and Metohia (June-October 1999), Media and Publishing
Center of Raska and Prizren Orthodox Eparchy- Zoran Andjelkovic, Days of
Terror,Center for Peace and Tolerance, Belgrade 2000-Teroristicki
Akti Albanskih Teroristickih Grupa na Kosovu i Metohiji, Dokumenta i
Dokazi 1/1/1998-10/6/1999, III&IV, SMIP, Beograd, Mart 2000- Sefko
Alomerovic, Postoje li Logori na Kosovu?, AIM, 31/3/2000- Gordana
Janicijevic, Otimaju Bebe, Zene, Starce, DUGA, No 1736Natasa Kandic, The
Lesson of Orahovac: The International Administration in KosovoEncourages
Violence Against Serbs, HLC Belgrade- Human Rights Watch, FRY:
Abuses Against Serbs and Roma in the New Kosovo, August 1999, Vol. 11,
No 10 (D)
[4] 18/1/2000
[5] N.D.A. Arvanites, Geopolitika i Balkan: Organizovani Kriminal i Novi
Svetski Poredak na Kosovu, BACL, Beograd 2000, p. 41-44
[6] IMS Assesment of UCK Arms Trafficking from Secretary General to
Permanent Representatives (Council) & Head of Mission of the Three
Invited Countries, SG (99) 0170, 10 February 1999- RIZOSPASTIS, 22
August 1999- STRATFOR Special Report, Kosovo: One Year Later,
3/3/2000- DUGA, Tajno Pismo Clanicama o Ilegalnom Naoruzavanju OVK,
No1721- N.D.A. Arvanites, Geopolitika i Balkan: Organizovani Kriminal
i Novi Svetski Poredak na Kosovu, BACL, Beograd 2000,p. 19-22, 29-32,
75-86
[7]Budimir Babovic, Iz Dosijea Interpola, Beograd 1991- Kosovo: Zona
bez Zakona, DANAS, 23/2/2000- Barry James, War Zone Turns to
Crime:Kosovo and Albania Are Cited for Lawlessness, International
Herald Tribune, 15/3/2000-Nikolaj Chavdarov, Kosovo Narco-Mafia Invading
Bulgaria, Sega, Sofia- Maggie O'Kane, Kosovo Drug Mafia Supply Heroin to
Europe, The Guardian, 13/3/2000- Imer Mushkolaj, KOSOVO DRUG
THREAT:Albanian drug dealers and traffickers are flourishing in post-war
Kosovo, IWPR'S BALKAN CRISIS REPORT, NO. 142, 23/5/2000
[8] Goran Draskovic, Osnovni Pravci Medjnarodnog Tranzita Opojnih Droga-
Ozivljavanje Balkanskog Puta in SPRECAVANJE ZLOUPOTREBE
DROGA, Srpsko Udruzenje Za Krivicno Pravo, 1999, p.123-131
[9] What Happened to the KLA?, International Crisis Group Reports,
3/3/2000
[10] Transfer Devojaka sa Istoka na Zapad, DANAS 18/2/2000- Mlade
Albanke Belo Roblje, GLAS, 18/3/2000- NATO Forces spur Kosovo
Prostitution Boom, AFP, 5/1/2000- Frances Kennedy, Albanians Redraw
Italy's Crime Map, The Independent, 20/2/2000-James Pringle, Sex Slave
Trade Thrives Among Kosovo Troops, The Times, 5/2/2000-Nightclub
shame,24/2/2000, TIMES- FEATURES- Imer Mushkolaj and Mentor
Shala, A Prostitutes Call: We Will Take Over Kosovo, IWPR, No 101,
10/12/1999
[11] Kosovo rebuilds among ruins of thewar that never ends, THE SUNDAY
TIMES, 19/5/2000- Kouchner and Reinhardt pronounce Thaci
untouchable, AFP, 22/1/2000- Vladimir Milovanovic, Kosovska Privreda:
Vlasnistvo Kusnera, VREME, 13/5/2000- on the field reports and
interviews in Kosovo
[12] Radivoje Petrovic, Likcidacije Medju Albanskim Teroristima,
POLITIKA, 11/5/2000- Granit Guri, Elimination of Former KLA Commanders:
"X
File", AIM , 18/5/ 2000
[13] Baton Haxhiu, Pse nuk mund te perseritet UCK-ja?: Pse dallojne
Kosova Lindore dhe Kosova. Ideja per t'i pershtaturPresheves, Bujanocit
dhe
Medvegjes variantin e Kosoves eshte aq errezikshme sa mund te kete
pasoja te renda per Kosoven dhe per politiken nderkombetare karshi ketij
problemi, Revista Klan, Nr 150- Fehim Rexhepi, Presevo, Boujanovac,
Medvedja:Moguca Tacka Sukoba?, AIM,5/2/2000- Vukasin Obradovic, Sta
se Zbiva na Jugu Srbije?, AIM, 4/3/2000- Milorad Pavlovic, Presevo i
Bujanovac ili Prica o Najavi Vrelog Proleca, DUGA, No 1737
[14]Slucaj Aracinovo: Stranskite paruznavaci predupreduvat na "proletno
scenario", START, No 53, 28/1/2000.D.A. Arvanites, Geopolitika i Balkan:
Organizovani Kriminal i Novi Svetski Poredak na Kosovu, BACL, Beograd
2000,p. 23-27, 33-36, 37-39, 45-46, 49-51
[15]Zijadin Gashi, Rugova Pridobija Birace Cuteci, Thaci obustavlja
Kritike, AIM, 30/1/2000- Lj. Staletovic, Zajednicki Zivot Uslov
Opstanka,
GLAS, 18/3/2000-Srpsko-Albanski Dijalog, Helsniski Odbor za Ljudska
Prava u Srbiji, I, Beograd 1997/ II, Beograd 1999
---
ARMI USA ALL'UCK
From: http://emperors-clothes.com/indexe.htm
U.S Arms 3,500 Albanian Terrorists
By the Yugoslav press agency, Tanjug
With extensive comments by Jared Israel (05/0500)
The following is based on an article from Tanjug (pronounced tanyug),
the
press service of the Yugoslav government. Given the admittedly partisan
source some might be inclined to poo-poo the charges made here, so I
added
some quotes from pro-NATO media. These and my own analysis suggest that,
if
anything, Tanjug understates its case, sparing us some of the more
unbelievable details.
TANJUG: The US administration recently secretly armed more than 3.500
Albanian extremists who are acting under the wing of the Kosovo
Protection
Corps (KPC). The US government has continually supplied Albanian
terrorists
in Kosovo-Metohija with arms since the arrival of the UN Peace Mission
in
the southern Serbian province, in spite of verbal public condemnations
of
terrorism, and unknown to its allies in KFOR.
Jared comments: In Why is the KLA shooting at KFOR? we noted that recent
fighting between the Kosovo Liberation Army and French troops in
northern
Kosovo (Mitrovica) was really a proxy war between the US and France.
Well,
during that fighting, French troops seized a KLA ambulance stuffed with,
we
kid you not, "14 anti-tank rocket launchers, more than 180
high-explosive
grenades, and more than 3,000 cartridges for guns, (Bergen County
Record,
2-16-00) and "including a US-made 'street sweeper' grenade launcher..."
(AFP, 2-15-00)
Got that? Pretty amazing?
Here's more amazing. Gen. Shelton, boss of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,
immediately held a press conference commenting on the ambulance. Why
would a
big-shot like him comment on an incident like that? But OK, did he at
least
denounce the KLA for violating the UN agreement under which NATO tries
to
justify its occupation of Kosovo? Did he chastise the KLA for planning
to
slaughter even more local people and now French troops as well? No sir,
he
talked about the difficulties of preventing arms smuggling from Serbia.
>From Serbia?
The ambulance was seized as it was being driven north towards not away
from
inner Serbia. And these were US-made weapons stashed inside, and this
was a
KLA ambulance.
So what was the point of Shelton's statement? I think the intention was
clear. By first taking the unheard of step of commenting on a minor
incident, and then pointing the finger at Yugoslavia instead of the KLA,
Shelton was affirming, at the highest level, that the US government
supported the KLA arms buildup. What reason do we have to doubt that the
US
also covertly supplies the KLA with weapons? The only question is: why
would
the US equip only 3500 terrorists? has the CIA gotten cheap?
Back to TANJUG: The Kosovo Protection Corps, officially formed Sept 20,
1999
as a civilian institution...is actually the so-called Kosovo Liberation
Army
(KLA)...an extreme grouping of Albanian separatists but repackaged in a
manner that NATO experts hope will be acceptable to the international
public, that is, in a manner that creates the illusion of respecting
Resolution 1244 of the UN Security Council.
Jared comments: The Kosovo Protection Corps is openly run by the same
thugs
who led the KLA. It's a name change. The KPC remains a racist, crazy,
terrorist-gangster organization. Just read the following mind boggling
account from the Albanian Daily News of 4-19-00. If I were editing the
Albanian Daily News, I would have called the story:
"THE RIGHT TO BEAR ROCKET LAUNCHERS.."
Forgive me but I peppered the Daily News text with comments, in
brackets.
Here's the story:
"United Nations police have detained a suspect in the murder of a
high-ranking officer of the Kosovo Protection Force (KPC), spokesman
Charlie
Johnson said Tuesday... They are also searching for another man
suspected of
involvement in the slaying in central Pristina Monday of Besim Mala, a
former commander of the separatist Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA)...gunned
down in broad daylight in a restaurant in what was thought to be a
property
dispute, Johnson said.
The suspect was detained several hours later. The killing was condemned
by
the commander of the KPC, General Agim Ceku who described it as an
attack on
the "freedom and future of Kosovo."
[Jared's note: Ceku is a former (?) KLA top leader, that is, war
criminal.
He has also been charged with war crimes for his role five years ago
helping
lead the slaughter and expulsion of over 200,000 Serbian residents of
the
Krajina section of what is now Croatias. It is clear from Ceku's remark
about the murder being "an attack on the 'freedom and future of
Kosovo.'"
that this killing resulted from a leadership fight within the KPC. These
guys conduct elections in the style of Al Capone: "Bang! Youse guys is
dead.
My guys is elected!"]
The KPC is a civil emergency organization formed out of the
demilitarized
KLA. [Jared's note: Demilitarized? This is nightmare-comedy. Read on...]
Johnson said UN police had also released a man held late Monday in
connection with another attack in central Prishtina just a few hundred
meters from the restaurant where Mala was shot. The man had been
detained by
KFOR peacekeeping troops at a vehicle checkpoint for having two rocket
warheads in his car shortly after unidentified attackers fired a
rocket-propelled grenade into a building in the city center. The blast
injured two ethnic Albanians but was thought to have been targeted at a
neighboring apartment occupied by Serbian journalists, Johnson said. He
[Johnson] said the explosive had apparently been fired from a rocket
launcher from a nearby rooftop. The firing tube was found some 200
meters
from the rooftop, Johnson said.
The detainee was released after explosives experts established the
rockets
he was carrying were of a different type to the one used in the attack.
[Jared's note: Is any comment necessary?]
Back to TANJUG: Since the arrival of KFOR in Kosovo-Metohija, members of
"Kosovo Protection Corps" have brutally liquidated more than 1.000
civilians.
Jared comments: KFOR, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International,
Kosovapress, and the Internatioanl Crisis Group, who are to different
degrees either NATO or pro-NATO, have each admitted the KLA/KPC killed
hundreds of people in Kosovo. There is no question that, in NATO's
interest,
these groups have understated the numbers murdered.
The Orthodox Church, the Pristina Center for Tolerance and the Yugoslav
government have documented hundreds more deaths. Aside from that, many
have
been kidnapped and may be dead. In any case, the most important point is
not
the exact number of murders - which probably exceed 1000 - but the
situation.
Over 300,000 people have been driven from Kosovo. This includes most
Serbs,
Slavic Muslims, about 150,000 non-KLA Albanians and tens of thousands of
Roma ("Gypsies"). They did not leave out of fear of NATO bombs and they
did
not leave in order to make a political statement, to make the KLA look
bad.
They left because of the following:
"Murder, torture and extortion: these are the extraordinary charges made
against the UN's own Kosovo Protection Corps in a confidential United
Nations report written for Secretary-General Kofi Annan.
The KPC stands accused in the document, drawn up on 29 February, of
'criminal activities - killings, ill-treatment/torture, illegal
policing,
abuse of authority, intimidation, breaches of political neutrality and
hate-speech'.
The 5,000-strong corps, funded by UN members including Britain, has a
£30
million aid budget for Kosovo. It was set up to provide 'disaster
response
services'; instead, says the UN, it has been murdering and torturing
people." (From London Observer, 3/12/00 quoted in How will you plead at
the
trial, Mr.Annan?)
In other words, the cause of the huge exodus is gangsterism and racist
terror. As you may recall, NATO said it was taking over Kosovo in order
to
produce racial harmony. So what is NATo's reaction to the destruction of
multietnic life in Kosovo, to the transformation of Kosovo into a
nightmare
of fascist gangsterism? Here is the answer from the outgoing NATO
Commander
in Kosovo, Gen. Wesley Clark:
"On Monday, he visited Kosovo and said there was an 'increasing sense of
security, the indicators of recovery from strong-arm ethnic cleansing
and
even some first budding signs of willingness to tolerate ethnic
differences
and cooperate among ethnic groups.'"
TANJUG: The Corps comprises 5.000 men and is under the direct command of
the
KFOR...in keeping with the policy of the UN Secretary-General's special
envoy... Bernard Kouchner of France.
The fact that US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright recently ordered
Hague Tribunal Chief Prosecutor, Carla Del Ponte, to strike leader
Hashim
Thaci (of the officially disbanded terrorist KLA) from the list of
persons
indicted for war crimes, is perhaps the best confirmation that Albanian
extremists are in fact favorites and protégés of the US administration.
Jared comments: Maybe the Thaci cover-up is the best evidence that the
murderous KLA racists are US administration proteges. But it's as we
have
seen, it is not the only evidence.
Let me close with a quote from an op ed article in the NY Times by
William
Clinton. It is inconceivable that when Clinton wrote this op ed piece
last
May he was unaware of the nature of the KLA, which US covert agencies
had
helped to create and for whom the US had been the key sponsor at least
since
the Verification Teams went to Kosovo in the Fall of 1998. He understood
the
nature of the monster the US had chosen as its proxy force; he knew the
KLA's dreams:
"He, like many KLA officers, says openly that he dreams of a Kosovo
without
Serbs." (Description of KLA death squad commander "The Teacher", Agence
France Presse, August 19, 1999, quoted in The roots of Kosovo fascism by
George Thompson.)
Knowing what the KLA was, knowing what NATO and therefore KLA domination
of
Kosovo would mean, Clinton wrote:
"Freedom, respect for minority rights, and prosperity are powerful
forces
for progress. They give people goals to work for; they elevate hope over
fear and tomorrow over yesterday." (Clinton, op-ed editorial, NY Times,
May
23, 1999)
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---
1995: TRAFFICI DI ARMI IN BULGARIA/FYROM
1997: FURTI DI ARMI IN ALBANIA
BTA - BULGARIAN TELEGRAPH AGENCY
BULLETIN OF NEWS FROM BULGARIA
JUNE 16, 1995
ARM DEALS
The case of the so-called "Albanian deal" will be
tried within a month, "Standart News" writes citing Military
Prosecutor Colonel Mityu Markov. The question is about a
consignment of the Bulgarian Defence Ministry that
consisted of 100 mine-throwers, 10, 000 mines and 250
sniper rifles totalling 670, 000 US dollars which disappeared
in Macedonia on its way to Albania. It is not clear how the
carrier Mario Stoichkov, who in on the Interpol wanted list,
can be made to appear in court, the paper writes. The same
paper writes that eleven days ago Ivan M., a military
intelligence officer who was in charge of was reported
missing foreign currency remittances at the department, was
reported missing.
http://www.albaniannews.com
Albanian Daily News
June 9, 2000
Over 500,000 Albanian Guns Unaccounted For
TIRANA - More than half a million guns looted during
Albania’s civil uprising in 1997 are still at large
despite the government’s efforts to retrieve them, the
Interior Ministry said on Thursday.
Minister Spartak Poci said one fifth - or 117,488 guns
- of the 650,000 plundered from army depots have been
collected over the past three years, as well as 84
million bullets from an arsenal of over 1.5 billion.
“A part of the stolen guns has left the country, but
we don’t know how much,” Poci told reporters. The bulk
is thought to have been trafficked to neighbouring
Kosovo to help ethnic Albanian Kosovo Liberation Army
guerrillas fight for independence from Belgrade in a
conflict that ended last year.
The 1997 Albanian uprising was sparked by the collapse
of corrupt pyramid investment schemes and lasted
several months. Angry mobs looted army barracks in an
effort to destroy everything related with the state.
Last month the police found in a village in the Lezha
district 19 air-to-air missiles, type P2. The missiles
were in working order and were returned to the nearby
Gjader military air base. Police said 20 missiles had
been stolen from the base in 1997. Only one has not
been found yet.
The government has recently been consistent in its
firm commitment to the disarmament process, but
despite two years of work, the number of weapons and
ammunition collected accounts for no more than 20
percent of those looted. The police has also seized 52
tonnes of TNT, only a small fraction of the explosives
looted.
The government decided earlier this year to create a
500 strong police force to deal specifically with the
disarmament process.
Disarmament campaign “Development instead of Weapons”
is being extended to several districts of Albania
following the success of the Gramsh pilot project. The
United Nations Development Programme, and other
international organisations sponsoring disarming
projects, have pledged to provide investments for the
restructuring of infrastructure and creation of jobs
in return of arms surrender.
---
KOSOVO E CECENIA
http://www.albaniannews.com
Albanian Daily News
June 6, 2000
Russian General Says Terrorism in Chechnya Has Roots
in Kosovo
MOSCOW - The terrorism which Russia is fighting in
Chechnya has some roots in Kosovo, the commander of
Russia’s airborne troops General Georgy Shpak claimed
in a newspaper report published Monday.
In an interview with the daily Vremya Novostei, the
officer discussed Russia’s role in the KFOR
international peacekeeping effort in Kosovo.
“The presence of the Russians is indispensable in this
hot spot of Europe, where we have political and
economic interests and our ancient traditions,” he
said.
“Apart from that, the terrorism against which we are
fighting in Chechnya has certain roots in Kosovo,”
Shpak added, without elaborating.
Terrorism is the official Moscow terminology for the
activities of Chechen separatist fighters.
General Valery Manilov, number two in the military
hierarchy, threatened last month to withdraw Russian
forces from KFOR if Yugoslavia’s integrity was
threatened. Some 3,600 Russian troops serve with KFOR,
which has a multinational total of 40,000 under NATO
leadership.
Russian and German soldiers with KFOR came under
anti-tank, machine gun and automatic fire last week in
the latest in a series of incidents. Russian soldiers
are frequent targets of Kosovar Albanians who believe
the Russians support the Serbian ruling power in
Belgrade.
---
BALKAN - ALBANIA - KOSOVO - HEROIN - JIHAD
The Centre for Peace in the Balkans
www.balkanpeace.org
scontact@...
Research Analysis
May 2000
The biggest paradox in the international war on drugs is connected to
the Balkans and the explosion of terrorist activities in that troubled
area. However, it relates less to drugs and arms and more to the major
participants in this deadly game.
Terrorist organizations at the top of America's most wanted list are
receiving tacit support in the Balkans from the Clinton administration.
The "most wanted" terrorist in the world today, Osama bin Laden, who
declared a "fatwa" against the US, is being abetted by the Clinton
doctrine. In the Balkans, we are witnessing a true paradox where several
mortal enemies - Iranian revolutionary guards, Osama bin Laden and the
CIA - are standing shoulder to shoulder while pursuing diametrically
opposite goals.
Drugs Finance Terrorism
Earlier reporting has confirmed that terrorism in the Balkans has been
primarily financed through narcotics trafficking. Heroin - worth 12
times its weight in gold - is by far the most profitable commodity on
the markets. A kilogram of heroin, worth $1,000 in Thailand, wholesales
for $110,000 in Canada with a street value of $800,000.
In fact, heroin trafficking has become so beneficial to the cause of
Albanian separatism that the predominantly Albanian-inhabited towns of
Veliki Trnovac and Blastica in Serbia, Vratnica and Gostivar in FYR
Macedonia, and Shkoder and Durres in Albania have become known as the
"new Medellins" of the Balkans. Via the Balkan Route, heroin travels
through Turkey, FYR Macedonia, Kosovo and Albania en route to western
European markets. The value of the heroin shipped is $400-billion (US) a
year. As early as 1996, the US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) detailed
the Balkan Route in its annual report. In 1998, the DEA stated that
Kosovo Albanians had become the second most important traffickers on the
Balkan Route.
These predominantly Albanian drug barons from Kosovo ship heroin
exclusively from Asia's Golden Crescent, an apparently inexhaustible
source. At one end of the crescent lies Afghanistan, which in 1999
surpassed Burma as the world's largest producer of opium poppies. From
there, the heroin base passes through Iran to Turkey, where it is
refined, and then placed into the hands of the Albanians who operate out
of the lawless towns bordering FYR Macedonia, Albania, and Serbia.
According to the US State Department, four to six tons of heroin move
through Turkey every month.
"Not very much is stopped", says one official. "We get just a fraction
of the total". Not surprisingly, the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) has
flourished along the route. Its dependence on the drug lords is
difficult to prove, but the evidence is impossible to overlook.
In 1998, German Federal Police froze two bank accounts belonging to the
"United Kosova" organization at a Dusseldorf bank after it was
discovered that several hundred thousand dollars had been deposited into
those accounts by a convicted Kosovo Albanian drug trafficker. According
to at least one published report, Bujar Bukoshi, Prime Minister of the
"Kosova" Government in Exile, also allegedly controlled the accounts.
In early 1999 an Italian court in Brindisi convicted an Albanian heroin
trafficker named Amarildo Vrioni, who admitted obtaining weapons for the
KLA from the Mafia in exchange for drugs.
Last February 23, Czech police arrested Princ Dobroshi, the head of an
Albanian Kosovo drug gang. While searching his apartment, they
discovered evidence that he had placed orders for light infantry weapons
and rocket systems. No one had questioned what a small-time dealer would
be doing with rockets. Only later did Czech police reveal he was
shipping them to the KLA. The Czechs extradited Dobroshi to Norway where
he had escaped from prison in 1997 while serving a 14-year sentence for
heroin trafficking.
It's therefore not surprising, say European law enforcement officials,
that the faction that ultimately seized power in Kosovo -- the KLA under
Hashim Thaci -- was the group that maintained the closest links to
traffickers.
In its report about the KLA and heroin smuggling, the Montreal Gazette
wrote: "...Michael Levine, a 25-year veteran of the DEA (US Drug
Enforcement Agency) who left in 1990, said he believes there is no
question that US intelligence knew about the KLA's drug ties. "They (the
CIA) protected them (the KLA) in every way they could. As long as the
CIA is protecting the KLA, you've got major drug pipelines protected
from any police investigation", said Levine, who teaches undercover
tactics and informer handling to US and Canadian police forces,
including the RCMP. "The evidence is irrefutable," he said, explaining
that his information comes from "sources inside the DEA".
The Albanian Medellin connection is particularly strong in Italy where
it is operating in conjunction with the "Sacra Corona Unita," or the
fourth mafia. The group controls the drug trade in the regions of
Brindisi, Lecce and Taranto.
The tentacles of the Albanian mafia stretch across Europe. According to
Interpol, Albanian-speaking drug dealers accounted for 14% of those
arrested for heroin smuggling in 1997. While the average trafficker was
apprehended with two grams of heroin, the Albanians had an average of
120 grams in their possession. Scandinavian countries claim that
Albanians control 80% of the heroin market there. Switzerland says 90%
of the drug trafficking in that country is connected to Albanians.
German law enforcement agencies claim that Albanians form the largest
group involved in heroin trafficking.
German Federal Police now say that Kosovo Albanians import 80 percent of
Europe's heroin. So dominant is the Kosovo Albanian presence in
trafficking that many European users refer to illicit drugs in general
as "Albanka", or Albanian lady.
Terrorism, Spies and Albanians
Osama bin Laden's activities in Albania are well known and documented.
The presence of his network in that country is so powerful that US
Defence Secretary William Cohen cancelled a scheduled visit last July
out of fear of being assassinated.
The Albanian national security organization SHIK confirmed that plans
exist to target US objects in Albania. SHIK is the offspring of the
notorious communist security apparatus the "Sigurimi." The former head
of the Sigurimi, Irakli Kocollari, is advisor to the current head of
SHIK, Fatos Klosi. In 1997 the CIA sent a team of experts to modernize
and reorganize SHIK. The other major patron of SHIK is the German
intelligence agency Bundensnachrichtendienst (BND) which opened one of
its largest stations in Tirana. A review of BND personnel is revealing.
While the terrorist Albanian organization Ushtria Clirimtare e Kosove -
UCK (KLA) was being formed, the BND was headed by Hansjorg Geiger whose
deputy was Rainer Kesselring, the son of the Luftwaffe general who
bombed Belgrade during the Second World War.
Mr. Kesselring was given the job of training KLA terrorists at a Turkish
base near Izmir where he was head of the BND station in 1978. French
sources confirmed that members of the German commando unit, Kommando
Spezialkrafte (KSK), participated in the KLA training program. Gen.
Klaus Neumann, the outgoing head of NATO's occupational forces in Kosovo
and Metohija, formed the German commando unit.
The relationship between the CIA and SHIK is one of master and servant.
At the CIA's "request" last year, Albania expelled three "humanitarian"
workers, two Syrians and an Iranian. Acting on another request, SHIK
arrested an Albanian national, Maksim Ciciku, for spying on the US
embassy. Ciciku was educated in Saudi Arabia. In Albania he worked for a
private security company which provided bodyguards for visiting Arabs.
He was accused of following embassy employees on behalf of Osama bin
Laden. Albania also expelled four Egyptians who were suspected of ties
to bin Laden. Two others were arrested and handed over to US agents,
along with a van full of documents and computer equipment, all of which
belonged to Osama bin Laden's organization.
At about the same time, Iran, through its embassy in Rome and it's
operative Mahmut Nuranija, began to organize an intelligence-gathering
sector in Albania. Their involvement in Albania was based on two levels:
economic-financial through the Albanian Arab Islamic Bank, and
humanitarian through organizations which have become standard covers for
subversive activities. At the beginning of 1998 Iran began the serious
consolidation of its most important European strongholds, Sarajevo and
Tirana. According to Yossef Bodansky, terrorism and unconventional
warfare analyst, Iran aided the KLA by providing military plans drawn up
by Zaim Bersa, a former colonel in the Yugoslav National Army (JNA), and
another Kosovo Albanian, Ejup Dragaj.
One of the leaders of an elite KLA unit was Muhammed al-Zawahiri, the
brother of Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri, a leader in an Egyptian Jihad
organization and a military commander of Osama bin Laden. Once again
Kosovo becomes a paradox where several mortal enemies - Iranian
revolutionary guards, Osama bin Laden and the CIA - are standing
shoulder to shoulder training the KLA.
It is believed that bin Laden solidified his organization in Albania in
1994 with the help of then premier Sali Berisha. Albania's ties to
Islamic terrorist blossomed during Berisha's rule when the main KLA
training base was on Berisha's property in northern Albania. During the
"honeymoon" period between the CIA and Jihad holy warriors, Fatos Klosi,
the head of SHIK, said he had reliable information that four groups of
Jihad warriors from Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Algiers, Tunisia and Sudan were
in northern Albania and fighting with the KLA. Klosi recently stated
that there is an attempt to destabilize the country, alluding primarily
to former premier Sali Berisha.
Jihad and Serbia
In 1994 in Lebanon, a radical Sunni Muslim group, Takfir wal Hijra,
attempted to blow up a convoy of Serbian priests who were on their way
Koura. The priests avoided death when the suicide bomber detonated the
explosive device prematurely.
This attempt on the lives of Serbian priests preceded a more ambitious
plan. At the 18th Islamic conference, Al-Jama'ah al-Islaiyyah, held in
Pakistan (October 23-25, 1998), Albanian separatism in Kosovo and
Metohija was characterized as a Jihad. The same definition was given to
Muslim battles in India (Kashmir), Israel (Palestine) and Eritrea. By
defining armed battles as a "holy war" or Jihad, an obligation is placed
on the Muslim world to do everything in its power - economically,
politically and diplomatically - to aid the fight for freedom in
occupied Muslim territories". This gave legitimacy to terrorist acts
carried out by Allah's holy warriors. Referring to a Jihad, the
terrorist organization of Osama bin Laden announced terrorist attacks
against "infidel nations", namely Great Britain, United States, France,
Israel, Russia, India and Serbia.
The Bosnian Jihad Connection
In Bosnia-Herzegovina, the influence of the ruling Islamic party, Party
of Democratic Action (SDA), has brought out the recently born again
"true believers". Recognized by their long beards and short-legged
pants, large numbers of them participated in KLA terrorist activities in
Kosovo and Metohija. The transport of these Jihad warriors was conducted
under the patronage of the SDA which provided them with passports. Visas
were issued for a "haj," or pilgrimage, to Mecca. Dr. Nauman Balic, head
of the Kosovo SDA and now a minister in Hashim Thaci's government", was
responsible for their transit to Albania. The Bosnian Muslims were
provided with journalists' credentials and 2,000 DM for travel costs. It
is not known how many returned from Kosovo, but a number of these Jihad
warriors lost their lives in Chechnya.
The Sarajevo authorities were active in the training of terrorists. In
1993 Saudi Arabia provided $1 million to build a refugee camp for
Bosnian Muslims in Albania. One of the main political leaders of the
Muslim authorities in Sarajevo admitted to Misha Glenny that the base
was used to train saboteurs sent to Kosovo because their Serbian was
flawless.
Kosovo under NATO - A Virtual Narco-State (1)
The benefits of the drug trade are evident around Pristina -- more so
than the benefits of Western aid. "The new buildings, the better roads,
and the sophisticated weapons -- many of these have been bought with
drugs," says Michel Koutouzis, the Balkans region expert for the Global
Drugs Monitor (OGD), a Paris-based think tank. The repercussions of this
drug connection are only now emerging, and many Kosovo observers fear
that the province could be evolving into a virtual narco-state under the
noses of 49,000 peacekeeping troops.
It was the disparate structure of the KLA, Koutouzis says, that
Facilitated the drug-smuggling explosion. "It permitted a
democratization of drug trafficking where ordinary people get involved,
and everyone contributes a part of his profit to his clan leader in the
KLA," he explains. "The more illegal the activity, the more money the
clan gets from the traffickers. So it's in the interest of the clan to
promote drug trafficking".
According to Marko Nicovic, the former chief of police in Belgrade, now
an investigator who works closely with Interpol, the international
police agency, 400 to 500 Kosovo Albanians move shipments in the 20-kilo
range, while about 5,000 Kosovo Albanians are small-timers, handling
shipments of less than two kilos. At one point in 1996, he says, more
than 800 ethnic Albanians were in jail in Germany on narcotics charges.
In many places, Kosovo Albanians traffickers gained a foothold in the
Illicit drug trade through raw violence. According to a 1999 German
Federal Police report, "The ethnic Albanian gangs have been involved in
drugs, weapons trafficking blackmail, and murder. They are increasingly
prone to violence".
Tony White of the United Nations Drug Control Program agrees with this
assessment. "They are more willing to use violence than any other
group," he says. "They have confronted the established order throughout
Europe and pushed out the Lebanese, Pakistani, and Italian cartels".
Few gangs are willing to tangle with the Kosovo Albanians. Those that do
often pay the ultimate price. In January 1999, Kosovo Albanians killed
Nine people in Milan, Italy during a two-week bloodbath between rival
heroin groups.
Now free of the war and the Yugoslav police, drug traffickers have
Reopened the old Balkan Road. With the KLA in power -- and in the
spotlight - the top trafficking families have begun to seek relative
respectability without decreasing their heroin shipments. "The Kosovo
Albanians are trying to position themselves in the higher levels of
trafficking", says the U.N.'s Tony White. "They want to get away from
the violence of the streets and attract less attention. Criminals like
to move up like any other business, and the Kosovo Albanians are
becoming business leaders. They have become equal partners with the
Turks".
Italian national police discovered this new Kosovo Albanian outreach
last year when they undertook "Operation Pristina". The carabinieri
(Italian Police) uncovered a chain of connections that originated in
Kosovo and stretched through nine European countries, extending into
Central Asia, South America and the United States.
White House officials deny a whitewashing of KLA activities. "We do care
about (KLA drug trafficking)", says Agresti. "It's just that we've got
our hands full trying to bring peace there".
The DEA is equally reticent to address the issue. According to Michel
Koutouzis, the DEA's website once contained a section detailing Kosovo
Albanians trafficking, but a week before the US-led bombings began, the
section disappeared. "The DEA doesn't want to talk publicly (about the
KLA)", says OGD director Alain Labrousse. "It's embarrassing to them".
High-ranking US officials are dismayed that the KLA was installed in
power without public discussion or a thorough check of its background.
"I don't think we're doing anything there to stem the drugs", says a
senior State Department official. "It's out of control. It should be a
high priority. We've warned about it".
Even if it tried to stop the Kosovo Albanian heroin trade, the US would
be hard-pressed to do so. "Nobody's in control in Kosovo", adds the
State Department official. "They don't even have a police force".
Regardless of what it says, there's little indication that the
administration wants to do anything with the intelligence available
about its newest ally. "There is no doubt that the KLA is a major
trafficking organization", said a congressional expert who monitors the
drug trade and requested anonymity. "But we have a relationship with the
KLA, and the administration doesn't want to damage (its) reputation. We
are partners.
The attitude is: The drugs are not coming here, so let others deal with
it".
Conclusion
Indeed the biggest paradox in the world war on drugs is connected to the
Balkans and the outburst of terrorist activities in that troubled area.
What is the reason for this unusual co-relation between US policy in
Balkans, the most wanted terrorist in the world today, Osama bin y en,
and this enormous KLA drug trafficking.
As Michael Levine, a 25-year veteran of the DEA (US Drug Enforcement
Agency) stated: "They (the CIA) protected them the KLA) in every way
they could". McCoy, author of The Politics of Heroin, said the Afghan
Mujahideen rebels were one of the first US-backed rebel groups to get
into the heroin trade in a big way. The anti-Communist Mujahideen were
backed by the US in their opposition to the Soviet invasion of
Afghanistan in 1979. They started exporting massive amounts of opium to
raise money, with the knowledge and protection of the CIA and Pakistani
intelligence, according to McCoy. "That produced a massive traffic in
the '80s to Europe and the U.S.," he said.
Other recipients of US support were Nicaraguan Contras, Panama's General
Noriega, Afghan Taliban, Indonesia (remember massacres by their special
units in Timor), and Burma's Khun Sa. Another US-backed rebel army, the
Nicaraguan contras, raised money for their war against the leftist
Sandinista government in the 1980s by flooding U.S. cities with crack -
all with the knowledge and assistance of the CIA and the DEA, according
to the book Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras and the Crack Cocaine
Explosion, by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Gary Webb.
Webb's allegations were initially denied by the CIA, but a CIA
inspector-general's report in October 1998 revealed that 58 contras were
linked to drug allegations.
Early in 1999, as the war against Serbia raged, Congress voted to fund
the KLA's drive for independence. One tear later the US embrace of the
KLA may come as an embarrassment, but not a precedent.
Quo Vadis America?
1 - Material from "Mother Jones" Heroin Heroes, January/February 2000
used without permission, for academic and research purposes only.
The Centre for Peace in the Balkans
www.balkanpeace.org
---
SUI PIANI DI STANZIAMENTO PERMANENTE USA NELLA BASE DI CAMP BONDSTEEL
U.S. in Kosovo for the Long Haul
http://www.latimes.com/news/front/20000610/t000055108.html
Saturday, June 10, 2000
U.S. in Kosovo for the Long Haul
-
http;://www.serbia-info.com/news
"Le Figaro": American base was the aim of bombing of Yugoslavia
June 13, 2000
Paris, June 12th (Tanjug) - The official French government sticks to the
explanation they offered concerning their involvement in NATO aggression
on Yugoslavia, but they can no longer deceive neither their public nor
the media about the real cause of the criminal bombing of Yugoslavia. It
turned out that Paris and other Europeans "worked" for the benefit of
Washington interests, which is stressed in the latest edition of the
Paris weekly "Le Figaro".
"Allies of the United States start to wonder whether the formation of
American base in Kosmet was real purpose of the war" led, allegedly, on
behalf of the human rights of Kosmet Albanians, and which ended a year
ago. This is the statement by which the Paris weekly announced detailed
story about the American base "Bondsteel" in southern Kosovo.
"Le Figaro" published the information already known by Yugoslav public
and described "Bondsteel" as "large base" or even "military-industrial
complex" which resembled more "a town of 10 000 inhabitants than a
temporary camp provided by the UN Security Council Resolution 1244 a
year ago by which the bombing of Yugoslavia was ended".
The base, for which the weekly said "it was no secret, but was rather
discrete", spreads over the area of 300 hectares, where everything shows
that it was created "to stay for long".
In the base, the weekly said, there were 1600 lodgings, provided with
heating and air conditioners, 24 administration buildings "which were
already constructed and other which are under construction", "two
pharaoh dining rooms" open 24 hours, as well as the infrastructure
objects, including the projection room with 800 seats, football and
other sports fields.
"Everything proves that Americans came there to stay longer. They do not
even hide it, since the officers admit in cold blood that this base is
the most important one outside the US", "Le Figaro" says.
The Paris weekly stressed that the American base position in Kosmet was
"ideally chosen", since it is a "Muslim area where European sentiments
do not exist" and it is also the region where the conflict zones cross:
the Balkans, Mediterranean and the Middle East together with its oil.
"The Crusade for human rights of ethnic Albanians could, as its first
result i.e. its purpose, have (new) arrangement of Americans in the Old
continent", which is actually the creation of mighty "Bondsteel" base,
"Le Figaro" weekly concludes in this week's edition.
---
http://www.foreignaffairs.org/hedges.html/reader/reprints.html
Foreign Affairs May/Junel 1999 (volume 78, number 3)
Kosovo's Next Masters
By Chris Hedges
INSIDE THE KOSOVO LIBERATION ARMY
--------- COORDINAMENTO ROMANO PER LA JUGOSLAVIA -----------
RIMSKI SAVEZ ZA JUGOSLAVIJU
e-mail: crj@... - URL: http://marx2001.org/crj
http://www.egroups.com/group/crj-mailinglist/
------------------------------------------------------------
* Armi USA per l'UCK (Tanjug / Emperors Clothes)
* 1995-1997: "preistoria" delle forniture di armi all'UCK... (BTA,
Albanian Daily News)
* Il terrorismo ceceno ha radici in Kosovo? (Albanian Daily News)
* BALKAN - ALBANIA - KOSOVO - HEROIN - JIHAD (Center for Peace in the
Balkans)
* Sui piani di stanziamento permanente USA in Kosovo (LA Times, Le
Figaro, SerbiaInfo)
* Un articolo sull'UCK da Foreign Affairs (link)
---
TOWARDS A "NEW KOSOVO"
http://www.sabac.co.yu/e-zine/social_politics/txt/english/n_arvanites_towards_new_kosovo_062000.html
Text: Nick Arvanites , expert for geopolitics
© Sabac OnLine, June 2000.
It started with the "ethnic cleansing" of the Kosovo Albanians[1], but
one year after the entry of peacekeeping forces into
Kosovo, the tables have turned.
The KFOR peace force entered Kosovo on the 13th of June 1999 with the
aim of guaranteeing peace and security to all the
citizens of the Serbian southern province with the support of the UN
civil authority as well as a number of humanitarian
and non-government organizations[2]. Since then over 180,000 Serbs and
other non-Albanians have fled or have been
driven out of the province, 3,688 terrorist attacks have been
perpetrated, 739 people have been killed, 611 injured, 688
kidnapped and over 70 Serbian Orthodox churches and monasteries
destroyed or damaged. According to journalistic data
the majority of Kosovo's towns have been all but cleansed of Serbs.
About 2,500 Serbs have remained in Orahovac and Velika Hoca, while from
the village of Brecja near Kosovo Polje, across
Drenica and Metohija to the Albanian border not more than a few tens of
Serbs remain. Around a hundred Serbian families
have remained in Prizren, six old women have found shelter in the
Djakovica church, and two women in the Pec
Patriarchy. A larger number of Serbs, about 100,000 have remained in the
Kosovo basin, the Morava valley of Kosovo and
in Sririnik region of the Sar mountains.[3]
Obviously, the state of affairs in Kosovo after the arrival of
peacekeeping forces has been deteriorating constantly. Some
of the UN representatives also think that there are no positive trends
in this region. For example, the German paper,
BERLINER ZEITUNG, quotes an active UN representative in Kosmet, Tom
Kenings, who says that "the murders of
Serbs and Romas have not stopped there" and concludes that "the idea of
the creation of multiethnic Kosovo has dismally
failed".[4]
Some[5] believe that Kenings' statements contradict statements issuing
from NATO's military and political leadership,
that the Alliance is presently the only credible and effective force for
the containment of conflict anywhere in the world
especially when having in mind that, as a the result of the same NATO
policy, the Albanian authorities in the region are
caving in under the pressure from the criminal clans of Hasim Taci and
other KLA leaders who receive extra profit from
narcobusiness and the arms trade.
Four months after the bombardment of Yugoslavia, secret documents,
signed by the general secretary of NATO, Javier
Solana, were leaked. These documents analyze the manner in which the KLA
is financed and comment on its Mafia
connections and the routes by which arms reach Kosovo. All NATO members
were familiar with the contents of the
documents dated 10.02.1999[6]. However, this did not stop them from
launching the air-campaign against Yugoslavia
only 45 days later.
According to the precise, secret data in the document, the KLA received
arms and financial support from the Albanian
Diaspora and different criminal groups. Traffic in narcotics provides
the basic part of income. A significant role is played
by the Mafia from Croatia, consisting of Croats who left Kosovo from
1989 to 1990. It controls the drugs traffic in
Zagreb and gives economic support to the KLA. The routes along which
arms travel to Kosovo are the same ones used by
humanitarian organizations, and arms are hidden in the same trucks
carrying food and medicine. Besides some
internationally known humanitarian organizations, this is true of
Albanian humanitarian organizations such as "Help for
Kosovo" with central offices in Tirana. According to a further NATO
report the largest help to the KLA comes from
Europe, but also from North America and the Middle East. The arms routes
go through Bosnia, Italy, Croatia, Macedonia
and Montenegro. The countries from which the KLA has bought arms are:
Rumania, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Turkey, Cyprus,
China, Israel, Bosnia, Croatia, South Africa and Switzerland. The
center of economic operations is in Switzerland and the
money is transferred further via banks. Bosnia has become the center of
arms trade due to its special position . After the
war in Croatia and Bosnia a large quantity of arms has remained there,
while SFOR "... allows smugglers freedom of
movement...". In one part, the report suggests measures to be used to
prevent the arms trade, arms delivery and financial
support to the KLA, but in the same breath it continues: "these measures
should be taken if this is the result we require".
The Kosmet "gray zone" which is more and more in the state of collapse,
due to the lack of infrastructure, political
corruption, the international community's lack of success and the loss
of legitimacy and control over certain factions, has
become the resort of criminal syndicates and terrorist groups which are
the centers of local power and money acquired
through smuggling, the development of low and middle level narcobusiness
and other illegal activities[7]. At the same
time a part of the KLA incorporates in the Albanian narcomafia[8] from
the harbor of Valona to Drac, the old training
centers of the KLA in northern Albania in Kukes, in Tropoja to the
Adriatic with transit zones through Prokletije or via
the Skadar lake channel. At the local level, former KLA structures aim
to create an ethnically cleansed Kosmet with the
forms of government of the Sicilian, Albanian or Colombian type, where
the Mafia controls local and other policies
primarily through influencing local administration and the management
of large firms, and by infiltrating the local
police and the UN and KFOR structures, primarily by means of supplying
luxury goods, drugs and prostitution[9].
More than 10,000 prostitutes are thought to be working in Kosmet,
recruited from Kosmet, Albania, Macedonia,
Bulgaria and the interior of Serbia and Montenegro with a calculated
profit of 600 to 700 million marks a year[10].
Counterfeit money and documents originating from Kosmet are also
expected to appear. It is clear that this is a highly
criminalized corner of southeast Europe, the potential victims of which
could also be the KFOR mission and the total
UN presence in Kosmet. The power of money can be used to bribe
influential individuals from the UN, OSCE, EU and
NATO administration.
According to the statements of OSCE mission co-workers in Kosovo, the
takeover of one of the largest energy
complexes, OBILIC, by the Kosmet Albanians the Thaci clan has secured
another source of riches. At this moment the
power station produces at least 700mWATTs of electrical energy, but only
150mWATTs reach the consumers. This
means that the rest of the energy is illegally exported to Macedonia,
Albania and possibly to Serbia, and the income thus
gained ends up in the pockets of the Thaci family. According to the UN
experts, this source of income is second in
importance after drugs trafficking but the present administration cannot
halt it due to an apparent lack of evidence. In the
UN and OSCE mission some believe that the UN mission chief Bernard
Koucner takes his cut of this profit, via Thaci.
Such rumors were be heard in Kosmet particularly after the release of
Thaci's brother who had been arrested at the
beginning of January this year because of illegal possession of arms and
released only a couple of hours later, following
the personal intervention of Kouchner[11].
Thus the Thaci clan and their associates can expand their influence on
political developments, the organization of local
government and the police, the distribution of humanitarian aid and the
expansion of crime while, at the same time,
carrying out terrorist acts against the non-Albanian population, thus
forcing them to flee the province. There are
additional indications that the KLA is preparing for the physical
liquidation of persons on the KLA lists[12]. Those
targeted would be politicians, journalists, members of the Yugoslav Army
and Police force, undesirable for the KLA but
also for the "underground diplomacy" of Albania and some countries of
the KFOR mission. Taci's intention seems to be to
launch terrorism within Serbia proper, everywhere where Albanians live,
primarily in Bujanovac, Presevo and Medvedja
where Albanians constitute a significant presence[13]. The resistance of
the Albanian village militias is also to be
expected, since they are against KLA plundering and enforcement of their
will in ethnically pure Albanian environments.
In this context the possibility of activating a part of the KLA in
Macedonia should not be excluded, and this would be
within "Brigade KLA 121"[14].
However, the Albanian "civil option" in Kosmet and other ordinary
citizens have reacted against the Thaci clan on a
number of occasions, some of them even say that "it was better at the
time of Serbs"[15], but those political players have
no room for maneuver at present. They are awaiting another phase with a
clearer form of KLA transformation and
probably a more stable picture of political actors in Belgrade who have
to understand that the solution exists only from
inside, and not outside, and that it is high time speeches about
Kosmet's and country's fate were delivered inside the
Serbian territory rather than in neighboring countries or luxurious
offices and hotels in abroad.
Nick Arvanites,
May, 2000.
© Saba c OnLine
[1] Raport mbi shkeljen e të drejtave e të lirive të njeriut në Kosovë
gjatë vitit 1999: DHUNA E TERRORI I
INSTITUCIONALIZUAR SERB MORI DIMENSIONIN E HAPUR SHFAROSËS GJENOCIDAL TË
SHQIPTARËVE
[2] Joska Fiser, Kosovo: Izazovi i Sanse, autorski tekst za BLIC,
24/3/2000- Ambassador Alexander Vershbow , European Security Post-Kosovo
,
Oxford's Konigswinter Conference 23/3/2000.
[3] Crucified Kosovo, Destroyed and Desecrated Serbian Orthodox Churches
in Kosovo and Metohia (June-October 1999), Media and Publishing
Center of Raska and Prizren Orthodox Eparchy- Zoran Andjelkovic, Days of
Terror,Center for Peace and Tolerance, Belgrade 2000-Teroristicki
Akti Albanskih Teroristickih Grupa na Kosovu i Metohiji, Dokumenta i
Dokazi 1/1/1998-10/6/1999, III&IV, SMIP, Beograd, Mart 2000- Sefko
Alomerovic, Postoje li Logori na Kosovu?, AIM, 31/3/2000- Gordana
Janicijevic, Otimaju Bebe, Zene, Starce, DUGA, No 1736Natasa Kandic, The
Lesson of Orahovac: The International Administration in KosovoEncourages
Violence Against Serbs, HLC Belgrade- Human Rights Watch, FRY:
Abuses Against Serbs and Roma in the New Kosovo, August 1999, Vol. 11,
No 10 (D)
[4] 18/1/2000
[5] N.D.A. Arvanites, Geopolitika i Balkan: Organizovani Kriminal i Novi
Svetski Poredak na Kosovu, BACL, Beograd 2000, p. 41-44
[6] IMS Assesment of UCK Arms Trafficking from Secretary General to
Permanent Representatives (Council) & Head of Mission of the Three
Invited Countries, SG (99) 0170, 10 February 1999- RIZOSPASTIS, 22
August 1999- STRATFOR Special Report, Kosovo: One Year Later,
3/3/2000- DUGA, Tajno Pismo Clanicama o Ilegalnom Naoruzavanju OVK,
No1721- N.D.A. Arvanites, Geopolitika i Balkan: Organizovani Kriminal
i Novi Svetski Poredak na Kosovu, BACL, Beograd 2000,p. 19-22, 29-32,
75-86
[7]Budimir Babovic, Iz Dosijea Interpola, Beograd 1991- Kosovo: Zona
bez Zakona, DANAS, 23/2/2000- Barry James, War Zone Turns to
Crime:Kosovo and Albania Are Cited for Lawlessness, International
Herald Tribune, 15/3/2000-Nikolaj Chavdarov, Kosovo Narco-Mafia Invading
Bulgaria, Sega, Sofia- Maggie O'Kane, Kosovo Drug Mafia Supply Heroin to
Europe, The Guardian, 13/3/2000- Imer Mushkolaj, KOSOVO DRUG
THREAT:Albanian drug dealers and traffickers are flourishing in post-war
Kosovo, IWPR'S BALKAN CRISIS REPORT, NO. 142, 23/5/2000
[8] Goran Draskovic, Osnovni Pravci Medjnarodnog Tranzita Opojnih Droga-
Ozivljavanje Balkanskog Puta in SPRECAVANJE ZLOUPOTREBE
DROGA, Srpsko Udruzenje Za Krivicno Pravo, 1999, p.123-131
[9] What Happened to the KLA?, International Crisis Group Reports,
3/3/2000
[10] Transfer Devojaka sa Istoka na Zapad, DANAS 18/2/2000- Mlade
Albanke Belo Roblje, GLAS, 18/3/2000- NATO Forces spur Kosovo
Prostitution Boom, AFP, 5/1/2000- Frances Kennedy, Albanians Redraw
Italy's Crime Map, The Independent, 20/2/2000-James Pringle, Sex Slave
Trade Thrives Among Kosovo Troops, The Times, 5/2/2000-Nightclub
shame,24/2/2000, TIMES- FEATURES- Imer Mushkolaj and Mentor
Shala, A Prostitutes Call: We Will Take Over Kosovo, IWPR, No 101,
10/12/1999
[11] Kosovo rebuilds among ruins of thewar that never ends, THE SUNDAY
TIMES, 19/5/2000- Kouchner and Reinhardt pronounce Thaci
untouchable, AFP, 22/1/2000- Vladimir Milovanovic, Kosovska Privreda:
Vlasnistvo Kusnera, VREME, 13/5/2000- on the field reports and
interviews in Kosovo
[12] Radivoje Petrovic, Likcidacije Medju Albanskim Teroristima,
POLITIKA, 11/5/2000- Granit Guri, Elimination of Former KLA Commanders:
"X
File", AIM , 18/5/ 2000
[13] Baton Haxhiu, Pse nuk mund te perseritet UCK-ja?: Pse dallojne
Kosova Lindore dhe Kosova. Ideja per t'i pershtaturPresheves, Bujanocit
dhe
Medvegjes variantin e Kosoves eshte aq errezikshme sa mund te kete
pasoja te renda per Kosoven dhe per politiken nderkombetare karshi ketij
problemi, Revista Klan, Nr 150- Fehim Rexhepi, Presevo, Boujanovac,
Medvedja:Moguca Tacka Sukoba?, AIM,5/2/2000- Vukasin Obradovic, Sta
se Zbiva na Jugu Srbije?, AIM, 4/3/2000- Milorad Pavlovic, Presevo i
Bujanovac ili Prica o Najavi Vrelog Proleca, DUGA, No 1737
[14]Slucaj Aracinovo: Stranskite paruznavaci predupreduvat na "proletno
scenario", START, No 53, 28/1/2000.D.A. Arvanites, Geopolitika i Balkan:
Organizovani Kriminal i Novi Svetski Poredak na Kosovu, BACL, Beograd
2000,p. 23-27, 33-36, 37-39, 45-46, 49-51
[15]Zijadin Gashi, Rugova Pridobija Birace Cuteci, Thaci obustavlja
Kritike, AIM, 30/1/2000- Lj. Staletovic, Zajednicki Zivot Uslov
Opstanka,
GLAS, 18/3/2000-Srpsko-Albanski Dijalog, Helsniski Odbor za Ljudska
Prava u Srbiji, I, Beograd 1997/ II, Beograd 1999
---
ARMI USA ALL'UCK
From: http://emperors-clothes.com/indexe.htm
U.S Arms 3,500 Albanian Terrorists
By the Yugoslav press agency, Tanjug
With extensive comments by Jared Israel (05/0500)
The following is based on an article from Tanjug (pronounced tanyug),
the
press service of the Yugoslav government. Given the admittedly partisan
source some might be inclined to poo-poo the charges made here, so I
added
some quotes from pro-NATO media. These and my own analysis suggest that,
if
anything, Tanjug understates its case, sparing us some of the more
unbelievable details.
TANJUG: The US administration recently secretly armed more than 3.500
Albanian extremists who are acting under the wing of the Kosovo
Protection
Corps (KPC). The US government has continually supplied Albanian
terrorists
in Kosovo-Metohija with arms since the arrival of the UN Peace Mission
in
the southern Serbian province, in spite of verbal public condemnations
of
terrorism, and unknown to its allies in KFOR.
Jared comments: In Why is the KLA shooting at KFOR? we noted that recent
fighting between the Kosovo Liberation Army and French troops in
northern
Kosovo (Mitrovica) was really a proxy war between the US and France.
Well,
during that fighting, French troops seized a KLA ambulance stuffed with,
we
kid you not, "14 anti-tank rocket launchers, more than 180
high-explosive
grenades, and more than 3,000 cartridges for guns, (Bergen County
Record,
2-16-00) and "including a US-made 'street sweeper' grenade launcher..."
(AFP, 2-15-00)
Got that? Pretty amazing?
Here's more amazing. Gen. Shelton, boss of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,
immediately held a press conference commenting on the ambulance. Why
would a
big-shot like him comment on an incident like that? But OK, did he at
least
denounce the KLA for violating the UN agreement under which NATO tries
to
justify its occupation of Kosovo? Did he chastise the KLA for planning
to
slaughter even more local people and now French troops as well? No sir,
he
talked about the difficulties of preventing arms smuggling from Serbia.
>From Serbia?
The ambulance was seized as it was being driven north towards not away
from
inner Serbia. And these were US-made weapons stashed inside, and this
was a
KLA ambulance.
So what was the point of Shelton's statement? I think the intention was
clear. By first taking the unheard of step of commenting on a minor
incident, and then pointing the finger at Yugoslavia instead of the KLA,
Shelton was affirming, at the highest level, that the US government
supported the KLA arms buildup. What reason do we have to doubt that the
US
also covertly supplies the KLA with weapons? The only question is: why
would
the US equip only 3500 terrorists? has the CIA gotten cheap?
Back to TANJUG: The Kosovo Protection Corps, officially formed Sept 20,
1999
as a civilian institution...is actually the so-called Kosovo Liberation
Army
(KLA)...an extreme grouping of Albanian separatists but repackaged in a
manner that NATO experts hope will be acceptable to the international
public, that is, in a manner that creates the illusion of respecting
Resolution 1244 of the UN Security Council.
Jared comments: The Kosovo Protection Corps is openly run by the same
thugs
who led the KLA. It's a name change. The KPC remains a racist, crazy,
terrorist-gangster organization. Just read the following mind boggling
account from the Albanian Daily News of 4-19-00. If I were editing the
Albanian Daily News, I would have called the story:
"THE RIGHT TO BEAR ROCKET LAUNCHERS.."
Forgive me but I peppered the Daily News text with comments, in
brackets.
Here's the story:
"United Nations police have detained a suspect in the murder of a
high-ranking officer of the Kosovo Protection Force (KPC), spokesman
Charlie
Johnson said Tuesday... They are also searching for another man
suspected of
involvement in the slaying in central Pristina Monday of Besim Mala, a
former commander of the separatist Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA)...gunned
down in broad daylight in a restaurant in what was thought to be a
property
dispute, Johnson said.
The suspect was detained several hours later. The killing was condemned
by
the commander of the KPC, General Agim Ceku who described it as an
attack on
the "freedom and future of Kosovo."
[Jared's note: Ceku is a former (?) KLA top leader, that is, war
criminal.
He has also been charged with war crimes for his role five years ago
helping
lead the slaughter and expulsion of over 200,000 Serbian residents of
the
Krajina section of what is now Croatias. It is clear from Ceku's remark
about the murder being "an attack on the 'freedom and future of
Kosovo.'"
that this killing resulted from a leadership fight within the KPC. These
guys conduct elections in the style of Al Capone: "Bang! Youse guys is
dead.
My guys is elected!"]
The KPC is a civil emergency organization formed out of the
demilitarized
KLA. [Jared's note: Demilitarized? This is nightmare-comedy. Read on...]
Johnson said UN police had also released a man held late Monday in
connection with another attack in central Prishtina just a few hundred
meters from the restaurant where Mala was shot. The man had been
detained by
KFOR peacekeeping troops at a vehicle checkpoint for having two rocket
warheads in his car shortly after unidentified attackers fired a
rocket-propelled grenade into a building in the city center. The blast
injured two ethnic Albanians but was thought to have been targeted at a
neighboring apartment occupied by Serbian journalists, Johnson said. He
[Johnson] said the explosive had apparently been fired from a rocket
launcher from a nearby rooftop. The firing tube was found some 200
meters
from the rooftop, Johnson said.
The detainee was released after explosives experts established the
rockets
he was carrying were of a different type to the one used in the attack.
[Jared's note: Is any comment necessary?]
Back to TANJUG: Since the arrival of KFOR in Kosovo-Metohija, members of
"Kosovo Protection Corps" have brutally liquidated more than 1.000
civilians.
Jared comments: KFOR, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International,
Kosovapress, and the Internatioanl Crisis Group, who are to different
degrees either NATO or pro-NATO, have each admitted the KLA/KPC killed
hundreds of people in Kosovo. There is no question that, in NATO's
interest,
these groups have understated the numbers murdered.
The Orthodox Church, the Pristina Center for Tolerance and the Yugoslav
government have documented hundreds more deaths. Aside from that, many
have
been kidnapped and may be dead. In any case, the most important point is
not
the exact number of murders - which probably exceed 1000 - but the
situation.
Over 300,000 people have been driven from Kosovo. This includes most
Serbs,
Slavic Muslims, about 150,000 non-KLA Albanians and tens of thousands of
Roma ("Gypsies"). They did not leave out of fear of NATO bombs and they
did
not leave in order to make a political statement, to make the KLA look
bad.
They left because of the following:
"Murder, torture and extortion: these are the extraordinary charges made
against the UN's own Kosovo Protection Corps in a confidential United
Nations report written for Secretary-General Kofi Annan.
The KPC stands accused in the document, drawn up on 29 February, of
'criminal activities - killings, ill-treatment/torture, illegal
policing,
abuse of authority, intimidation, breaches of political neutrality and
hate-speech'.
The 5,000-strong corps, funded by UN members including Britain, has a
£30
million aid budget for Kosovo. It was set up to provide 'disaster
response
services'; instead, says the UN, it has been murdering and torturing
people." (From London Observer, 3/12/00 quoted in How will you plead at
the
trial, Mr.Annan?)
In other words, the cause of the huge exodus is gangsterism and racist
terror. As you may recall, NATO said it was taking over Kosovo in order
to
produce racial harmony. So what is NATo's reaction to the destruction of
multietnic life in Kosovo, to the transformation of Kosovo into a
nightmare
of fascist gangsterism? Here is the answer from the outgoing NATO
Commander
in Kosovo, Gen. Wesley Clark:
"On Monday, he visited Kosovo and said there was an 'increasing sense of
security, the indicators of recovery from strong-arm ethnic cleansing
and
even some first budding signs of willingness to tolerate ethnic
differences
and cooperate among ethnic groups.'"
TANJUG: The Corps comprises 5.000 men and is under the direct command of
the
KFOR...in keeping with the policy of the UN Secretary-General's special
envoy... Bernard Kouchner of France.
The fact that US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright recently ordered
Hague Tribunal Chief Prosecutor, Carla Del Ponte, to strike leader
Hashim
Thaci (of the officially disbanded terrorist KLA) from the list of
persons
indicted for war crimes, is perhaps the best confirmation that Albanian
extremists are in fact favorites and protégés of the US administration.
Jared comments: Maybe the Thaci cover-up is the best evidence that the
murderous KLA racists are US administration proteges. But it's as we
have
seen, it is not the only evidence.
Let me close with a quote from an op ed article in the NY Times by
William
Clinton. It is inconceivable that when Clinton wrote this op ed piece
last
May he was unaware of the nature of the KLA, which US covert agencies
had
helped to create and for whom the US had been the key sponsor at least
since
the Verification Teams went to Kosovo in the Fall of 1998. He understood
the
nature of the monster the US had chosen as its proxy force; he knew the
KLA's dreams:
"He, like many KLA officers, says openly that he dreams of a Kosovo
without
Serbs." (Description of KLA death squad commander "The Teacher", Agence
France Presse, August 19, 1999, quoted in The roots of Kosovo fascism by
George Thompson.)
Knowing what the KLA was, knowing what NATO and therefore KLA domination
of
Kosovo would mean, Clinton wrote:
"Freedom, respect for minority rights, and prosperity are powerful
forces
for progress. They give people goals to work for; they elevate hope over
fear and tomorrow over yesterday." (Clinton, op-ed editorial, NY Times,
May
23, 1999)
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---
1995: TRAFFICI DI ARMI IN BULGARIA/FYROM
1997: FURTI DI ARMI IN ALBANIA
BTA - BULGARIAN TELEGRAPH AGENCY
BULLETIN OF NEWS FROM BULGARIA
JUNE 16, 1995
ARM DEALS
The case of the so-called "Albanian deal" will be
tried within a month, "Standart News" writes citing Military
Prosecutor Colonel Mityu Markov. The question is about a
consignment of the Bulgarian Defence Ministry that
consisted of 100 mine-throwers, 10, 000 mines and 250
sniper rifles totalling 670, 000 US dollars which disappeared
in Macedonia on its way to Albania. It is not clear how the
carrier Mario Stoichkov, who in on the Interpol wanted list,
can be made to appear in court, the paper writes. The same
paper writes that eleven days ago Ivan M., a military
intelligence officer who was in charge of was reported
missing foreign currency remittances at the department, was
reported missing.
http://www.albaniannews.com
Albanian Daily News
June 9, 2000
Over 500,000 Albanian Guns Unaccounted For
TIRANA - More than half a million guns looted during
Albania’s civil uprising in 1997 are still at large
despite the government’s efforts to retrieve them, the
Interior Ministry said on Thursday.
Minister Spartak Poci said one fifth - or 117,488 guns
- of the 650,000 plundered from army depots have been
collected over the past three years, as well as 84
million bullets from an arsenal of over 1.5 billion.
“A part of the stolen guns has left the country, but
we don’t know how much,” Poci told reporters. The bulk
is thought to have been trafficked to neighbouring
Kosovo to help ethnic Albanian Kosovo Liberation Army
guerrillas fight for independence from Belgrade in a
conflict that ended last year.
The 1997 Albanian uprising was sparked by the collapse
of corrupt pyramid investment schemes and lasted
several months. Angry mobs looted army barracks in an
effort to destroy everything related with the state.
Last month the police found in a village in the Lezha
district 19 air-to-air missiles, type P2. The missiles
were in working order and were returned to the nearby
Gjader military air base. Police said 20 missiles had
been stolen from the base in 1997. Only one has not
been found yet.
The government has recently been consistent in its
firm commitment to the disarmament process, but
despite two years of work, the number of weapons and
ammunition collected accounts for no more than 20
percent of those looted. The police has also seized 52
tonnes of TNT, only a small fraction of the explosives
looted.
The government decided earlier this year to create a
500 strong police force to deal specifically with the
disarmament process.
Disarmament campaign “Development instead of Weapons”
is being extended to several districts of Albania
following the success of the Gramsh pilot project. The
United Nations Development Programme, and other
international organisations sponsoring disarming
projects, have pledged to provide investments for the
restructuring of infrastructure and creation of jobs
in return of arms surrender.
---
KOSOVO E CECENIA
http://www.albaniannews.com
Albanian Daily News
June 6, 2000
Russian General Says Terrorism in Chechnya Has Roots
in Kosovo
MOSCOW - The terrorism which Russia is fighting in
Chechnya has some roots in Kosovo, the commander of
Russia’s airborne troops General Georgy Shpak claimed
in a newspaper report published Monday.
In an interview with the daily Vremya Novostei, the
officer discussed Russia’s role in the KFOR
international peacekeeping effort in Kosovo.
“The presence of the Russians is indispensable in this
hot spot of Europe, where we have political and
economic interests and our ancient traditions,” he
said.
“Apart from that, the terrorism against which we are
fighting in Chechnya has certain roots in Kosovo,”
Shpak added, without elaborating.
Terrorism is the official Moscow terminology for the
activities of Chechen separatist fighters.
General Valery Manilov, number two in the military
hierarchy, threatened last month to withdraw Russian
forces from KFOR if Yugoslavia’s integrity was
threatened. Some 3,600 Russian troops serve with KFOR,
which has a multinational total of 40,000 under NATO
leadership.
Russian and German soldiers with KFOR came under
anti-tank, machine gun and automatic fire last week in
the latest in a series of incidents. Russian soldiers
are frequent targets of Kosovar Albanians who believe
the Russians support the Serbian ruling power in
Belgrade.
---
BALKAN - ALBANIA - KOSOVO - HEROIN - JIHAD
The Centre for Peace in the Balkans
www.balkanpeace.org
scontact@...
Research Analysis
May 2000
The biggest paradox in the international war on drugs is connected to
the Balkans and the explosion of terrorist activities in that troubled
area. However, it relates less to drugs and arms and more to the major
participants in this deadly game.
Terrorist organizations at the top of America's most wanted list are
receiving tacit support in the Balkans from the Clinton administration.
The "most wanted" terrorist in the world today, Osama bin Laden, who
declared a "fatwa" against the US, is being abetted by the Clinton
doctrine. In the Balkans, we are witnessing a true paradox where several
mortal enemies - Iranian revolutionary guards, Osama bin Laden and the
CIA - are standing shoulder to shoulder while pursuing diametrically
opposite goals.
Drugs Finance Terrorism
Earlier reporting has confirmed that terrorism in the Balkans has been
primarily financed through narcotics trafficking. Heroin - worth 12
times its weight in gold - is by far the most profitable commodity on
the markets. A kilogram of heroin, worth $1,000 in Thailand, wholesales
for $110,000 in Canada with a street value of $800,000.
In fact, heroin trafficking has become so beneficial to the cause of
Albanian separatism that the predominantly Albanian-inhabited towns of
Veliki Trnovac and Blastica in Serbia, Vratnica and Gostivar in FYR
Macedonia, and Shkoder and Durres in Albania have become known as the
"new Medellins" of the Balkans. Via the Balkan Route, heroin travels
through Turkey, FYR Macedonia, Kosovo and Albania en route to western
European markets. The value of the heroin shipped is $400-billion (US) a
year. As early as 1996, the US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) detailed
the Balkan Route in its annual report. In 1998, the DEA stated that
Kosovo Albanians had become the second most important traffickers on the
Balkan Route.
These predominantly Albanian drug barons from Kosovo ship heroin
exclusively from Asia's Golden Crescent, an apparently inexhaustible
source. At one end of the crescent lies Afghanistan, which in 1999
surpassed Burma as the world's largest producer of opium poppies. From
there, the heroin base passes through Iran to Turkey, where it is
refined, and then placed into the hands of the Albanians who operate out
of the lawless towns bordering FYR Macedonia, Albania, and Serbia.
According to the US State Department, four to six tons of heroin move
through Turkey every month.
"Not very much is stopped", says one official. "We get just a fraction
of the total". Not surprisingly, the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) has
flourished along the route. Its dependence on the drug lords is
difficult to prove, but the evidence is impossible to overlook.
In 1998, German Federal Police froze two bank accounts belonging to the
"United Kosova" organization at a Dusseldorf bank after it was
discovered that several hundred thousand dollars had been deposited into
those accounts by a convicted Kosovo Albanian drug trafficker. According
to at least one published report, Bujar Bukoshi, Prime Minister of the
"Kosova" Government in Exile, also allegedly controlled the accounts.
In early 1999 an Italian court in Brindisi convicted an Albanian heroin
trafficker named Amarildo Vrioni, who admitted obtaining weapons for the
KLA from the Mafia in exchange for drugs.
Last February 23, Czech police arrested Princ Dobroshi, the head of an
Albanian Kosovo drug gang. While searching his apartment, they
discovered evidence that he had placed orders for light infantry weapons
and rocket systems. No one had questioned what a small-time dealer would
be doing with rockets. Only later did Czech police reveal he was
shipping them to the KLA. The Czechs extradited Dobroshi to Norway where
he had escaped from prison in 1997 while serving a 14-year sentence for
heroin trafficking.
It's therefore not surprising, say European law enforcement officials,
that the faction that ultimately seized power in Kosovo -- the KLA under
Hashim Thaci -- was the group that maintained the closest links to
traffickers.
In its report about the KLA and heroin smuggling, the Montreal Gazette
wrote: "...Michael Levine, a 25-year veteran of the DEA (US Drug
Enforcement Agency) who left in 1990, said he believes there is no
question that US intelligence knew about the KLA's drug ties. "They (the
CIA) protected them (the KLA) in every way they could. As long as the
CIA is protecting the KLA, you've got major drug pipelines protected
from any police investigation", said Levine, who teaches undercover
tactics and informer handling to US and Canadian police forces,
including the RCMP. "The evidence is irrefutable," he said, explaining
that his information comes from "sources inside the DEA".
The Albanian Medellin connection is particularly strong in Italy where
it is operating in conjunction with the "Sacra Corona Unita," or the
fourth mafia. The group controls the drug trade in the regions of
Brindisi, Lecce and Taranto.
The tentacles of the Albanian mafia stretch across Europe. According to
Interpol, Albanian-speaking drug dealers accounted for 14% of those
arrested for heroin smuggling in 1997. While the average trafficker was
apprehended with two grams of heroin, the Albanians had an average of
120 grams in their possession. Scandinavian countries claim that
Albanians control 80% of the heroin market there. Switzerland says 90%
of the drug trafficking in that country is connected to Albanians.
German law enforcement agencies claim that Albanians form the largest
group involved in heroin trafficking.
German Federal Police now say that Kosovo Albanians import 80 percent of
Europe's heroin. So dominant is the Kosovo Albanian presence in
trafficking that many European users refer to illicit drugs in general
as "Albanka", or Albanian lady.
Terrorism, Spies and Albanians
Osama bin Laden's activities in Albania are well known and documented.
The presence of his network in that country is so powerful that US
Defence Secretary William Cohen cancelled a scheduled visit last July
out of fear of being assassinated.
The Albanian national security organization SHIK confirmed that plans
exist to target US objects in Albania. SHIK is the offspring of the
notorious communist security apparatus the "Sigurimi." The former head
of the Sigurimi, Irakli Kocollari, is advisor to the current head of
SHIK, Fatos Klosi. In 1997 the CIA sent a team of experts to modernize
and reorganize SHIK. The other major patron of SHIK is the German
intelligence agency Bundensnachrichtendienst (BND) which opened one of
its largest stations in Tirana. A review of BND personnel is revealing.
While the terrorist Albanian organization Ushtria Clirimtare e Kosove -
UCK (KLA) was being formed, the BND was headed by Hansjorg Geiger whose
deputy was Rainer Kesselring, the son of the Luftwaffe general who
bombed Belgrade during the Second World War.
Mr. Kesselring was given the job of training KLA terrorists at a Turkish
base near Izmir where he was head of the BND station in 1978. French
sources confirmed that members of the German commando unit, Kommando
Spezialkrafte (KSK), participated in the KLA training program. Gen.
Klaus Neumann, the outgoing head of NATO's occupational forces in Kosovo
and Metohija, formed the German commando unit.
The relationship between the CIA and SHIK is one of master and servant.
At the CIA's "request" last year, Albania expelled three "humanitarian"
workers, two Syrians and an Iranian. Acting on another request, SHIK
arrested an Albanian national, Maksim Ciciku, for spying on the US
embassy. Ciciku was educated in Saudi Arabia. In Albania he worked for a
private security company which provided bodyguards for visiting Arabs.
He was accused of following embassy employees on behalf of Osama bin
Laden. Albania also expelled four Egyptians who were suspected of ties
to bin Laden. Two others were arrested and handed over to US agents,
along with a van full of documents and computer equipment, all of which
belonged to Osama bin Laden's organization.
At about the same time, Iran, through its embassy in Rome and it's
operative Mahmut Nuranija, began to organize an intelligence-gathering
sector in Albania. Their involvement in Albania was based on two levels:
economic-financial through the Albanian Arab Islamic Bank, and
humanitarian through organizations which have become standard covers for
subversive activities. At the beginning of 1998 Iran began the serious
consolidation of its most important European strongholds, Sarajevo and
Tirana. According to Yossef Bodansky, terrorism and unconventional
warfare analyst, Iran aided the KLA by providing military plans drawn up
by Zaim Bersa, a former colonel in the Yugoslav National Army (JNA), and
another Kosovo Albanian, Ejup Dragaj.
One of the leaders of an elite KLA unit was Muhammed al-Zawahiri, the
brother of Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri, a leader in an Egyptian Jihad
organization and a military commander of Osama bin Laden. Once again
Kosovo becomes a paradox where several mortal enemies - Iranian
revolutionary guards, Osama bin Laden and the CIA - are standing
shoulder to shoulder training the KLA.
It is believed that bin Laden solidified his organization in Albania in
1994 with the help of then premier Sali Berisha. Albania's ties to
Islamic terrorist blossomed during Berisha's rule when the main KLA
training base was on Berisha's property in northern Albania. During the
"honeymoon" period between the CIA and Jihad holy warriors, Fatos Klosi,
the head of SHIK, said he had reliable information that four groups of
Jihad warriors from Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Algiers, Tunisia and Sudan were
in northern Albania and fighting with the KLA. Klosi recently stated
that there is an attempt to destabilize the country, alluding primarily
to former premier Sali Berisha.
Jihad and Serbia
In 1994 in Lebanon, a radical Sunni Muslim group, Takfir wal Hijra,
attempted to blow up a convoy of Serbian priests who were on their way
Koura. The priests avoided death when the suicide bomber detonated the
explosive device prematurely.
This attempt on the lives of Serbian priests preceded a more ambitious
plan. At the 18th Islamic conference, Al-Jama'ah al-Islaiyyah, held in
Pakistan (October 23-25, 1998), Albanian separatism in Kosovo and
Metohija was characterized as a Jihad. The same definition was given to
Muslim battles in India (Kashmir), Israel (Palestine) and Eritrea. By
defining armed battles as a "holy war" or Jihad, an obligation is placed
on the Muslim world to do everything in its power - economically,
politically and diplomatically - to aid the fight for freedom in
occupied Muslim territories". This gave legitimacy to terrorist acts
carried out by Allah's holy warriors. Referring to a Jihad, the
terrorist organization of Osama bin Laden announced terrorist attacks
against "infidel nations", namely Great Britain, United States, France,
Israel, Russia, India and Serbia.
The Bosnian Jihad Connection
In Bosnia-Herzegovina, the influence of the ruling Islamic party, Party
of Democratic Action (SDA), has brought out the recently born again
"true believers". Recognized by their long beards and short-legged
pants, large numbers of them participated in KLA terrorist activities in
Kosovo and Metohija. The transport of these Jihad warriors was conducted
under the patronage of the SDA which provided them with passports. Visas
were issued for a "haj," or pilgrimage, to Mecca. Dr. Nauman Balic, head
of the Kosovo SDA and now a minister in Hashim Thaci's government", was
responsible for their transit to Albania. The Bosnian Muslims were
provided with journalists' credentials and 2,000 DM for travel costs. It
is not known how many returned from Kosovo, but a number of these Jihad
warriors lost their lives in Chechnya.
The Sarajevo authorities were active in the training of terrorists. In
1993 Saudi Arabia provided $1 million to build a refugee camp for
Bosnian Muslims in Albania. One of the main political leaders of the
Muslim authorities in Sarajevo admitted to Misha Glenny that the base
was used to train saboteurs sent to Kosovo because their Serbian was
flawless.
Kosovo under NATO - A Virtual Narco-State (1)
The benefits of the drug trade are evident around Pristina -- more so
than the benefits of Western aid. "The new buildings, the better roads,
and the sophisticated weapons -- many of these have been bought with
drugs," says Michel Koutouzis, the Balkans region expert for the Global
Drugs Monitor (OGD), a Paris-based think tank. The repercussions of this
drug connection are only now emerging, and many Kosovo observers fear
that the province could be evolving into a virtual narco-state under the
noses of 49,000 peacekeeping troops.
It was the disparate structure of the KLA, Koutouzis says, that
Facilitated the drug-smuggling explosion. "It permitted a
democratization of drug trafficking where ordinary people get involved,
and everyone contributes a part of his profit to his clan leader in the
KLA," he explains. "The more illegal the activity, the more money the
clan gets from the traffickers. So it's in the interest of the clan to
promote drug trafficking".
According to Marko Nicovic, the former chief of police in Belgrade, now
an investigator who works closely with Interpol, the international
police agency, 400 to 500 Kosovo Albanians move shipments in the 20-kilo
range, while about 5,000 Kosovo Albanians are small-timers, handling
shipments of less than two kilos. At one point in 1996, he says, more
than 800 ethnic Albanians were in jail in Germany on narcotics charges.
In many places, Kosovo Albanians traffickers gained a foothold in the
Illicit drug trade through raw violence. According to a 1999 German
Federal Police report, "The ethnic Albanian gangs have been involved in
drugs, weapons trafficking blackmail, and murder. They are increasingly
prone to violence".
Tony White of the United Nations Drug Control Program agrees with this
assessment. "They are more willing to use violence than any other
group," he says. "They have confronted the established order throughout
Europe and pushed out the Lebanese, Pakistani, and Italian cartels".
Few gangs are willing to tangle with the Kosovo Albanians. Those that do
often pay the ultimate price. In January 1999, Kosovo Albanians killed
Nine people in Milan, Italy during a two-week bloodbath between rival
heroin groups.
Now free of the war and the Yugoslav police, drug traffickers have
Reopened the old Balkan Road. With the KLA in power -- and in the
spotlight - the top trafficking families have begun to seek relative
respectability without decreasing their heroin shipments. "The Kosovo
Albanians are trying to position themselves in the higher levels of
trafficking", says the U.N.'s Tony White. "They want to get away from
the violence of the streets and attract less attention. Criminals like
to move up like any other business, and the Kosovo Albanians are
becoming business leaders. They have become equal partners with the
Turks".
Italian national police discovered this new Kosovo Albanian outreach
last year when they undertook "Operation Pristina". The carabinieri
(Italian Police) uncovered a chain of connections that originated in
Kosovo and stretched through nine European countries, extending into
Central Asia, South America and the United States.
White House officials deny a whitewashing of KLA activities. "We do care
about (KLA drug trafficking)", says Agresti. "It's just that we've got
our hands full trying to bring peace there".
The DEA is equally reticent to address the issue. According to Michel
Koutouzis, the DEA's website once contained a section detailing Kosovo
Albanians trafficking, but a week before the US-led bombings began, the
section disappeared. "The DEA doesn't want to talk publicly (about the
KLA)", says OGD director Alain Labrousse. "It's embarrassing to them".
High-ranking US officials are dismayed that the KLA was installed in
power without public discussion or a thorough check of its background.
"I don't think we're doing anything there to stem the drugs", says a
senior State Department official. "It's out of control. It should be a
high priority. We've warned about it".
Even if it tried to stop the Kosovo Albanian heroin trade, the US would
be hard-pressed to do so. "Nobody's in control in Kosovo", adds the
State Department official. "They don't even have a police force".
Regardless of what it says, there's little indication that the
administration wants to do anything with the intelligence available
about its newest ally. "There is no doubt that the KLA is a major
trafficking organization", said a congressional expert who monitors the
drug trade and requested anonymity. "But we have a relationship with the
KLA, and the administration doesn't want to damage (its) reputation. We
are partners.
The attitude is: The drugs are not coming here, so let others deal with
it".
Conclusion
Indeed the biggest paradox in the world war on drugs is connected to the
Balkans and the outburst of terrorist activities in that troubled area.
What is the reason for this unusual co-relation between US policy in
Balkans, the most wanted terrorist in the world today, Osama bin y en,
and this enormous KLA drug trafficking.
As Michael Levine, a 25-year veteran of the DEA (US Drug Enforcement
Agency) stated: "They (the CIA) protected them the KLA) in every way
they could". McCoy, author of The Politics of Heroin, said the Afghan
Mujahideen rebels were one of the first US-backed rebel groups to get
into the heroin trade in a big way. The anti-Communist Mujahideen were
backed by the US in their opposition to the Soviet invasion of
Afghanistan in 1979. They started exporting massive amounts of opium to
raise money, with the knowledge and protection of the CIA and Pakistani
intelligence, according to McCoy. "That produced a massive traffic in
the '80s to Europe and the U.S.," he said.
Other recipients of US support were Nicaraguan Contras, Panama's General
Noriega, Afghan Taliban, Indonesia (remember massacres by their special
units in Timor), and Burma's Khun Sa. Another US-backed rebel army, the
Nicaraguan contras, raised money for their war against the leftist
Sandinista government in the 1980s by flooding U.S. cities with crack -
all with the knowledge and assistance of the CIA and the DEA, according
to the book Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras and the Crack Cocaine
Explosion, by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Gary Webb.
Webb's allegations were initially denied by the CIA, but a CIA
inspector-general's report in October 1998 revealed that 58 contras were
linked to drug allegations.
Early in 1999, as the war against Serbia raged, Congress voted to fund
the KLA's drive for independence. One tear later the US embrace of the
KLA may come as an embarrassment, but not a precedent.
Quo Vadis America?
1 - Material from "Mother Jones" Heroin Heroes, January/February 2000
used without permission, for academic and research purposes only.
The Centre for Peace in the Balkans
www.balkanpeace.org
---
SUI PIANI DI STANZIAMENTO PERMANENTE USA NELLA BASE DI CAMP BONDSTEEL
U.S. in Kosovo for the Long Haul
http://www.latimes.com/news/front/20000610/t000055108.html
Saturday, June 10, 2000
U.S. in Kosovo for the Long Haul
-
http;://www.serbia-info.com/news
"Le Figaro": American base was the aim of bombing of Yugoslavia
June 13, 2000
Paris, June 12th (Tanjug) - The official French government sticks to the
explanation they offered concerning their involvement in NATO aggression
on Yugoslavia, but they can no longer deceive neither their public nor
the media about the real cause of the criminal bombing of Yugoslavia. It
turned out that Paris and other Europeans "worked" for the benefit of
Washington interests, which is stressed in the latest edition of the
Paris weekly "Le Figaro".
"Allies of the United States start to wonder whether the formation of
American base in Kosmet was real purpose of the war" led, allegedly, on
behalf of the human rights of Kosmet Albanians, and which ended a year
ago. This is the statement by which the Paris weekly announced detailed
story about the American base "Bondsteel" in southern Kosovo.
"Le Figaro" published the information already known by Yugoslav public
and described "Bondsteel" as "large base" or even "military-industrial
complex" which resembled more "a town of 10 000 inhabitants than a
temporary camp provided by the UN Security Council Resolution 1244 a
year ago by which the bombing of Yugoslavia was ended".
The base, for which the weekly said "it was no secret, but was rather
discrete", spreads over the area of 300 hectares, where everything shows
that it was created "to stay for long".
In the base, the weekly said, there were 1600 lodgings, provided with
heating and air conditioners, 24 administration buildings "which were
already constructed and other which are under construction", "two
pharaoh dining rooms" open 24 hours, as well as the infrastructure
objects, including the projection room with 800 seats, football and
other sports fields.
"Everything proves that Americans came there to stay longer. They do not
even hide it, since the officers admit in cold blood that this base is
the most important one outside the US", "Le Figaro" says.
The Paris weekly stressed that the American base position in Kosmet was
"ideally chosen", since it is a "Muslim area where European sentiments
do not exist" and it is also the region where the conflict zones cross:
the Balkans, Mediterranean and the Middle East together with its oil.
"The Crusade for human rights of ethnic Albanians could, as its first
result i.e. its purpose, have (new) arrangement of Americans in the Old
continent", which is actually the creation of mighty "Bondsteel" base,
"Le Figaro" weekly concludes in this week's edition.
---
http://www.foreignaffairs.org/hedges.html/reader/reprints.html
Foreign Affairs May/Junel 1999 (volume 78, number 3)
Kosovo's Next Masters
By Chris Hedges
INSIDE THE KOSOVO LIBERATION ARMY
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