Belgrade _ The United States will cooperate with Serbia because it has opted for a European path, a Washington official has said.

Daniel Fried, the US Under-Secretary of State for Europe and Eurasia, told reporters at the State Department that his country was ready to cooperate “in a responsible way” with the coalition in Serbia that “includes the Socialist Party of Serbia.”

“After so many difficult years, Serbia deserves peace at home and peace in its neighbourhood, and we will work with them on that,” Fried said.

He referred to the situation in Kosovo, saying it was a “relatively peaceful and successful beginning to the process started by the declaration of independence.”

However, those were only the first steps by the new state which “is facing serious challenges,” he said, particularly mentioning the situation in northern Kosovo where local Serbs do not recognise Pristina’s authority and are against the European Union taking over as the main international presence from the United Nations.

Fried also warned that Russia’s opposition to Kosovo’s UN membership would not change the fact that the former Serbian province is independent.

“Kosovo is independent regardless of having or not a UN declaration confirming it. We’re sorry that Russia is making this more difficult instead of facilitating it,” Fried argued.

He added that by doing that, Moscow is not only jeopardising security in the region but also Serbia’s European future.

“We expect from Russia not to try to prevent President (Boris) Tadic and Prime Minister (Mirko) Cvetkovic to commit themselves to Serbia’s European outlook,” he cautioned.

El reconocimiento por Occidente de la declaración unilateral de independencia de Kosovo 'es un peligroso y desgraciado precedente, que costará caro a Europa durante décadas', advierte el presidente ruso, Dmitry Medvedev.

En una entrevista con el diario británico 'The Guardian', Medvedev señala que 'es evidente que toda una serie de regímenes separatistas explotarán (ese hecho) para justificar sus propios deseos de estatus legal' de independencia.

Medvedev critica al secretario general de la ONU, Ban Ki-moon, por haberse declarado públicamente a favor de la decisión de la Unión Europea de sustituir la administración de las Naciones Unidas en la antigua provincia serbia por una presencia de la propia UE.

Según Medvedev las decisiones 'tiene que adoptarlas el Consejo de Seguridad. Y resulta extraño que sin que el Consejo se haya pronunciado y, sin embargo, el secretario general se pronuncie en público'.

Preguntado por Irán, Medvedev critica también a la UE por reforzar las sanciones contra ese país y congelar los activos de su banco principal justo cuando progresaban las negociaciones.

'Si estamos en conversaciones con ellos, deberíamos evitar las acciones capaces de irritar al liderazgo iraní y que puedan llevar a nuevas sanciones. No entiendo por qué la Unión Europea emprendió su última acción (contra Irán)', señala el presidente ruso.

'O hablamos con ellos o intentamos criticarlos con cualquier pretexto', se queja Medvedev, quien asegura haber tratado el asunto con el presidente de la Comisión Europea, José Manuel Barroso, y el alto representante para la política exterior de la UE, Javier Solana.

Sobre el sistema financiero mundial, una de las materias que dominarán la próxima reunión del G-8, Medvedev dice que 'ante todo debe ser más justo y tener en cuenta los riesgos que hoy tienen relevancia', como 'la experiencia negativa' de la crisis de las hipotecas que no sólo ha afectado a Estados Unidos.

'Tenemos que formular propuestas y comenzar negociaciones para discutir la forma que debe aceptar este sistema. (...) Nosotros preparamos también nuestras propias propuestas...pero ello no significa que haya que demoler un edificio creado durante varias décadas', explica el presidente ruso.

'Pero hay algo absolutamente claro -agrega- y es que tiene que ser mejorado, tiene que estar más actualizado y mejor protegido frente a los riesgos. No debe resentirse tampoco de los egoísmos nacionales, ya sean financieros o económicos y ha de ser más justo para con otros países'.

Medvedev se queja de que hay una dependencia excesiva del dólar y afirma que el rublo debería ser una moneda de reserva ahora que es convertible.

'El sistema no puede estar orientado hacia un sólo país y una sola moneda. En el futuro debe basarse en el equilibrio entre las principales economías y en el principio de varias monedas de reserva', propone el presidente ruso.

Agencia EFE

Extraído de Terra Actualidad.

ABOUT THIS FILM: War Photographer is the 2001 Academy Award Nominee for Best Documentary Feature that follows preeminent war photographer James Nachtwey for two years as he bravely documents the harrowing realities of Kosovo, Rawanda, Indonesia, and the West Bank.

If I forget thee O Kosovo my Jerusalem let my right hand be forgotten. Let my tongue cleave to my throat if I forget thee my Metohija, if I do not have thee as the opening of my song, my psalmody to my God and my Saviour.

Stefan of Metohija
Hariton of Kosovo

+) Monk Hariton (Lukic) was kidnapped by Shqiptars (Albanians), in front of KFOR soldiers right in the middle of Prizren on the 14^th of June 1999. +) Hieromonk Stefan (Puljic) was kidnapped in front of Budisavci Monastery in Metohija on the 19th of July 1999 by Roman Catholic Albanians. To this day, two wordly powers NATO and UNMIK could not report that they had found any trace of either man.

Blessed art Thou, O Lord, the God of our Fathers, for righteous are all Thy works, and truthful are Thou in all Thy deeds; upright are Thy ways and Thy judgements are true and they bring salvation.

Judgements of truth and righteousness and punishment that leads to salvation hast Thou performed in all things which Thou hast brought upon us and upon our people and our land for our sins. In truth and righteousness Thou hast surrendered us into the hands of lawless enemies, the most hateful apostates and the ungodly among our own people and enslaved us through unjust foreign masters and a tyrant of this world most wicked of all in the earth.

For Thou were angered and we transgressed said one of Thy servants in the days of old, but it is more appropriate for us to say: we transgressed and that is why Thou were angered. And truly we have sinned, transgressed, and forsaken Thou and Thy covenant; we have sinned in everything and Thy commandments that lead to salvation we either ignored or did not manage to keep alive as Thou commanded so that we could live well upon the land that Thou our Lord and God has granted us.

[-- MORE --]

And we Americans are to blame for much of what has happened!!

Wherever these non-humans from the West come they only bring wars and suffering. They say that they came to bring peace and human rights to all, but instead they brought even bigger injustice and more suffering, never resolving any evil, only increasing and extending it. You see them outwardly full of flattery but violent, fine sounding but incredibly brutal. They resemble their tools and their weapons of destruction, inhuman as the godlessness of their tyranny. They say that they are the measure of this world, the "judges" of everything in it, but they neither have the measure of Justice nor, in fact, do they want to know the Truth. Their lips speak glowingly about the "new order" of things in the world, but their treachery is as old and worn out as their sins and their inhumanity. They grew old and worn out in their hearts, being eaten from the inside by fear of not appearing successful (which NATO calls its credibility) and thus losing confidence that they still are the leaders who should bring happiness to mankind. Their "new order" is only old-new enslavement by various passions and greed contained in their interests, in their devilish lust for power through which they aim to conquer the world and reshape it after their own image. Whoever does not comply is labelled as the worst, as the "rogue state", or as "uncooperative" and non-flexible with regard to their plans and interests and as such is denied the right to exist. Their mouths are full of words about freedom, while they remain slaves to greed, the basest of passions and unconcealed idol-worship of false deities. Wherever they come and pass through "their leave traces that reek of their inhumanity". They are constantly yelling: "Peace, peace! - But there is no peace in their hearts or their consciences. Wherever they come they bring turmoil in their train and it appears their only instrument of "peace" are, in fact, bombs and tanks, NATO occupation and coercion, using deadly weapons of war. There is a constant war raging in their souls and that is why they spread wars wherever they appear. Or, without formal declaration of war itself lead "air campaigns," a term they euphemistically use to conceal the annihilation of a country and its inhabitants with radioactive bombs and fiendish rockets. All this they like to call Europe and Western "civilization" and we call it NATOisation of the final remnants of Europe, and the dimming twilight of a civilization that was once called Christian.

[-- MORE --]

Serbia is one of the oldest European Christian nations - and we have the gall to turn it over to the Islamacists?!

“It is a place completely independent, regardless of whether a UN resolution says that exists or not. It is independent. Kosovo has been recognized by two-thirds of the EU sates, Europe, Japan and Australia. It is as an independent country. I feel sorry that Russia has chosen to make this thing more difficult rather than to ease it, risking the stability but also the European future of Serbia”.

Few comments:

• Completely independent must be a joke. Kosovo is UN protectorate where UN and EU are arguing who has authority to supervise it, Kosovo is occupied by KFOR troops owns one of the biggest Nato bases in its territory and has all symptoms to come next "failed state" in World.
• Recognizing as argument fails also: 40 countries is not the world, some World´s biggest countries - Brazil, China, India, Russia have not recognized it are not planning to do it before new negotiations about status.
• Russia has indeed made thing more difficult because it has defended UN Charter and international law which US&allies have been breaking last decades.
• Strong arguments could be made that US Balkan policy has been risking the Balkan stability by creating a precedent to some 5000 ethnic groups scattered across the globe.

James Bisset was Canada's ambassador to Yugoslavia, Bulgaria and Albania. He is widely recognized as one of the foremost authorities on Balkan politics. I agree with most of his analysis and quote one of them here:

"United States policy in the Balkans has been dysfunctional since March 1992 when their Ambassador, Warren Zimmerman, persuaded Izetbegovic the Islamist leader of the Bosnian Muslims to withdraw his signature to the Lisbon Agreement. This decision which led to US acceptance of the results of an illegal referendum and recognition of the first Muslim state in Europe triggered civil war in Bosnia and led directly to the death and destruction that followed. In the following years US decisions have proven to be equally disastrous for the region.

The decision of the United States government to support the cause of the terrorist KLA in its armed rebellion to secede from Yugoslavia is another example of US policy making gone wrong.Their current policy supporting independence for Kosovo is but another chapter in an unfolding series of strategic errors.

United States policy in the Balkans has been characterized by cynicism, duplicity and short term tactical gain. By backing Islamist aims in the region and supporting terrorist groups in Kosovo there might be the immediate advantage of establishing a large military base in Kosovo or appeasing further Albanian demands by advocating independence for Kosovo but in the long term it will backfire."

To me it is alarming, that this US policy has made both during democratic and republican US presidents and not only in Balkans but e.g. in Iraq also. Future shows if the change will come with new president, will he change old advisers also. And will US succeed to gain support for these actions either through the use of NATO or by persuading the European Community or the newly emerging states of Central and Eastern Europe to get on side.

That was before I went to Kosovo in 1998.

In the northern provinces of Kosovo, the demographics are the exact reverse of that in the rest of the country.  While all but the northern three provinces are predominantly Albanian, Leposavic and two others are more than 80% Serbian.  In Leposavic, Albanians and Serbs lived and worked side-by-side until the KLA came along.  The Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) didn't think it should be that way.  They were then and are now a terrorist Albanian guerilla organisation backed by money made off the illegal drug trade, and their mission has always been to cleanse all of Kosovo of ethnic Serbs.  When Milosevic was in power in Yugoslavia, a great deal of strife occurred in most of Kosovo, and I will be the first to say that this should not have been.  To take Milosevic down was not the bad thing.  What transpired with Serbs even in predominantly Serbian provinces, however, was very bad.  The KLA took it upon themselves to force Albanians to quit working with Serbs, threatening their families and demanding Albanians "out" their Serbian friends and neighbours.  I saw this.  I saw people shot in the street because they were Serbians.  I saw families lose their houses to fire and destruction by the KLA for associating with the "wrong" people.  I even saw the Albanian KLA shoot and kill fellow Albanians because they would not give up their friends and family to torture and certain death.

I experienced their wrath, myself, while I was working with both Serbs and Albanians to find shelter and food and clothing for themselves and for their children.  I comforted women who lost their husbands.  I cared for children who lost both parents.  I wept with parents whose children were caught in the crossfire and killed.  For this, I was yanked out of bed in the middle of the night, a gun shoved in my mouth, demands made of me that I could not fulfill, and let go because I was an American.  Then they shot dead an Albanian friend of mine who had been helping me help others.

Setting off M-80s and rockets and anything else that makes the noise of machine-gun fire and roadside bombs and standard gunfire makes for one hell of a night for me.  Independence Day frivolity is not my friend.  It's only once a year.  Who am I to tell people who have never experienced life in a region in conflict that the play-time war zone they create in their back yards so close to my home has such a negative effect?  

As I have every Independence Day for the last 10 years, I have borne the noise and spent the night awake to avoid the nightmares, rocking in the closet where it is dark and where they cannot find me.

My heart goes out to every single war veteran and NGO worker who has gone through similar situations, and to those whose nights are affected like mine when this happens.  I sincerely hope the rest of America, who have never been touched in this way, live out the rest of their lives conflict-free.

Below the fold you'll find some background information on me, and what you'll find on these pages in the future.

I was born in 1975 in a small town in central Finland. Travelling has always been one of my big passions. I moved out of Finland in 1997, and have been on the road for most of the years since. I've lived in 5 countries (USA, Hong Kong, Kosovo and the Netherlands) and visited well over 30, some of which don't even exist anymore due to geopolitical upheavals. I currently live and work in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

I have a Bachelors degree in Economics & Business from one of the top American educational institutions, and studied for my Masters in Finance & Economics in Holland. I currently work in corporate finance as a finance manager for a Fortune 50 company, and enjoy it, and its trappings and spoils immensely. I have background in the military as well. On my free time I watch movies, read non-fiction, lift weights, play games on my PS3 and Wii, do travel photography and some occasional fiction writing. And I travel: next up is Hong Kong and Beijing in early August to see the Olympic Games and the Opening Ceremony!

While I like living in Amsterdam, I'm looking for something better. People often ask me what's the best place I've ever visited - more on that at a later date -, and that has left a nagging feeling: why am I not living there, or somewhere even better? Somewhere with an agreeable climate and people, good career opportunities, pretty ladies and good prospects for building a family.

I have set a goal for myself to find a place to settle in permanently by the end of 2010. I welcome you to help me on that endeavor, or just to enjoy the ride!

it is a public shame.

so, to mitigate the effects of this public shame, we have teamed up with Kosovo Railways, a leader in innovative South-eastern European railway partnerships, and General G. S. “Burger” Patton to embark on a radical restructuring of our railways, which, so far, regrettably, serve only annoying, overweight, foreign tourists.

and, to give you an introduction to what lies ahead and to the highly innovative entity that is the new Kosovo Railways, let’s read together what its Managing Director, Xhevat R., has to say about their new identity.

---

Dear readers,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

First Railway line in Kosovo is constructed in 1874 in route Hani i Elezit- Fushë Kosovë- Mitrovicë. Later is started and was completed construction of existing railway network throughout Kosovo territory. Kosovo Railways is extended to entire Kosovo territory with network of 333,451 km. Industrial railway lines are not included to above mentioned distance and covers 103, 4 km of railway. Railway lines are linkage between all most important centers of Kosovo except Gjakova and Gjilani. Railway lines of Kosovo have direct links also with neighboring countries such is Macedonia and Serbia and through them with othercountries as well.

Kosovo Railways are in very bed situation. Railway Infrastructure (Tracks, Station Buildings, Signaling, Telecommunication and Power Supply Equipments), then Railway Operations (Locomotives, Passenger and Freight Wagons, Workshops, etc.); requests big investments, maximal engagement of all employees, management staff and other responsible authorities in order to improve existing situation.

I know that to achieve this, there are many obstacles and difficulties in our way. Nevertheless, with clear objectives, good prepared actions and plans, I believe that we will achieve desirous results.

One famous American General said:

"You must never try to make circumstances fit the plan: you must always make the plan fit the circumstances".
George S. Patton 1944

If the circumstances change and the Plan has to fit those changing circumstances, then the Plan must change too. If the Plan cannot adjust to changing circumstances, it will quickly become out-dated and be put on the shelf to collect dust. We cannot have a Plan which presumes tomorrow's list of problems will be the same as today's.

We cannot have a Plan, which presumes that the money available to solve those problems will always be there. We should be prepared for challenges in our way. Therefore, based in all this, what was mention above, I consider that with a good work, with an authentic management and with possible investments, Railways of Kosovo JSC will have a more brilliant future from this in which are now.

No doubt, this is one big challenge, for what, we should be prepared and to create enough capacity to realize foreseen objectives.

Kosovo Railways JSC everyday is moving ahead. Our vision is very clear. We will be the main providers of transport of goods and passengers within and outside of Kosovo. Realisation of this objective has started and we are working to complete with the success this mission.

Therefore, with known motto: "Client has always right" we welcome all individuals and companies inside and outside of Kosovo to use possibilities which offers Kosovo Railways JSC. We guaranty to all the same possibilities and chances without difference in gender, nationality, religion or race. We are open and transparent against everybody with the aim not to disappoint ever our clients.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Our todays and future clients, Kosovo Railways are expecting you to use possibilities, which these railways offer to you. Therefore, welcome in our joint train, which is moving towards United Europe, which is moving toward the future.

Managing Director of KR,
Xhevat R.

source

E' rimbalzata sui media una triste storia di cronaca, che riguarda una ragazzina venduta dai genitori come sposa ad un uomo. La vicenda è venuta a galla quando la dodicenne ha partorito in ospedale. I medici si sono evidentemente resi conto che c'era qualcosa di terribilmente strano ed hanno consentito l'avvio di indagini. I risultati sono stati soprendenti (in senso negativo). A undici anni la ragazzina è stata venduta dai suoi genitori alla famiglia dello sposo per una cifra pari a 17.000 Euro, un anno dopo ha dato alla luce una bambina qui in Italia.
La storia in altre aree del mondo sarebbe purtroppo vista senza stupore alcuno. In Italia, dove questo genere di cose non accade da almeno un secolo (non crediate di più) ha avuto il giusto rilievo ed ha destato scandalo. Quello che mi ha fatto impressione, a parte l'inumanità di questa vicenda umana, è che noi italiani non abbiamo capito niente. I giornali hanno detto che la ragazzina è serba ed è stata venduta ad un cossovaro di religione mussulmana. Hanno aggiunto che la stessa ragazzina avrebbe detto che quanto le è accaduto nella regione da cui proviene "è normale". C'è una pericolosa commistione fra correttezza dell'informazione e superficialità.
Probabilmente la ragazzina è cittadina serba, mentre lo sposo "acquirente" è cittadino del territorio del Kosovo. La sostanza dei fatti non cambia, ma chi conosce i serbi e la loro cultura sa molto bene che in Serbia non è per nulla normale che accadano cose del genere. I Serbi sono gente civile e degnissima, forse dovremmo conoscerli prima di giudicarli. E poi giudicare un popolo è sempre un'operazione pericolosa, si cade nei luoghi comuni, che sono sempre sbagliati.
In Italia poi siamo abituati a fare confusione con leggerezza fra cittadinanza, nazionalità e cultura. Forse è un complesso che ci portiamo dietro, perché nel fondo del nostro cuore sappiamo di essere tutti cittadini di un grande Paese, ma che questo non coincide con una sola nazione. Siamo portati allo sciovinismo, ma c'è anche tanta ignoranza, troppa.
Sospetto che la ragazzina "serba" non sia per nulla serba. In Italia non ci degnamo di capire cosa succede e cosa c'è al dilà dell'Adriatico. Questo mare per gli italiani è un muro.
Siamo dei pasticcioni. Confodiamo i Rom coi Rumeni, il che non è cosa da poco. Ora consideriamo Serbi gente che probabilmente non lo sono. La cosa straordinaria è che nessuno si sogna ancora di chiamare Italiano un ragazzino con la pelle nera nato nel nostro paese, che è cittadino italiano, cresciuto in Italia e magari parla la nostra lingua molto meglio di tanti indigeni.
Tutta questa ignoranza e questa confusione giovano solo a chi vive sul razzismo ed a chi fa male il proprio mestiere. Si, perché cari amici giornalisti, il dovere di un professionista è verificare le cose prima di scriverle. Altrimenti bisogna fare come me in questo articolo: si dichiara di fare ipotesi. Ben diverso da spacciare congetture per verità.

04 July 2008 Belgrade _ Serbia’s new government will be voted in on Monday, following a deal signed between the pro-Europeans and Socialists.

President Boris Tadic and Ivica Dacic officially signed a coalition deal on the composition of the new cabinet days after they announced the agreement.

Nada Kolundzija, the spokeswoman for Tadic’s pro-European coalition told reporters in the Serbian Parliament that the parliament could end its debate on two crucial laws late Friday enabling the vote on the government to take place on Monday.

Following the signing at Tadic’s office, Dacic told reporters that the new government would work on the preservation of Serbia’s territorial integrity, European integration, economic development and social justice.

He added that another document, a declaration on reconciliation between the two hostile parties in the past would also be signed next week, after the government was formed.

The Socialists, once led by late strongman Slobodan Milosevic, blamed for the 1991-1999 regional wars and the economic devastation of Serbia, have been at odds with the Democrats for years.

But after emerging as “king makers” following the May 11 elections, they became an inevitable partner for Tadic and their coalition has been welcomed by all major world powers.

In the new cabinet, Dacic’s party and its coalition partners, the United Pensioners and United Serbia, will hold five ministries, including the Interior Ministry.

Dacic said that Friday’s talks did not include a deal on the composition of a new authority for Belgrade.

Sharing power in the capital has become a hot issue after Socialists and nationalists signed an accord on ruling Belgrade and following statements from Tadic’s camp that it has to be reversed and that the city authorities would have to reflect the governing coalition at the national level.

1) Sarkozy argued against Turkey’s entry into the EU on the grounds that ‘Turkey is in Asia Minor’ and that ‘I won’t be able to explain to French school kids that Europe’s border neighbors are Iraq and Syria.’ He is, meanwhile, no doubt aware that the state of which he is head includes territories in the Caribbean, South America and the Indian Ocean as its integral parts or ‘overseas departments’. It is difficult to believe that the French president genuinely has difficulty with the concept of an EU including Turkey, which was part of the Ancient Greek world and the Roman Empire and whose largest city was for a time the Roman capital, but has no difficulty with the concept of a France that borders on Brazil. Or that he is unaware that EU member Cyprus is, geographically, more wholly Asian than Turkey. Either Sarkozy really is spectacularly ignorant - which I find difficult to believe - or he is cynically playing up to the popular ignorance and chauvinism of his citizens in the most vulgar manner.

2) At the NATO summit in Bucharest in April, Sarkozy vetoed the granting of a Membership Action Plan to Georgia and Ukraine; for all his denial, he appears to have done so because he did not want to offend Russia. This makes no sense in terms of principles; it is as if Norway should have been denied NATO membership so as not to offend Sweden; or Poland, so as not to offend Belarus. A sovereign state's right to join a military alliance cannot be the subject of a veto by one of its neighbours; otherwise it ceases to be sovereign. The deference to Russia harks back to an era of imperial spheres of influence. Sarkozy appears less interested in the principle of European unity than in pursuing old-style imperial diplomacy on the European continent.

3) Sarkozy has long supported Greece in its dispute with Macedonia without pretending that this has anything to do with principles: ‘I always stressed that we support the Greek position in the name issue. Greeks are our friends.’ In his most recent statement, however, Sarkozy not only argues that Macedonia should back down because 'the newcomer is the one that should make efforts', but reportedly also on the grounds that Macedonia is a 'non-democratic country'. This marks a new low in French efforts to destabilise a fragile country that was deemed sufficiently democratic by the international community to warrant international recognition back in 1992, and whose provisions for minority rights are incomparably better than that of Greece, which does not even recognise the existence of its Macedonian and Turkish minorities. The consequences of a Macedonian collapse for peace and stability in Europe should not need emphasising; Sarkozy is playing his cynical, Gaullist game in the most irresponsible manner possible.

4) While denying Macedonia's democratic credentials, France under Sarkozy is reverting to the traditional French policy of supporting Serbia, the country primarily responsible for the catastrophes in the Balkans in the 1990s, and whose attempts to undermine Kosova's independence are endangering peace and stability in the Balkans more than anything else. France's ambassador in Belgrade, Jean Francois Terral, is reported to have described Serbia as 'the country with the greatest possibilities in the Balkans'. He is quoted as saying that 'as far as France is concerned, Serbia has the priority among Western Balkan states'. After all the efforts in which the West has engaged in this decade, to encourage Serbia to change its ways and behave in a responsible manner, France now appears to be reinforcing the old, destructive belief of Serbia's - that it is a natural regional hegemon with a right to preeminence over its smaller and weaker neighbours. And this without demanding any commensurate change in Serbian policy toward Kosova.

5) While rewarding the two Balkan states - Greece and Serbia - that are pursuing the most destructive, nationalistic policies at the expense of the wider region, Sarkozy has taken efforts to punish Croatia, a state that has turned its back on extreme nationalism. In contrast to Serbia, Croatia since 2000 has abandoned expansionism vis-a-vis Bosnia, abandoned support for anti-Bosnian separatists and come round to full cooperation with the war-crimes tribunal in the Hague. Yet in response to the Irish rejection of the Lisbon Treaty, Sarkozy has announced that France will veto further EU enlargement until the treaty is ratified - a step that above all punishes Croatia, which is the next state slated for EU membership. Showing scant regard for the democratic will of his fellow Europeans, he appears to be willing to punish Croatia and other EU aspirants for the fact that votes within the EU have not gone his way.

Nicolas Sarkozy is a sorry excuse for a European. His foreign policy makes no pretence at being guided by any principles or consistency, and he appears to revel in its selfish, nationally egotistical character. Nevertheless, at a certain level, one must admire his readiness to behave so unreasonably: the EU is a body that rewards the unreasonable and the selfish and that punishes the well behaved. If an EU member - or indeed a non-member - wishes to get its way, it pays for it to be stubborn and obstructive, as then the EU's spineless, amoral bureaucrats will pander to it with talk about a 'compromise acceptable to both sides' or other such cliches designed to conceal appeasement. It is difficult to see that Sarkozy's policy toward South East Europe is inspired by anything other than short-term, tactical and narrowly national considerations, but he is at least prepared to go about trying to get what he wants.

It would be encouraging if our own British government were to be similarly stubborn and obstructive in pursuit of goals where, justifiably, our policies have diverged from France's: over EU and NATO expansion; Turkey; Macedonia; etc. Were it to do so, it would achieve more than it does. But I'm not holding my breath.

Report from Balkan Insight:

03 July 2008 Pristina _ Kosovo belongs only to its own citizens and no international court can strike down its independence, Kosovo’s President Fatmir Sejdiu says.

Sejdiu emphasised on Wednesday that the idea of Serbian President Boris Tadic taking the case of Kosovo’s independence to the International Court of Justice is a wrong approach arguing Kosovo is now moving forward and there can be no reversal.

“That is, I may say, a bad approach of Serbia and therefore of its President too,” Sejdiu told Germany’s Radio Deutsche Welle in an interview.

He added that “Kosovo is not a part that has been cut off from another part but it has its body and it belongs to its own citizens in the same way as it brought freedom to its own citizens.”

He was referring to the idea launched earlier by Tadic that Serbia will question the legality of Kosovo’s independence at the International Court of Justice.

Kosovo declared independence with the backing of western powers in February this year, after being governed by the United Nations for over nine years and talks between Belgrade and Pristina on its final status failed.

Kosovo’s independence is strongly opposed by Serbia and its chief ally Russia, who argue it is not part of a mutually-agreed deal.

Sejdiu pointed out that “no international court would be competent in dealing with the issue [proposed by Tadic],” adding that “only the international community was a part of the joint achievement of Kosovo’s independence and it is the community’s role that counts.”

“I consider such a demand by Tadic or of anyone else as an effort to keep Kosovo within a state that has previously been hegemonic,” he concluded.

Just as a footnote: Kosovo was granted a special status within the Yugoslav Federation, before Milosevic, and was treated as an equal to Serbia and the other states (although it was still defined as being a part of Serbia). After Milosevic, the alleged demon who revoked Kosovo's autonomy, Kosovo still had autonomy, although its special status was revoked because of protests from the Serbs. So Kosovo being under a hegemonic state is another one of Fatmir Sejdium's (Kosovo's "president") fantasies.

Din EurActiv.

Serbs in Kosovo's divided city of Mitrovica have announced they will establish their own parliament on 28 June. Although UN officials played down the move, EU diplomats told EurActiv they were concerned about "the future of Kosovo".

(...)

The new parliament will consist of Serb representatives elected on 11 May in local elections in Kosovo, held in defiance of the international community and ignoring Kosovo's newly proclaimed independence.

(...).

Si, in plus:

But speaking on condition of anonymity, a diplomat from an EU country that has not recognised Kosovo's independence said the development comes as proof that the decision to establish a state within the limits of the Serb province was wrong.

Daniel Fried, the US Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs said the USA would offer 400 million dollars (9.391 billion roubles. 254.4 million euros. 201.64 million UK pounds) to the self-proclaimed republic of Kosovo. Judging by what Assistant Secretary Fried said, Washington expects its European allies to follow suit. Mr Fried said that much more than a billion dollars (23.51 billion roubles. 636 million euros. 504 million UK pounds) might be collected at a US–EU-sponsored conference of donor-countries, which is to be held in Brussels at the end of next week. This sum of money will enable Kosovo to get a good start, Mr Fried said. 

To call a spade a spade, the USA and its partners are laying a financial foundation for the sovereignty of Kosovo. Their donations will be spent in an effort to build a judiciary, a police force, and other elements of the governmental structure of that self-proclaimed republic. They will also be spent in attempts to streamline economic programs in economically-troubled Kosovo. Kosovo is a stillborn republic. The years that have passed since its separation from Serbia prove that beyond doubt. Only Western aid and drug trafficking keep it afloat. Left to its own devices, a legally- and economically-troubled Kosovo would have collapsed long ago. It owes its bogus sovereignty to NATO, whose vision of the Balkans has no room for a united Yugoslavia or the legal successor to that country, Serbia.

Nadezhda Arbatova, an expert with the Centre of European studies under the Institute of the Global Economy and International Relations, sees those foreign-sponsored processes as a threat to the Balkans. In Ms Arbatova’s view, “any move for Kosovar sovereignty will, in the absence of a legal foundation for it, send tension up inside Kosovo and in neighbouring countries. Furthermore, because they incite separatism, these sorts of moves will exert an equally negative influence on the Albanian minorities in other countries”. 

The US and EU strategy for Kosovo sets a dangerous precedent and, as Russian President Medvedev told journalists of the world’s leading industrialised nations, it will take Europe decades to eliminate their negative after-effects.

3 July 2008

Voice of Russia World Service

http://www.ruvr.ru/main.php?lng=eng&q=29210&cid=67&p=03.07.2008 (in English) 

Fifty-four years ago to the day, a young Jewish boy from a small town in the Carpathian Mountains woke up, not far from Goethe's beloved Weimar, in a place of eternal infamy called Buchenwald. He was finally free, but there was no joy in his heart. He thought there never would be again.

Liberated a day earlier by American soldiers, he remembers their rage at what they saw. And even if he lives to be a very old man, he will always be grateful to them for that rage, and also for their compassion. Though he did not understand their language, their eyes told him what he needed to know -- that they, too, would remember, and bear witness.

And now, I stand before you, Mr. President -- Commander-in-Chief of the army that freed me, and tens of thousands of others -- and I am filled with a profound and abiding gratitude to the American people.

Gratitude is a word that I cherish. Gratitude is what defines the humanity of the human being. And I am grateful to you, Hillary -- or Mrs. Clinton -- for what you said, and for what you are doing for children in the world, for the homeless, for the victims of injustice, the victims of destiny and society. And I thank all of you for being here.

We are on the threshold of a new century, a new millennium. What will the legacy of this vanishing century be? How will it be remembered in the new millennium? Surely it will be judged, and judged severely, in both moral and metaphysical terms. These failures have cast a dark shadow over humanity: two World Wars, countless civil wars, the senseless chain of assassinations -- Gandhi, the Kennedys, Martin Luther King, Sadat, Rabin -- bloodbaths in Cambodia and Nigeria, India and Pakistan, Ireland and Rwanda, Eritrea and Ethiopia, Sarajevo and Kosovo; the inhumanity in the gulag and the tragedy of Hiroshima. And, on a different level, of course, Auschwitz and Treblinka. So much violence, so much indifference.

What is indifference? Etymologically, the word means "no difference." A strange and unnatural state in which the lines blur between light and darkness, dusk and dawn, crime and punishment, cruelty and compassion, good and evil.

What are its courses and inescapable consequences? Is it a philosophy? Is there a philosophy of indifference conceivable? Can one possibly view indifference as a virtue? Is it necessary at times to practice it simply to keep one's sanity, live normally, enjoy a fine meal and a glass of wine, as the world around us experiences harrowing upheavals?

Of course, indifference can be tempting -- more than that, seductive. It is so much easier to look away from victims. It is so much easier to avoid such rude interruptions to our work, our dreams, our hopes. It is, after all, awkward, troublesome, to be involved in another person's pain and despair. Yet, for the person who is indifferent, his or her neighbor are of no consequence. And, therefore, their lives are meaningless. Their hidden or even visible anguish is of no interest. Indifference reduces the other to an abstraction.

Over there, behind the black gates of Auschwitz, the most tragic of all prisoners were the "Muselmanner," as they were called. Wrapped in their torn blankets, they would sit or lie on the ground, staring vacantly into space, unaware of who or where they were, strangers to their surroundings. They no longer felt pain, hunger, thirst. They feared nothing. They felt nothing. They were dead and did not know it.

Rooted in our tradition, some of us felt that to be abandoned by humanity then was not the ultimate. We felt that to be abandoned by God was worse than to be punished by Him. Better an unjust God than an indifferent one. For us to be ignored by God was a harsher punishment than to be a victim of His anger. Man can live far from God -- not outside God. God is wherever we are. Even in suffering? Even in suffering.

In a way, to be indifferent to that suffering is what makes the human being inhuman. Indifference, after all, is more dangerous than anger and hatred. Anger can at times be creative. One writes a great poem, a great symphony, one does something special for the sake of humanity because one is angry at the injustice that one witnesses. But indifference is never creative. Even hatred at times may elicit a response. You fight it. You denounce it. You disarm it. Indifference elicits no response. Indifference is not a response.

Indifference is not a beginning, it is an end. And, therefore, indifference is always the friend of the enemy, for it benefits the aggressor -- never his victim, whose pain is magnified when he or she feels forgotten. The political prisoner in his cell, the hungry children, the homeless refugees -- not to respond to their plight, not to relieve their solitude by offering them a spark of hope is to exile them from human memory. And in denying their humanity we betray our own.

Indifference, then, is not only a sin, it is a punishment. And this is one of the most important lessons of this outgoing century's wide-ranging experiments in good and evil.

In the place that I come from, society was composed of three simple categories: the killers, the victims, and the bystanders. During the darkest of times, inside the ghettoes and death camps -- and I'm glad that Mrs. Clinton mentioned that we are now commemorating that event, that period, that we are now in the Days of Remembrance -- but then, we felt abandoned, forgotten. All of us did.

And our only miserable consolation was that we believed that Auschwitz and Treblinka were closely guarded secrets; that the leaders of the free world did not know what was going on behind those black gates and barbed wire; that they had no knowledge of the war against the Jews that Hitler's armies and their accomplices waged as part of the war against the Allies.

If they knew, we thought, surely those leaders would have moved heaven and earth to intervene. They would have spoken out with great outrage and conviction. They would have bombed the railways leading to Birkenau, just the railways, just once.

And now we knew, we learned, we discovered that the Pentagon knew, the State Department knew. And the illustrious occupant of the White House then, who was a great leader -- and I say it with some anguish and pain, because, today is exactly 54 years marking his death -- Franklin Delano Roosevelt died on April the 12th, 1945, so he is very much present to me and to us.

No doubt, he was a great leader. He mobilized the American people and the world, going into battle, bringing hundreds and thousands of valiant and brave soldiers in America to fight fascism, to fight dictatorship, to fight Hitler. And so many of the young people fell in battle. And, nevertheless, his image in Jewish history -- I must say it -- his image in Jewish history is flawed.

The depressing tale of the St. Louis is a case in point. Sixty years ago, its human cargo -- maybe 1,000 Jews -- was turned back to Nazi Germany. And that happened after the Kristallnacht, after the first state sponsored pogrom, with hundreds of Jewish shops destroyed, synagogues burned, thousands of people put in concentration camps. And that ship, which was already on the shores of the United States, was sent back.

I don't understand. Roosevelt was a good man, with a heart. He understood those who needed help. Why didn't he allow these refugees to disembark? A thousand people -- in America, a great country, the greatest democracy, the most generous of all new nations in modern history. What happened? I don't understand. Why the indifference, on the highest level, to the suffering of the victims?

But then, there were human beings who were sensitive to our tragedy. Those non-Jews, those Christians, that we called the "Righteous Gentiles," whose selfless acts of heroism saved the honor of their faith. Why were they so few? Why was there a greater effort to save SS murderers after the war than to save their victims during the war?

Why did some of America's largest corporations continue to do business with Hitler's Germany until 1942? It has been suggested, and it was documented, that the Wehrmacht could not have conducted its invasion of France without oil obtained from American sources. How is one to explain their indifference?

And yet, my friends, good things have also happened in this traumatic century: the defeat of Nazism, the collapse of communism, the rebirth of Israel on its ancestral soil, the demise of apartheid, Israel's peace treaty with Egypt, the peace accord in Ireland. And let us remember the meeting, filled with drama and emotion, between Rabin and Arafat that you, Mr. President, convened in this very place. I was here and I will never forget it.

And then, of course, the joint decision of the United States and NATO to intervene in Kosovo and save those victims, those refugees, those who were uprooted by a man whom I believe that because of his crimes, should be charged with crimes against humanity. But this time, the world was not silent. This time, we do respond. This time, we intervene.

Does it mean that we have learned from the past? Does it mean that society has changed? Has the human being become less indifferent and more human? Have we really learned from our experiences? Are we less insensitive to the plight of victims of ethnic cleansing and other forms of injustices in places near and far? Is today's justified intervention in Kosovo, led by you, Mr. President, a lasting warning that never again will the deportation, the terrorization of children and their parents be allowed anywhere in the world? Will it discourage other dictators in other lands to do the same?

What about the children? Oh, we see them on television, we read about them in the papers, and we do so with a broken heart. Their fate is always the most tragic, inevitably. When adults wage war, children perish. We see their faces, their eyes. Do we hear their pleas? Do we feel their pain, their agony? Every minute one of them dies of disease, violence, famine. Some of them -- so many of them -- could be saved.

And so, once again, I think of the young Jewish boy from the Carpathian Mountains. He has accompanied the old man I have become throughout these years of quest and struggle. And together we walk towards the new millennium, carried by profound fear and extraordinary hope.

Zana Krasniqi, Miss Kosovo Univers 2008, will represent Kosovo in the 57th Miss Universe beauty pageant, will be held at the Crown Convention Center (Diamond Bay Resort) in Nha Trang, Vietnam on July 14, 2008

Part 2:

Someone tell this fool to read Resolution 1244. I also love how the US doesn't want interference from any "outside power" and yet won't even acknowledge that its own military base in Kosovo, and the NATO and EU mission all constitute an "outside power." Sort of like Secretary of State Condcleeza Rice's suggestion on how to improve security in Iraq: Block foreign arms and soldiers. Yet, it doesn't hit our secretary that the "foreign arms and soldiers" are the ones occupying the country.

However, time has proven that, on the basis of my nationality, I was unworthed of the discount. On February 16th, the day before the declaration of Independence, the portuguese President, Aníbal Cavaco Silva, made a public statement saying that "he feared that the consequences of the declaration of independence would fall on EU's back". With this statement he successefully undermined the portuguese government strategy to deal with this issue.

The president latter reinforced his case against the independence of Kosova by claiming that all the experts on International Law that he consulted told him that it was illegal, and that Portugal had to bear in mind that it had 300 soldiers in the territory. I would like to know who were these experts and where were they when the portuguese population and its political leaders joined to support the independence of East-Timor (thus assuming its istorical responsabilities for having abandoned the territory in the most shameful way). I would also like to ask those experts if they ever read the Charter of the United Nations and where does it say that new countries may become independent only with prior consent of the Security Council. The argument of the portuguese military is ridiculous, because they are there precisely to garantee that any violent confrontation is prevented or sucessfully halted.

The fact is that Anibal cavaco Silva is nothing more than a narrow minded person who understands nothing of international relations and has very poor advisers. I have to refrain myself in the expression of my despise for the president, because although he happens to represent everything I hate about my country, I have to respect the fact my fellow citizens think otherwise, that's why they keep voting in him. curiously, it never bothered the portuguese president the fact that Portugal was providing de facto exile to the monstruos war criminal Jean Pierre Bemba, againts whom the International Criminal Court issued an international warrant, and who had been confortably living in one of the most expensive and luxurious resorts in Portugal, Quinta do lago, in the Algarve. Bemba was arrested in Belgium in May 24th 2008.

My guess is that the military were the key factor in the presiden't move. I had the opportunity of participating in a workshop some years ago in a military institution, I had several Professors in faculty who were military (some of them were excellent teachers whith whom I learned a lot) and, more recently, I personally met some portuguese military officers that have experience in Kosova and Bosnia, so I pretty much have an idea of their mind set.

One of them actually tried to convince me that it was the Muslims and not the Serbs who shelled the Markale market in Sarajevo and that the Massacre of Srebrenica was a forgery. He actually flooded my email box with photos from Srebrenica, texts by genocide-deniers and and Draza Mihailovic admirers. His main argument to discredit Srebrenica was that, until then """"ONLY"""" a bit less than two thousand bodies had been recovered.

Another one, a guy within the military secret services (how do I know that... well, he didn't tell me, but my job as a researcher is to know things) who contacted me because he didn't believe that a normal portuguese woman would ever be able to risk travelling alone to Kosova and back, so, with his brain full of conspiracy theories, he tried to 'seduce' me (poor guy, it takes much more ...) into telling him the real reasons for my trips. At some point he told me that 'we the portuguese military are pro-serb'. I am quoting. These were his exact words. 'We the portuguese military are pro-serb'. I reminded him that that was not the official position of any portuguese government since it was decided in 1996 to send peace keeping missions to the Balkans, and asked him how could a peace keepin force take sides. I replied that if I knew the Muslims well I would understand why they were pro-serb. I didn't bothered to reply to this, I just told him that if that was his perspective there was nothing to talk about with me. His last rethorical trick was to say that I was obviously biased because of my emotional attachment to the albanian. I simply can't stand it when someone tells me that I am too emotional, especially if it is a man saying it...

(In March 17th, the portuguese military, who are deployed as a tactical reserve unit-I hope this is the right translation to the term- were called to intervene to stop the violent riots provocked by serbian-government backed occupation of a court in Mitrovica... on TV I had the opportunity to listen to a portuguese military saying that he didn't understand how this could have happened, meaning that he had never expected the serbs to attack the UN and to resist to NATO forces. this is what happens when a peacekeeping force chooses sides...)

Back to the president, so far he managed to be successful where the chech president failed. Constitutionally, the recognition of states is an exclusive power of the government, and it is interesting to note that for someone who claims to be defendind international law, exhoribitating his own legal powers is not problematic.

The portuguese government had made clear several times that the independence was the best possible solution, in fact the only possible solution given the failure of the negotiations between Belgrade and Prishtina. During the portuguese presidency of the EU, held in the second semester of 2007, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Luís Amado, made several statements in that sense, and in February 17th 2008 the newspaper Público published statements by the Minister that implicitly rejected the idea of the declaration breaching International law, by saying that "recognition is a prerrogative of states and not of international organizations" thus rejecting the argument that prior consent by the UNSC was required.

The fact that the president strongly opposed to the recognition adds to internal opposition to such decision within the Socialist ruling party, where the most leftist faction indulges in primary anti-americanism, while the Minister is well known for its connections to the USA, and is therefore considered by this faction to be 'a man of the americans'. Here it is important to say that when in 1975 Portugal was on the edge of Civil War, the US supported the Socialist Party in his opposition to the attempt that the Communist Party was making to coopt the state and create a new Cuba in Europe. By then being 'agents of imperialism' was not a problem to the socialists, and in most cases I am not only talking of the same party but also of the same persons.

All of this is agravated by the belief that the Balkans are a nest for islamic terrorists.

Interestingly, it was to Portugal that the islamic terrorists came to buy the explosives that blew up the trains in Madrid in March 11 2004. The large amount of uncontrolled small factories of fireworks makes it very easy to find the type of explosives used in this tragedy.

It was also in Portugal that Tariq Ahmed Dar, the terrorist who killed 62 people in New Delhi in 2005, took shelter, before being arrested by the portuguese police.

Not to mention that there are suspicions that after France stopped tolerating ETA, Portugal has been used as a safe haven, and that some of the cars used in ETA's terrorist acts were stolen or rented in Portugal...

The fact is that the portuguese government fount itself in a position where it would need to buy itself a conflict with the president over Kosova, which would undermine the constructive relation it has managed to keep with him, something that it was not willing to do, as there will be general elections next year. Kosova is not that important to the portuguese government.

This setback on the compromises portugal had informally assumed with its allies was a major blow to the credibility of our foreign and european policy. The image that foreigners have about the Portuguese position is that it refrained from recognizing kosova not to bother its neighbour Spain. It is true that the government was never interested in being among the first countries to recognize Kosova, and the Foreign Minister himself stated that he would have preferred that the Declaration of kosova was postponed to a date after the general elections in Spain and Cyprus.

However, to submit our foreign policies to the interests of Spain is an unprecedented move that goes against the whole diplomatic tradition and the History of Portugal as an independent country. This subject will be develpod in another post somewhen, but for now sufice is to say that the portuguese military deployed in international missions never work with spanish military, Portugal does not work with spanish military in NATO's military manouvres, and countries that have no Embassy in portugal are not allowed to use their embassies in Madrid to represent their countries in Portugal ( in this list you can see that countries with no Embassy in Lisbon use their embassies in Paris or London, but never Madrid).

By recognizing Kosova, Portugal would be reinforcing its role as a peaceful country committed to the values of justice and would be coherent with its post- April 25th shift from a colonialist country to a country that supports of self-determination and the idea that sovereignty belongs to the people. By not having recognized Kosova, Portugal once again missed an excellent opportunity to assume the autonomy of its foreign policy and build the reputation of an 'honest broker' who bases its decisions in democratic principles and goals.

Portugal will end up recognizing Kosova, because it is being pressured to do so by other european countries and the US. Kosova is not that important to the portuguese government, but neither is serbia to the portuguese president. I wished Portugal had recognized Kosova because it was the right thing to do to contribute to peace in the Wertern Balkans and to correct an historical injustice dating back to 1912, but at least I am happy if this country's decision makers finally understand that between being agents of american imperialism or backing Russia's move to undermine the European Union, the first option is the only one that suits our permanent national interests.

I just hope that this happens sooner rather than latter, otherwise I will feel obliged to give back my discount next time i visit Kosova, and i am not that well paid.

1st July, 2008

During the past several weeks, the public’s attention has been focused on various recent geopolitical developments, and the expiration of Slovenia’s Presidency over the Council of the EU on July 1 is going to remain almost unnoticed against the background. Yet this was the first time in the EU history when such a prominent role was played by a Slavic Balkan country, and high expectations were associated with the fact in the Balkan region.

The Slovenians did everything to foster the expectations. At the start of the term of Slovenia’s Presidency last January, its Foreign Minister Dimitrij Rupel made no secret of his optimism about the resolution of Balkan problems and, in particular, about the chances of signing an agreement with Serbia. At that time he even opined that the agreement would possibly be signed within a month.

The Stabilization and Association Agreement was signed only by the end of April amidst the elections campaign in Serbia. The signing helped to tilt the balance in favor of B. Tadic’s pro-Western coalition. The undisguised intervention into the domestic politics of a sovereign country seems to be Slovenia’s sole achievement during the EU Presidency. It failed to help other former Yugoslavian republics and Albania gain admission to the EU or to do anything to alleviate the Kosovo problem in a legitimate framework. Instead, new conflicts erupted in the Balkan region, for example, in Macedonia. Mr. Rupel does not seem upset – a few days ago he declared proudly that the Balkan crisis was nearing the end and that the situation in the region was on the verge of improving despite all the challenges that Slovenia had faced during the Presidency.

What positive developments could he have had in mind? The unilateral proclamation of independence by Kosovo on February 17 which left the EU and the rest of the world divided? Or, perhaps, the unprecedented tensions in Macedonia, where the population once so convinced of the advantages of independence now rushed to obtain Bulgarian passports? In the early XX century, Albanian nationalist leaders offered Bulgaria to jointly rout Serbia and to have the border between Bulgaria an Albania pass across Macedonia. These days, one gets the impression that Macedonians are deciding on which side of the border to remain.

The June 1 snap parliamentary elections in Macedonia took place amid unprecedented outbursts of Albanian extremists’ violence. Even Brussels had to express its “disappointment”, though a EU police mission has been deployed in Macedonia already for several years.

As for Serbia, the political situation in it is unstable. Dimitrij Rupel says that “the progressive forces” are leading in Serbia and its population regards the EU as a friend, but this is not what public opinion surveys actually indicate. Over 2/3 of Serbs do not agree to sacrifice Kosovo for a EU membership. The country has been unable to form a viable government for the two months after the elections, and the political crisis is bound to continue. The newly born coalition of Tadic’s democrats and socialists led by Ivica Dačić is a ridiculous undertaking - the party of S. Milosevic forged an alliance with the democrats who overthrew its leader in 2000. Socialists hope to thus return to power, though this time as a minor partner in a coalition. Such a coalition is not going to last long even by Serbian standards.

One has to be totally unaware of what is actually going on in the Balkan region to project a resolution of the Yugoslavian crisis in a foreseeable future. Since this is clearly not true of Dimitrij Rupel, he must be simply following the political instructions issued by Brussels bureaucrats.

What can the instructions be? The strange connivance at the activity of Albanian extremists in Kosovo and the Muslim paramilitary formations in Macedonia, which is quite unnatural from the standpoint of Europe’s own interests, invokes certain historical parallels. When Nazism was rising in Germany in the mid-1930ies and starting to demand greater territories for the ”Aryan race”, European countries attempted to resolve the problem by appeasing the aggressor. On September 30, 1938 British PM Arthur Neville Chamberlain and French PM Édouard Daladier greenlighted Germany’s annexation of the Sudetes, the areas of Czechoslovakia with large German populations, hoping that this would satisfy Hitler’s appetite for aggression. It is a noteworthy circumstance that, having visited Hitler in his retreat at Berchtesgaden on September 15, 1938, Chamberlain agreed that the transfer of the Sudetes had to take place after a plebiscite, that is, on the basis of the right of nations to self-determination. He elaborated further on the concept in London on September 18 during the consultations with his French counterpart. Great Britain and France concluded that the territories had to be allocated to Germany since their population was more than 50% German.

Poland actively joined the process of partitioning Czechoslovakia. Already on October 1, 1938 it claimed Teschen Silesia, but in less than a year Poland itself fell victim to Germany which was getting increasingly bold due to the inaction of the West…

Hearing how these days European capitals call for “meeting the legitimate demands of the Albanians” of Kosovo, Macedonia, and the southern regions of Serbia and listening how the US puppeteers and their Balkan puppets promise that the independence of Kosovo will make it possible to turn the last page of the Yugoslavian crisis, one simply can’t help recalling the 1939 Munich Conference which legitimized the partition of Czechoslovakia.

A countryman of Daladier, President of the French Senate’s Commission for Foreign Affairs, Defense, and Armed Forces Josselin de Rohan-Chabot said in a recent interview that since 90% of the Kosovo population are ethnic Albanians it is impossible to keep this territory under the UN protectorate. And a countryman of Chamberlain former Ambassador of Great Britain to Moscow Tony Brenton sent a clear message to Albanian separatists before the Kosovo independence was proclaimed by saying that as Kosovo had been under the auspices of the UN already for eight years, this could not go on indefinitely and if the people wanted independence, it had to be given to them.

Roughly at the same time Nenad Popovic, deputy head of Serbian government’s Coordination Center for South-Serbian Presevo, Medveda, and Bujanova told me that there existed a center coordinating the Albanian extremist activity in Kosovo, Macedonia, South Serbia, and Montenegro. He says that the campaigns launched by Albanian extremists and terrorists in various parts of the Balkan region are synchronous and well-organized, but, unfortunately, the West ignores the peril. In 1938, the West also ignored various perils. Later a great price was paid for this…

Bucharest: Romania will not take part in any institution-building that implies Kosovo’s independence, argues the country’s President Traian Basescu.

“Our position remains very clear—we will not recognize Kosovo,” said Basescu at a conference dedicated to NATO’s future in the Romanian capital.

The Romanian President stressed that his country supported NATO’s efforts in Kosovo, “but only if they are based on Security Council Resolution 1244, and do not in any way imply recognition."

He added that “applied to new tasks linked to the Kosovo security forces” to be trained by the NATO peacekeeping force there, KFOR. Romania has a contingent of some 150 troops among the overall KFOR presence of some 16,600.

Resolution 1244 was passed at the end of the conflict between Serb forces and Kosovo’s ethnic Albanian majority in 1999 and regulates the mandate of the United Nations mission that has been there since.

Under the resolution, which is technically in force, Kosovo is still a part of Serbia.

Serbia and Russia, as well NATO members that have not recognised Kosovo’s independence, including Spain and Romania, believe that training the Kosovo security services means implicitly recognising Kosovo’s governing institutions.

Among the 26 NATO members, Portugal, Greece and Slovakia are the other countries to have withheld recognition.

“We will not participate in institution-building in an independent Kosovo in either the European Union or NATO,” Basescu underlined, adding that Bucharest’s position was based on full compliance with international law.

Malta and Cyprus are the other two EU member states not have recognised Kosovo’s declaration of independence.

It is imperative to notice the brazen hypocricy of the Kosovar leaders while seceding from Serbia and not allowing Serbian institutions in Mitrovica, a divided city within Kosovo populated by Serbs and Albanians alike. If Kosovo wishes for self-determination (Kosovo does so at the expense of the territorial integrity of Serbia which remains illegal under the UN charter) for herself, should it also not respect self-determination for the citizens of Mitrovica?

Reading this kind of statements I feel, that words as International, Law, Legal, Authority and Independence are used quite flimsy in mainstream media. Let´s look more some definitations:

• ISG and ICO as international body consists of 25 member countries that have recognized Kosovo´s independence . ISG is like an self-named association more than international body. If e.g. 100 countries those do not have recognized Kosovo´s independence would create similar association it could claim the same authority than ISG.
• Highest international authority so far is UNSC and in Kosovo case its resolution 1244. Resolution says that UNSC "Reaffirming the commitment of all Member States to the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the other States of the region, as set out in the Helsinki Final Act and annex 2"
• Mentioned Annex 2 e.g. says about interim administration, that "Establishment of an interim administration for Kosovo as a part of the international civil presence under which the people of Kosovo can enjoy substantial autonomy within the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, to be decided by the Security Council of the United Nations."
  
• So in conclusion: Kosovo´s Independence is not legal, ISG/ICO administration does not have legal authority under International Law
• Instead Assembly of Serbs was result of legal elections in Serbian territory and can have some justification at least representing local population in Serb-dominated areas.
• If EULEX is acting like its name obliges, so it can act lawfully only under UN umbrella and the same is case with ISG/ICO actions in Kosovo.

ISG/ICO and EULEX are in Kosovo case now in headlines. One should remember, that more legal international authorities in Kosovo actions are UN/UNMIK and OSCE which both still are acting status-neutral way.