From: truth@public-files
Date: February 19, 2007 4:40:08 PM GMT+01:00
-------- Original-Nachricht --------
Datum: Sun, 18 Feb 2007 05:27:07 -0500
Von: Diana Johnstone
An: truth@public-files
For your information, an article which I am submitting to CounterPunch.
Designing the Zoo
The "International Community" Plan for Kosovo
Diana Johnstone*
February 17, 2007
After nearly eight years of uneasy occupation of the
province of
Kosovo that NATO wrested from Serbian control by 78 days of bombing in
1999, the "International Community" (a fancy name for governments that
follow the lead of the United States) is eager to shift
responsibility for
the intractable situation to someone else. The way out could be a false
"solution" that may provoke either Serbs or Albanians, or both, to
react in
ways that can be blamed for the impending disaster.
This month, the "special envoy of the Secretary-General of the
United Nations for the future status process for Kosovo", former Finnish
president Marrti Ahtisaari, unveiled his proposal for the future of the
disputed province. This "Kosovo Status Settlement" is clearly designed
primarily to soothe the collective ego of the "International Community"
(IC) in its self-assigned role as humanitarian nation builder.
Ahtisaari's plan defines the future Kosovo according to the
IC wish
list. Kosovo, it announces, "shall be a multi-ethnic society, governing
itself democratically and with full respect for the rule of law, the
highest level of internationally recognized human rights and fundamental
freedoms, and which promotes the peaceful and prosperous existence of
all
its inhabitants."
Kosovo "shall be..." Not is. Because that description is
about the
exact opposite of what Kosovo is now: a poverty-stricken cauldron of
discontent characterized by violent ethnic hatred, a political system
manipulated by armed clans, a corrupt judicial system, and terrified
minorities (notably Serbs and Roma) deprived of the most basic freedoms,
such as being able to venture out of their besieged homes in order to
shop,
go to school or work their fields.
Not to mention broken down public services, an economy totally
dependent on foreign aid and criminal trafficking, and massive
unemployment
affecting a youthful population easily aroused to violence.
Turning water into wine is nothing compared to transforming
this
failed province into a model democratic multi-ethnic State. But that is
the miracle Ahtisaari is announcing.
And how is this miracle to be achieved?
Albanian separatists seem to be convinced that all that is
needed
is to grant Kosovo total independence. But that is not exactly what
Ahtisaari is proposing. Without pronouncing the word, he is letting the
Albanians conclude that his proposal leads to independence. According to
his Status Settlement, Kosovo is to have the trappings of
independence --
things to play with like "its own distinct flag, seal and
anthem" (but they
must reflect the "multiethnic" nature of the place). It can join the
International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. But the substance of
independence is very much in doubt.
According to the Settlement plan, Kosovo will remain under
strict
international supervision. Control will be exercised by an international
bureaucracy run by the European Union and a military presence led by
NATO,
in three parts:
1. An "International Civilian Representative (ICR), double-
hatted
as the EU Special Representative", appointed by an "International
Steering
Group (ISG) comprising key international stakeholders", will have the
power
to "ensure successful implementation of the Settlement", to "annul
decisions or laws adopted by Kosovo authorities and sanction or remove
public officials whose actions are determined by the ICR to be
inconsistent
with the letter or spirit of the Settlement". So much for political
"independence".
These "key international stakeholders" are, incidentally,
self-appointed and do not include the country with the greatest stake in
Kosovo: Serbia. Rather, they are a reincarnation of what used to be
called, in the nineteenth century, the Great Powers.
2. "A European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP) Mission will
monitor, mentor and advise on all areas related to the rule of law."
3. A "NATO-led International Military Presence will provide
a safe
and secure environment throughout Kosovo" until Kosovo's institutions
are
able to do so -- which could conceivably be many years, or 24 hours,
depending on how the "key stakeholders" choose to interpret events.
With some name changes, this is the same sort of
international
supervision that has so far been unable to combat crime, provide real
security to minorities or develop the economy.
Bureaucracy in the New World Order
Government by international bureaucracy seems to be a trend
in the
New World Order. Since the Dayton Accords that ended the Bosnia war in
late 1995, Bosnia-Herzegovina has been ruled by a similar combination: a
complicated set of local authorities under the strict supervision of a
"High Representative" (contemporary version of Proconsul or Viceroy) who
can, and does, annul laws adopted by the local democratic
institutions or
dismiss democratically chosen officials who fail to tow the IC line. The
declared purpose of this benevolent dictatorship is to foster
"multiculturalism", but the result is that nationalist antagonism
between
Muslims, Serbs and Croats in Bosnia-Herzegovina is as strong as ever, if
not stronger. This eleven-year-old failure is to serve as model for the
Kosovo success story.
But the trend is deeper and broader than the administration
of the
European Union's new protectorates. It applies to the European Union
itself. A number of astute observers note that the complex double-tiered
ruling structure of the Balkan colonies is essentially the same as
that of
the European Union, with its Member States progressively giving up their
democratic decision-making power to the EU Commission, only very
marginally
controlled by a European Parliament with none of the powers or popular
legitimacy of traditional national parliaments.
Even more striking, the "Settlement" spells out in advance a
whole
range of policies and measures for Kosovo, just as the EU draft
"Constitution", rejected by voters in France and the Netherlands in
referendums held in 2005, spells out in advance not only structures but
policies. Basic economic policies are left to the "free market", or its
institutions such as the IMF, the World Bank and the EU Commission.
Deprived of its economic policy-making, the role of the State centers on
defending "human rights", especially treatment of minorities. This
focus on
minority identities actually serves to distract populations from issues
that might produce a majority concerned with redistribution of
wealth. Such
a majority, forgetting identity issues, might demand policies putting
social welfare ahead of the demands of finance capital for ever-
expanding
profits.
Despite its unique features, Kosovo illustrates the
inextricable
mess created by this current imposed version of Western "democracy".
Creating Rights Violations
The post-Cold War capitalist West, totally absorbed in frenetic
consumption of the world's resources, needed to drape itself in a noble
cause. "Human rights" did the trick.
To preserve and expand the U.S.-led Cold War military
machine after
the dismantling of its official adversary, the Warsaw Pact, NATO was
endowed with the new mission of "humanitarian intervention". The 1999
"Kosovo war" was the trial run for this new mission.
The background of the centuries-old Kosovo conflict was
dismissed
as irrelevant by U.S. policy makers in their search for "new Hitlers" on
one side and "victims" on the other -- the cast of characters
required for
staging "humanitarian intervention".
Encouraged by the prospect of getting to play the "rescued
victim"
role, the armed separatist group calling itself the Kosovo Liberation
Army
(KLA) provoked reprisals by shooting policemen and other persons
loyal to
the existing government. Violent repression predictably ensued. NATO
then
chose to interpret the reprisals as part of a deliberate plan of "ethnic
cleansing" and perhaps even genocide. Thanks to ignorant and biased
media
coverage, NATO enjoyed overwhelming popular support for its bombing
campaign and subsequent occupation of Kosovo.
Henceforth, NATO has had to maintain its Manichean
interpretation
in order to justify its intervention. The main instrument for this
purpose
is the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY)
in The
Hague, which, although formally a "United Nations tribunal", is
essentially
staffed, funded and provided with "evidence" by NATO governments.
The main human problem in Kosovo today is psychological: the
terrible hatred between communities stirred and aggravated by one-sided
foreign intervention. This outside support by Great Powers encourages
Albanian nationalists to seek more and more: more concessions, more
territory, more indulgence toward their mistreatment of non-
Albanians, who,
according to the official NATO narrative, pretty much deserve what they
get. At the same time it leaves Serbs to nurse a bitter sense of
grievance
and unjust humiliation.
Instead of a punitive approach manipulated by NATO powers,
what was
needed to bring lasting peace to the Balkans was some sort of Truth
Commission that would investigate events, motives, grievances and
misdeeds
on all sides in an effort to bring about reconciliation.
Reconciliation can
only be based on a sense of common humanity, which is destroyed by
constant
identification of "guilty" and "victim" ethnic groups.
But an unbiased investigation of the whole Kosovo drama
would risk
revealing the fatally negative role of foreign powers: the United
States,
Germany and NATO.
Thus hatred and prejudice must be perpetuated.
Designing the Zoo
The basic attitude of the decision-makers of the International
Community is that they alone are qualified to make decisions. They are
better qualified than the people directly affected by their decisions.
Lesser peoples must be treated like unruly children, or rowdy animals
in a
zoo, kept in cages designed by those who know best what is good for
them.
This attitude is perfectly illustrated by a gaming exercize
conducted by and for U.S. officials in the fall and winter of 2001
and 2002
intended as preparation for final Kosovo status negotiations. [1]
In these simulations, participants -- mostly American
officials --
played the roles of Serbs, Albanians, Americans and other international
players. The report notes that : "Both simulated 'Serbs' and 'Albanians'
looked to the 'U.S.' as the power broker, ignoring other elements in the
international community like the 'UN', which lacked credibility with
both
sides."
The conclusions were drawn in a report by two main operators of
U.S. Balkan policy, James Hooper, executive director of the influential
Balkan Action Council, and Paul Williams, who served as advisor both
to the
Bosnian Muslim delegation at the 1995 Dayton talks and to the Kosovo
Albanian delegation at the 1999 Rambouillet talks that set the
diplomatic
stage for NATO bombing of Yugoslavia. Incidentally, Williams heads the
International Law and Politics group that carried out the exercise
and has
already undertaken to write the Constitution of a future independent
State
of Kosovo.
Their most remarkable conclusion:
" -- When left to their own devices, the 'Albanian' and
'Serbian'
delegations were ready to engage in division and reallocation of
territory,
exchanging land in northern Kosovo for land in southern Serbia and
ignoring
the consequences for Macedonia and Bosnia.
" -- If redistributing territory to promote ethnic
homogeneity is
to be avoided, the international community, led by the United States,
will
have to prevent it."
Leaving aside the reliability of such simulations, what is
truly
remarkable here is the arrogance of U.S. officials, their absolute
certainty that they have the right and the capacity to judge what is
best
for the peoples directly concerned, who must not be allowed to work
out a
possible solution by themselves.
This has been U.S. policy all along. It is generally
forgotten,
because largely ignored at the time, that in 1998, Belgrade attempted to
start negotiations with Kosovo Albanians. Kosovo Albanian leaders
rejected
talks in favor of the implicit promise of NATO intervention on their
behalf
if the situation deteriorated. Then to save diplomatic appearances
before
launching NATO's assault, the U.S. stage-managed last minute
"negotiations"
in Rambouillet chateau in France during which Serbian and Kosovo
Albanian
delegations were kept apart, as both were presented with "take it or
leave
it" proposals drafted by U.S. diplomats. These proposals were
crafted to
obtain Albanian acceptance and Serbian rejection, in order to justify
bombing with the claim that "the Serbs refuse to negotiate" -- which was
not true. Official Serbian compromise proposals were simply ignored.
Adding insult to injury, the Americans at Rambouillet abruptly
promoted Hashim Thaqi, a young rebel leaders with alleged criminal
connections, as head of the Albanian delegation, shoving aside the
better-known respected Albanian intellectuals who had also come to
Rambouillet.
This illustrates a typical feature of U.S. imperial behavior
abroad: select, listen to and promote only the worst elements in the
foreign society you want to influence. Yes, there are, in any society,
better and worse elements. On the one hand, there are shameless
opportunists, flatterers and outright criminals. Their advantage is
that
they are relatively easy to manipulate, at least in the short run.
But not
forever. There comes a time when they demand payment for their services.
The Albanian secessionists in Kosovo are out of patience, and since they
are still armed, the foreign occupiers are getting very nervous.
If the International Community itself is afraid of them,
which is
an urgent motive for giving them what they want before they start
shooting,
then what of the defenseless inhabitants? The remaining non-Albanian
inhabitants of Kosovo, notably Serb-speaking or Roma, live in terror of
these "liberators". And what of the welfare of the majority of
Albanians of
Kosovo, who have been delivered to the control of gangsters, or of
feuding
clan leaders such as Ramush Haradinaj, a favorite of the United States?
Haradinaj was given the post of provisional prime minister of Kosovo
despite a pending indictment for war crimes by The Hague Tribunal.
After
his arrest, while awaiting trial, Haradinaj was indulgently released to
pursue his political activity. It is constantly repeated that "all
Albanians in Kosovo want independence from Serbia", but in these
circumstances, any Albanian who thought otherwise would be ill-
advised to
say so.
On the other hand there are honorable men and women who are
concerned about the welfare of their country and their people. In any
society, there are likely to be a few intelligent and selfless people
who
could be described with the outdated adjective "wise". They are
systematically ignored... or worse.
The Alternative
One such man is unquestionably Dobrica Cosic, Serbia's geatest
living writer, who for a brief period as president of Yugoslavia in 1993
vainly tried to promote peace. Since it was unthinkable to qualify a
Serb's concern for the future of his country as "patriotism", much less
"wisdom", he was stigmatized as "nationalist" and ignored.
Nevertheless,
he has continued patiently to advocate the search for a genuine
compromise
agreement on Kosovo which might be sufficiently acceptable to all
sides to
serve as a basis for reconciliation and peace. In any genuine effort to
bring about mutual reconciliation, his ideas would at least be taken
into
consideration.
In September 2004, Cosic renewed his proposal "for the
Coexistence
of the Albanian and the Serbian People" in an eight-page document
sent to
all interested governments. It includes a detailed reflection on the
background of the Kosovo conflict and its context. While naturally and
inevitably speaking from a Serbian viewpoint, Cosic takes Albanian views
into account and observes a certain symmetry in their national
ideologies.
The "national ideologies of the Albanian and Serbian
peoples", he
writes, include anachronistic political perceptions based on their past
misfortunes: lengthy national subordinations and crushing defeats. The
products of these ideologies --"greater Albania" on the one hand and
"the
Serbian sacred land" of Kosovo on the other -- are myths that "cannot
serve
as a basis for a reasonable and just resolution of contemporary national
and state problems of the Albanian and Serbian people, determined by
complete interdependence of the peoples in the Balkans, Europe and the
world in modern civilization."
Cosic observes that radical changes in the ethnic
composition of
Kosovo, to the advantage of the Albanians, have compelled Serbia to
review
its policy, implying a compromise between Serbia's historical rights
to the
province and the Albanians' demographic rights. Keeping Kosovo within
the
Serbian state "would be a demographic, economic and political burden too
heavy for Serbia, and hampering its normal development."
While the same U.S. representatives who have exacerbated ethnic
hatred between Serbs and Albanians now insist that they must live
together
in a "multi-ethnic Kosovo" with unalterable borders, Cosic acknowledges
that "ethnic Albanians do not want to live together with the Serbs" in
Kosovo and "Serbs cannot live under Albanians; Serbs and Albanians
can live
freely only next to each other". He therefore argues that a territorial
division worked out between the parties themselves could provide the
basis
for a genuine settlement allowing future generations to free themselves
from this centuries-old conflict. Contrary to the U.S. approved
Ahtisaari
"Settlement", which prohibits Kosovo from uniting with neighboring
Albania,
Cosic sees such unification as a possible outcome of an overall
settlement.
Mutual Respect, or Mutual Hatred
Whether or not Serbs and Albanians could work out a "peace
of the
brave", in mutual respect, along the lines suggested by Cosic, has been
reduced to an academic question by U.S. meddling. Some ten years ago, a
few people in Europe were ready to try that peaceful method. Danielle
Mitterrand, the wife of the French President, sponsored round table
talks
in Paris between respected Albanian and Serb intellectuals. Such
initiatives never enjoyed the support of the United States, which
preferred
to promote Albanian gangsters and Serbian flatterers -- both eager
for the
favors of the Empire.
The United States and its "International Community" have done
everything to preclude an accord based on mutual respect. The
inevitable
result is mutual hatred.
It used to be that conquerors grabbed the top spots but left
certain essential structures in place, such as police and courts, so
as to
keep order. The humanitarian conquerors are different: in Kosovo as in
Iraq, they abolish the police and courts as tainted by whoever it is
they
overthrew, and attempt to start from scratch. The result is chaos:
large-scale chaos in Iraq and small-scale chaos in Kosovo.
The province is known as a hub of drug trafficking, transit for
prostitutes bought and sold from desperately poor Eastern European
areas,
notably Moldova, and various other forms of illegal trade. Trash
accumulates uncollected. The local police and courts are described as
corrupt and indulgent toward the criminal activities of their Albanian
brothers, and neither NATO nor the United Nations Mission in Kosovo
(UNMIK)
are able to bring order.
In the midst of this mess, the United States operates the huge,
self-contained strategic military base, Camp Bondsteel, that it built
the
moment U.S. forces entered Kosovo -- the very symbol of the autistic
empire. Revolution could happen in Cuba, but the U.S. military hung
onto
Guantanamo. Never mind what happens in Kosovo, Bondsteel can remain.
Other, less protected occupiers are more nervous. Already, in
March 2004, some of them clashed with huge Albanian mobs that went on a
rampage against Serbs and Serbian churches. Everyone knows that this
could
easily happen again, on a larger scale, and it will be very
embarrassing to
have to shoot at "the victims" in NATO's Manichean reality show.
Emissaries of the IC have announced that Serbia "lost its
right to
govern Kosovo" because of Milosevic's treatment of the province. But
what
gave the United States and its satellites the right to dispose of it as
they see fit? The answer: 78 days of NATO bombing of Serbian bridges,
homes, factories, schools and hospitals, brought to an end when the
faithful IC emissary Ahtisaari conveyed to Milosevic the message that
if he
did not give in, Belgrade would be razed to the ground.
Many Serbs might agree with Cosic that the burden of trying to
govern a violently hostile Albanian population would be too much for
Serbia. Perhaps more than Kosovo, Serbs want to keep their sense of
honor.
Their whole nation has been slandered for close to twenty years by
enemies
intent on grabbing off pieces of the former Yugoslavia for
themselves, on
the pretext that they were "oppressed" by the Serbs. In their
(successful)
effort to curry favor with Western Great Powers, a number of Serbian
politicians and journalists have eagerly spread lies about their own
country in order to demonstrate that "we are better than Milosevic".
The
most significant of these lies is that the Albanians of Kosovo had to be
rescued by NATO because they were "threatened with genocide" -- a
"genocide" no more real than the "weapons of mass destruction" that
served
as pretext for the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
The Kosovo issue has been used to punish and humiliate
Serbia in a
way that no nation could be expected to accept. Serbia cannot resist
Great
Power dictates, but it can refuse to endorse them. This is not
"nationalism" but elementary dignity.
The Russians and "Plan B"
Although the Ahtisaari plan does not mention "independence",
the
concerned parties seem to get the point It has met with the approval of
Agim Ceku, who as a senior officer in the Croatian army commanded troops
who "ethnically cleansed" Serbs from the Krajina region of Croatia,
before
taking command of Kosovo rebels and rising to his current post of
provisional prime minister of Kosovo. It has been rejected by the
Serbian
government, which states its readiness to grant full autonomy to
Kosovo but
not to give up part of Serbia's historic territory. The Russians
have said
they will not give UN Security Council approval to a plan Serbia
rejects.
Independence for Kosovo is also opposed by European Union Member States
Spain, Slovakia, Rumania, Greece and Cyprus.
The danger of the precedent set by rewarding an armed
secessionist
movement with independent statehood is of concern to much of the world,
since it would almost certainly encourage armed insurrections by ethnic
minority leaders hoping to win Great Power support as "victims" of the
repression they would provoke.
After the death of the non-violent Kosovo Albanian leader
Ibrahim
Rugova, who was denounced in his time for being willing to negotiate
with
Milosevic, Kosovo has fallen into the hands of militia and clan leaders
accused of war crimes. Serbia on the other hand is run by what the IC
describes as "pro-Western democrats". This makes no difference to
the U.S.
tilt toward the Albanians. After all, there is nothing to fear from
"pro-Western democrats", whereas the Albanian nationalists risk running
amok, as they did in March 2004, if they don't get what they consider
was
promised them by NATO's war.
Kosovo Albanian leaders have long announced that they intend to
declare independence, regardless of the UN Security Council.
According to
Fred Abrahams of Human Rights Watch, "If the UN Security Council
fails to
approve the plan, then Washington could turn to Plan B: unilateral
recognition by the United States, the United Kingdom, and then other
states."[2]
This could lead to armed conflict if an "independent" Albanian
nationalist Kosovo government undertook to extend its rule to Serbian
enclaves, especially the solidly Serb northern part of the province
whose
inhabitants will surely wish to remain part of Serbia. Even Serbs who
might
want to forget about Kosovo cannot easily abandon their compatriots
besieged in Kosovo by fanaticized mobs. The United States will of course
blame the Serbs for whatever goes wrong. And meanwhile NATO has made
contingency plans to evacuate the remaining Serbs from their ancestral
homes in Kosovo -- all to avoid partition, which is ruled out by the
doctrine of imposed "multiculturalism".
* Diana Johnstone is author of Fools' Crusade: Yugoslavia, NATO and
Western
Delusions, Monthly Review:PlutoPress. She can be reached at
dianajohnstone @ compuserve.com
--------
END NOTES
1 - See the United States Institute of Peace Special Report No. 95,
November 2002, "Simulating Kosovo: Lessons for Final Status
Negotiations".
The government-financed gaming exercises were conducted by the Public
International Law and Policy Group on September 28 and November 2, 2001,
and February 15, 2002 at American University in Washington, D.C.
2. Fred Abrahams, "Kosovo's Tricky Waltz", Foreign Policy In Focus,
February 7, 2007.
Date: February 19, 2007 4:40:08 PM GMT+01:00
-------- Original-Nachricht --------
Datum: Sun, 18 Feb 2007 05:27:07 -0500
Von: Diana Johnstone
An: truth@public-files
For your information, an article which I am submitting to CounterPunch.
Designing the Zoo
The "International Community" Plan for Kosovo
Diana Johnstone*
February 17, 2007
After nearly eight years of uneasy occupation of the
province of
Kosovo that NATO wrested from Serbian control by 78 days of bombing in
1999, the "International Community" (a fancy name for governments that
follow the lead of the United States) is eager to shift
responsibility for
the intractable situation to someone else. The way out could be a false
"solution" that may provoke either Serbs or Albanians, or both, to
react in
ways that can be blamed for the impending disaster.
This month, the "special envoy of the Secretary-General of the
United Nations for the future status process for Kosovo", former Finnish
president Marrti Ahtisaari, unveiled his proposal for the future of the
disputed province. This "Kosovo Status Settlement" is clearly designed
primarily to soothe the collective ego of the "International Community"
(IC) in its self-assigned role as humanitarian nation builder.
Ahtisaari's plan defines the future Kosovo according to the
IC wish
list. Kosovo, it announces, "shall be a multi-ethnic society, governing
itself democratically and with full respect for the rule of law, the
highest level of internationally recognized human rights and fundamental
freedoms, and which promotes the peaceful and prosperous existence of
all
its inhabitants."
Kosovo "shall be..." Not is. Because that description is
about the
exact opposite of what Kosovo is now: a poverty-stricken cauldron of
discontent characterized by violent ethnic hatred, a political system
manipulated by armed clans, a corrupt judicial system, and terrified
minorities (notably Serbs and Roma) deprived of the most basic freedoms,
such as being able to venture out of their besieged homes in order to
shop,
go to school or work their fields.
Not to mention broken down public services, an economy totally
dependent on foreign aid and criminal trafficking, and massive
unemployment
affecting a youthful population easily aroused to violence.
Turning water into wine is nothing compared to transforming
this
failed province into a model democratic multi-ethnic State. But that is
the miracle Ahtisaari is announcing.
And how is this miracle to be achieved?
Albanian separatists seem to be convinced that all that is
needed
is to grant Kosovo total independence. But that is not exactly what
Ahtisaari is proposing. Without pronouncing the word, he is letting the
Albanians conclude that his proposal leads to independence. According to
his Status Settlement, Kosovo is to have the trappings of
independence --
things to play with like "its own distinct flag, seal and
anthem" (but they
must reflect the "multiethnic" nature of the place). It can join the
International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. But the substance of
independence is very much in doubt.
According to the Settlement plan, Kosovo will remain under
strict
international supervision. Control will be exercised by an international
bureaucracy run by the European Union and a military presence led by
NATO,
in three parts:
1. An "International Civilian Representative (ICR), double-
hatted
as the EU Special Representative", appointed by an "International
Steering
Group (ISG) comprising key international stakeholders", will have the
power
to "ensure successful implementation of the Settlement", to "annul
decisions or laws adopted by Kosovo authorities and sanction or remove
public officials whose actions are determined by the ICR to be
inconsistent
with the letter or spirit of the Settlement". So much for political
"independence".
These "key international stakeholders" are, incidentally,
self-appointed and do not include the country with the greatest stake in
Kosovo: Serbia. Rather, they are a reincarnation of what used to be
called, in the nineteenth century, the Great Powers.
2. "A European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP) Mission will
monitor, mentor and advise on all areas related to the rule of law."
3. A "NATO-led International Military Presence will provide
a safe
and secure environment throughout Kosovo" until Kosovo's institutions
are
able to do so -- which could conceivably be many years, or 24 hours,
depending on how the "key stakeholders" choose to interpret events.
With some name changes, this is the same sort of
international
supervision that has so far been unable to combat crime, provide real
security to minorities or develop the economy.
Bureaucracy in the New World Order
Government by international bureaucracy seems to be a trend
in the
New World Order. Since the Dayton Accords that ended the Bosnia war in
late 1995, Bosnia-Herzegovina has been ruled by a similar combination: a
complicated set of local authorities under the strict supervision of a
"High Representative" (contemporary version of Proconsul or Viceroy) who
can, and does, annul laws adopted by the local democratic
institutions or
dismiss democratically chosen officials who fail to tow the IC line. The
declared purpose of this benevolent dictatorship is to foster
"multiculturalism", but the result is that nationalist antagonism
between
Muslims, Serbs and Croats in Bosnia-Herzegovina is as strong as ever, if
not stronger. This eleven-year-old failure is to serve as model for the
Kosovo success story.
But the trend is deeper and broader than the administration
of the
European Union's new protectorates. It applies to the European Union
itself. A number of astute observers note that the complex double-tiered
ruling structure of the Balkan colonies is essentially the same as
that of
the European Union, with its Member States progressively giving up their
democratic decision-making power to the EU Commission, only very
marginally
controlled by a European Parliament with none of the powers or popular
legitimacy of traditional national parliaments.
Even more striking, the "Settlement" spells out in advance a
whole
range of policies and measures for Kosovo, just as the EU draft
"Constitution", rejected by voters in France and the Netherlands in
referendums held in 2005, spells out in advance not only structures but
policies. Basic economic policies are left to the "free market", or its
institutions such as the IMF, the World Bank and the EU Commission.
Deprived of its economic policy-making, the role of the State centers on
defending "human rights", especially treatment of minorities. This
focus on
minority identities actually serves to distract populations from issues
that might produce a majority concerned with redistribution of
wealth. Such
a majority, forgetting identity issues, might demand policies putting
social welfare ahead of the demands of finance capital for ever-
expanding
profits.
Despite its unique features, Kosovo illustrates the
inextricable
mess created by this current imposed version of Western "democracy".
Creating Rights Violations
The post-Cold War capitalist West, totally absorbed in frenetic
consumption of the world's resources, needed to drape itself in a noble
cause. "Human rights" did the trick.
To preserve and expand the U.S.-led Cold War military
machine after
the dismantling of its official adversary, the Warsaw Pact, NATO was
endowed with the new mission of "humanitarian intervention". The 1999
"Kosovo war" was the trial run for this new mission.
The background of the centuries-old Kosovo conflict was
dismissed
as irrelevant by U.S. policy makers in their search for "new Hitlers" on
one side and "victims" on the other -- the cast of characters
required for
staging "humanitarian intervention".
Encouraged by the prospect of getting to play the "rescued
victim"
role, the armed separatist group calling itself the Kosovo Liberation
Army
(KLA) provoked reprisals by shooting policemen and other persons
loyal to
the existing government. Violent repression predictably ensued. NATO
then
chose to interpret the reprisals as part of a deliberate plan of "ethnic
cleansing" and perhaps even genocide. Thanks to ignorant and biased
media
coverage, NATO enjoyed overwhelming popular support for its bombing
campaign and subsequent occupation of Kosovo.
Henceforth, NATO has had to maintain its Manichean
interpretation
in order to justify its intervention. The main instrument for this
purpose
is the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY)
in The
Hague, which, although formally a "United Nations tribunal", is
essentially
staffed, funded and provided with "evidence" by NATO governments.
The main human problem in Kosovo today is psychological: the
terrible hatred between communities stirred and aggravated by one-sided
foreign intervention. This outside support by Great Powers encourages
Albanian nationalists to seek more and more: more concessions, more
territory, more indulgence toward their mistreatment of non-
Albanians, who,
according to the official NATO narrative, pretty much deserve what they
get. At the same time it leaves Serbs to nurse a bitter sense of
grievance
and unjust humiliation.
Instead of a punitive approach manipulated by NATO powers,
what was
needed to bring lasting peace to the Balkans was some sort of Truth
Commission that would investigate events, motives, grievances and
misdeeds
on all sides in an effort to bring about reconciliation.
Reconciliation can
only be based on a sense of common humanity, which is destroyed by
constant
identification of "guilty" and "victim" ethnic groups.
But an unbiased investigation of the whole Kosovo drama
would risk
revealing the fatally negative role of foreign powers: the United
States,
Germany and NATO.
Thus hatred and prejudice must be perpetuated.
Designing the Zoo
The basic attitude of the decision-makers of the International
Community is that they alone are qualified to make decisions. They are
better qualified than the people directly affected by their decisions.
Lesser peoples must be treated like unruly children, or rowdy animals
in a
zoo, kept in cages designed by those who know best what is good for
them.
This attitude is perfectly illustrated by a gaming exercize
conducted by and for U.S. officials in the fall and winter of 2001
and 2002
intended as preparation for final Kosovo status negotiations. [1]
In these simulations, participants -- mostly American
officials --
played the roles of Serbs, Albanians, Americans and other international
players. The report notes that : "Both simulated 'Serbs' and 'Albanians'
looked to the 'U.S.' as the power broker, ignoring other elements in the
international community like the 'UN', which lacked credibility with
both
sides."
The conclusions were drawn in a report by two main operators of
U.S. Balkan policy, James Hooper, executive director of the influential
Balkan Action Council, and Paul Williams, who served as advisor both
to the
Bosnian Muslim delegation at the 1995 Dayton talks and to the Kosovo
Albanian delegation at the 1999 Rambouillet talks that set the
diplomatic
stage for NATO bombing of Yugoslavia. Incidentally, Williams heads the
International Law and Politics group that carried out the exercise
and has
already undertaken to write the Constitution of a future independent
State
of Kosovo.
Their most remarkable conclusion:
" -- When left to their own devices, the 'Albanian' and
'Serbian'
delegations were ready to engage in division and reallocation of
territory,
exchanging land in northern Kosovo for land in southern Serbia and
ignoring
the consequences for Macedonia and Bosnia.
" -- If redistributing territory to promote ethnic
homogeneity is
to be avoided, the international community, led by the United States,
will
have to prevent it."
Leaving aside the reliability of such simulations, what is
truly
remarkable here is the arrogance of U.S. officials, their absolute
certainty that they have the right and the capacity to judge what is
best
for the peoples directly concerned, who must not be allowed to work
out a
possible solution by themselves.
This has been U.S. policy all along. It is generally
forgotten,
because largely ignored at the time, that in 1998, Belgrade attempted to
start negotiations with Kosovo Albanians. Kosovo Albanian leaders
rejected
talks in favor of the implicit promise of NATO intervention on their
behalf
if the situation deteriorated. Then to save diplomatic appearances
before
launching NATO's assault, the U.S. stage-managed last minute
"negotiations"
in Rambouillet chateau in France during which Serbian and Kosovo
Albanian
delegations were kept apart, as both were presented with "take it or
leave
it" proposals drafted by U.S. diplomats. These proposals were
crafted to
obtain Albanian acceptance and Serbian rejection, in order to justify
bombing with the claim that "the Serbs refuse to negotiate" -- which was
not true. Official Serbian compromise proposals were simply ignored.
Adding insult to injury, the Americans at Rambouillet abruptly
promoted Hashim Thaqi, a young rebel leaders with alleged criminal
connections, as head of the Albanian delegation, shoving aside the
better-known respected Albanian intellectuals who had also come to
Rambouillet.
This illustrates a typical feature of U.S. imperial behavior
abroad: select, listen to and promote only the worst elements in the
foreign society you want to influence. Yes, there are, in any society,
better and worse elements. On the one hand, there are shameless
opportunists, flatterers and outright criminals. Their advantage is
that
they are relatively easy to manipulate, at least in the short run.
But not
forever. There comes a time when they demand payment for their services.
The Albanian secessionists in Kosovo are out of patience, and since they
are still armed, the foreign occupiers are getting very nervous.
If the International Community itself is afraid of them,
which is
an urgent motive for giving them what they want before they start
shooting,
then what of the defenseless inhabitants? The remaining non-Albanian
inhabitants of Kosovo, notably Serb-speaking or Roma, live in terror of
these "liberators". And what of the welfare of the majority of
Albanians of
Kosovo, who have been delivered to the control of gangsters, or of
feuding
clan leaders such as Ramush Haradinaj, a favorite of the United States?
Haradinaj was given the post of provisional prime minister of Kosovo
despite a pending indictment for war crimes by The Hague Tribunal.
After
his arrest, while awaiting trial, Haradinaj was indulgently released to
pursue his political activity. It is constantly repeated that "all
Albanians in Kosovo want independence from Serbia", but in these
circumstances, any Albanian who thought otherwise would be ill-
advised to
say so.
On the other hand there are honorable men and women who are
concerned about the welfare of their country and their people. In any
society, there are likely to be a few intelligent and selfless people
who
could be described with the outdated adjective "wise". They are
systematically ignored... or worse.
The Alternative
One such man is unquestionably Dobrica Cosic, Serbia's geatest
living writer, who for a brief period as president of Yugoslavia in 1993
vainly tried to promote peace. Since it was unthinkable to qualify a
Serb's concern for the future of his country as "patriotism", much less
"wisdom", he was stigmatized as "nationalist" and ignored.
Nevertheless,
he has continued patiently to advocate the search for a genuine
compromise
agreement on Kosovo which might be sufficiently acceptable to all
sides to
serve as a basis for reconciliation and peace. In any genuine effort to
bring about mutual reconciliation, his ideas would at least be taken
into
consideration.
In September 2004, Cosic renewed his proposal "for the
Coexistence
of the Albanian and the Serbian People" in an eight-page document
sent to
all interested governments. It includes a detailed reflection on the
background of the Kosovo conflict and its context. While naturally and
inevitably speaking from a Serbian viewpoint, Cosic takes Albanian views
into account and observes a certain symmetry in their national
ideologies.
The "national ideologies of the Albanian and Serbian
peoples", he
writes, include anachronistic political perceptions based on their past
misfortunes: lengthy national subordinations and crushing defeats. The
products of these ideologies --"greater Albania" on the one hand and
"the
Serbian sacred land" of Kosovo on the other -- are myths that "cannot
serve
as a basis for a reasonable and just resolution of contemporary national
and state problems of the Albanian and Serbian people, determined by
complete interdependence of the peoples in the Balkans, Europe and the
world in modern civilization."
Cosic observes that radical changes in the ethnic
composition of
Kosovo, to the advantage of the Albanians, have compelled Serbia to
review
its policy, implying a compromise between Serbia's historical rights
to the
province and the Albanians' demographic rights. Keeping Kosovo within
the
Serbian state "would be a demographic, economic and political burden too
heavy for Serbia, and hampering its normal development."
While the same U.S. representatives who have exacerbated ethnic
hatred between Serbs and Albanians now insist that they must live
together
in a "multi-ethnic Kosovo" with unalterable borders, Cosic acknowledges
that "ethnic Albanians do not want to live together with the Serbs" in
Kosovo and "Serbs cannot live under Albanians; Serbs and Albanians
can live
freely only next to each other". He therefore argues that a territorial
division worked out between the parties themselves could provide the
basis
for a genuine settlement allowing future generations to free themselves
from this centuries-old conflict. Contrary to the U.S. approved
Ahtisaari
"Settlement", which prohibits Kosovo from uniting with neighboring
Albania,
Cosic sees such unification as a possible outcome of an overall
settlement.
Mutual Respect, or Mutual Hatred
Whether or not Serbs and Albanians could work out a "peace
of the
brave", in mutual respect, along the lines suggested by Cosic, has been
reduced to an academic question by U.S. meddling. Some ten years ago, a
few people in Europe were ready to try that peaceful method. Danielle
Mitterrand, the wife of the French President, sponsored round table
talks
in Paris between respected Albanian and Serb intellectuals. Such
initiatives never enjoyed the support of the United States, which
preferred
to promote Albanian gangsters and Serbian flatterers -- both eager
for the
favors of the Empire.
The United States and its "International Community" have done
everything to preclude an accord based on mutual respect. The
inevitable
result is mutual hatred.
It used to be that conquerors grabbed the top spots but left
certain essential structures in place, such as police and courts, so
as to
keep order. The humanitarian conquerors are different: in Kosovo as in
Iraq, they abolish the police and courts as tainted by whoever it is
they
overthrew, and attempt to start from scratch. The result is chaos:
large-scale chaos in Iraq and small-scale chaos in Kosovo.
The province is known as a hub of drug trafficking, transit for
prostitutes bought and sold from desperately poor Eastern European
areas,
notably Moldova, and various other forms of illegal trade. Trash
accumulates uncollected. The local police and courts are described as
corrupt and indulgent toward the criminal activities of their Albanian
brothers, and neither NATO nor the United Nations Mission in Kosovo
(UNMIK)
are able to bring order.
In the midst of this mess, the United States operates the huge,
self-contained strategic military base, Camp Bondsteel, that it built
the
moment U.S. forces entered Kosovo -- the very symbol of the autistic
empire. Revolution could happen in Cuba, but the U.S. military hung
onto
Guantanamo. Never mind what happens in Kosovo, Bondsteel can remain.
Other, less protected occupiers are more nervous. Already, in
March 2004, some of them clashed with huge Albanian mobs that went on a
rampage against Serbs and Serbian churches. Everyone knows that this
could
easily happen again, on a larger scale, and it will be very
embarrassing to
have to shoot at "the victims" in NATO's Manichean reality show.
Emissaries of the IC have announced that Serbia "lost its
right to
govern Kosovo" because of Milosevic's treatment of the province. But
what
gave the United States and its satellites the right to dispose of it as
they see fit? The answer: 78 days of NATO bombing of Serbian bridges,
homes, factories, schools and hospitals, brought to an end when the
faithful IC emissary Ahtisaari conveyed to Milosevic the message that
if he
did not give in, Belgrade would be razed to the ground.
Many Serbs might agree with Cosic that the burden of trying to
govern a violently hostile Albanian population would be too much for
Serbia. Perhaps more than Kosovo, Serbs want to keep their sense of
honor.
Their whole nation has been slandered for close to twenty years by
enemies
intent on grabbing off pieces of the former Yugoslavia for
themselves, on
the pretext that they were "oppressed" by the Serbs. In their
(successful)
effort to curry favor with Western Great Powers, a number of Serbian
politicians and journalists have eagerly spread lies about their own
country in order to demonstrate that "we are better than Milosevic".
The
most significant of these lies is that the Albanians of Kosovo had to be
rescued by NATO because they were "threatened with genocide" -- a
"genocide" no more real than the "weapons of mass destruction" that
served
as pretext for the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
The Kosovo issue has been used to punish and humiliate
Serbia in a
way that no nation could be expected to accept. Serbia cannot resist
Great
Power dictates, but it can refuse to endorse them. This is not
"nationalism" but elementary dignity.
The Russians and "Plan B"
Although the Ahtisaari plan does not mention "independence",
the
concerned parties seem to get the point It has met with the approval of
Agim Ceku, who as a senior officer in the Croatian army commanded troops
who "ethnically cleansed" Serbs from the Krajina region of Croatia,
before
taking command of Kosovo rebels and rising to his current post of
provisional prime minister of Kosovo. It has been rejected by the
Serbian
government, which states its readiness to grant full autonomy to
Kosovo but
not to give up part of Serbia's historic territory. The Russians
have said
they will not give UN Security Council approval to a plan Serbia
rejects.
Independence for Kosovo is also opposed by European Union Member States
Spain, Slovakia, Rumania, Greece and Cyprus.
The danger of the precedent set by rewarding an armed
secessionist
movement with independent statehood is of concern to much of the world,
since it would almost certainly encourage armed insurrections by ethnic
minority leaders hoping to win Great Power support as "victims" of the
repression they would provoke.
After the death of the non-violent Kosovo Albanian leader
Ibrahim
Rugova, who was denounced in his time for being willing to negotiate
with
Milosevic, Kosovo has fallen into the hands of militia and clan leaders
accused of war crimes. Serbia on the other hand is run by what the IC
describes as "pro-Western democrats". This makes no difference to
the U.S.
tilt toward the Albanians. After all, there is nothing to fear from
"pro-Western democrats", whereas the Albanian nationalists risk running
amok, as they did in March 2004, if they don't get what they consider
was
promised them by NATO's war.
Kosovo Albanian leaders have long announced that they intend to
declare independence, regardless of the UN Security Council.
According to
Fred Abrahams of Human Rights Watch, "If the UN Security Council
fails to
approve the plan, then Washington could turn to Plan B: unilateral
recognition by the United States, the United Kingdom, and then other
states."[2]
This could lead to armed conflict if an "independent" Albanian
nationalist Kosovo government undertook to extend its rule to Serbian
enclaves, especially the solidly Serb northern part of the province
whose
inhabitants will surely wish to remain part of Serbia. Even Serbs who
might
want to forget about Kosovo cannot easily abandon their compatriots
besieged in Kosovo by fanaticized mobs. The United States will of course
blame the Serbs for whatever goes wrong. And meanwhile NATO has made
contingency plans to evacuate the remaining Serbs from their ancestral
homes in Kosovo -- all to avoid partition, which is ruled out by the
doctrine of imposed "multiculturalism".
* Diana Johnstone is author of Fools' Crusade: Yugoslavia, NATO and
Western
Delusions, Monthly Review:PlutoPress. She can be reached at
dianajohnstone @ compuserve.com
--------
END NOTES
1 - See the United States Institute of Peace Special Report No. 95,
November 2002, "Simulating Kosovo: Lessons for Final Status
Negotiations".
The government-financed gaming exercises were conducted by the Public
International Law and Policy Group on September 28 and November 2, 2001,
and February 15, 2002 at American University in Washington, D.C.
2. Fred Abrahams, "Kosovo's Tricky Waltz", Foreign Policy In Focus,
February 7, 2007.