Kosovo Independence: Is this the Right Time?

by Danny Schechter

The UN Security Council met today on Kosovo. BBC reported: “Serbia’s foreign minister has urged the United Nations Security Council to oppose the province of Kosovo’s expected declaration of independence.

 

 

Supporters of Kosovo independence say genocidal ethnic cleansing by Serbia trumps claims of sovereignty and justifies demands for independence.

 

I wrote about this in some detail, posting it Thursday. For those who missed it, here’s my take.

 

A world crisis is brewing that most Americans know nothing about perhaps because it is being buried in our media. It could lead to bloodshed and more horror in a world that has enough pain to cope with already.

Please pay attention.

On Sunday, the National Assembly in Kosovo, historically a province of Serbia, will declare its independence as a sovereign country. There is a widespread sentiment for independence among Kossovars, and you can understand why many there feel this is an overdue and deserved way to solve a continuing problem. All people have a right to self-determination. Kosovo’s leaders have mostly acted properly and attracted US and European support. That does not mean this is the right time or the right way to act.

If it happens, it will be one more triumph for ethnic politics and balkanization. The Bush Administration is expected to recognize the new nation on Monday along with members of the EU.

 

Significantly, the BBC labels Kosovo a “Statelet,” not a full state.

In fact, the UN Security Council had an urgent and non-public deliberation on this crisis Thursday. Serbia is charging serious violations of Security Council Resolution 1244 and all sorts of other international agreements designed to encourage negotiations, returning displaced people and legal standards. It argues that this UDI—Unilateral Declaration of Independence — is actually an end run around those resolutions aimed at creating a “fact on the ground,” international law be damned.

More ominously, Russian President Putin compares Kosovo to separatist movements in his country, and calls its independence “immoral and illegal.” He hinted at actions to come: “we have a ready-made plan and we know what we are going to do.” Whatever it is, you can be sure it will not make the world safer or more peaceful and may deepen a new cold war.

For many in the world, this may seem a just resolution of a issue that Americans remember from the bloody Balkan wars when Serbia was an outcast in the international community because of atrocities linked to its then and now late President Molosovic.

We all saw citizens of Kosovo driven from their homes into refugee camps in what was characterized in much of the media as more of the ethnic cleansing and brutality that we saw nightly in, first Croatia and then Bosnia. The images, unfortunately, never told the whole story, and as in many “breaking news” spectaculars, there was little follow-up.

In that period, we at Globalvision covered the crimes being committed there on our human rights TV series Rights & Wrongs and in a documentary we did with filmmakers in Bosnia called “Sarrajevo Ground Zero.” We were among the first to cover human rights abuses in Kosovo. We also collaborated on a film called YELLOW WASPS about a Serbian journalist’s investigation into how the government there was funding brutal paramilitary gangs and terror.

At all times, we sought to explain the conflicts politically, not just in terms of ethnic or religious factors which is what our media mostly did. We showcased human rights and pro-democracy advocates there and relied on them— especially Belgrade’s brave B 92—for accurate coverage.

 

They colluded with neighboring Albania to drive hundreds of thousands of Serbs out of an area they had a legitimate historical connection with dating back to 1389.

Please remember that Albania, once an extreme Communist state (the only outside country aligned with, and even “lefter” than Mao’s China) later embraced a right-wing ideology and is known for harboring a major mafia presence. It was Albania that was the only country that gave a visiting George Bush a hero’s welcome, even as one of his “fans” who mobbed him, managing to steal his watch off of his arm in public. Albanians used to greet their Communist dictator Hoxha the same way!

It is Albania, many observers believe, that has worked covertly to create an independent Kosovo that it can control or maybe align with as part of some “Greater Albania.”

When the KLA was unable to dislodge the Serbian armies on the ground, there was a media war featuring charges and counter charges of atrocities on all sides and drug running by the KLA. NATO stepped in to demand the Serbs stop defending Kosovo and when they wouldn’t, started bombing Kosovo and Serbia.

General Wes Clark’s bombadiers were outflanked in Kosovo by camouflaged Serbian forces and, in frustration started bombing other parts of the country. In the Capital, they managed to take out the Chinese Embassy. Why NATO was bombing Belgrade, a civilian capital, never made sense, and many of those who opposed Milosovic including all the “democratic forces” backed by the West protested the bombing as insane. It was defended as a “humanitarian intervention.”

Later, the UN took over in Kosovo, and favored the Albanian majority which began a campaign of ethnic terror of its own against civilians of Serbian background driving 250,000 people from their communities. Personal property was destroyed. Individuals were killed and discriminated against. 207,000 of these civilians now want to go home. They also destroyed churches, historical and cultural sites and other institutions.

Human rights groups documented the violations but not much was done. The world press which had provided saturation coverage of earlier abuses by Milosovic’s Army and police ignored similar crimes against Serbian people because it was decided that the Balkans and Kosovo were “over.” The story was no longer news.

Well, its about to be news again. Serbia now has a democratic government and a pro-western President in Boris Tadic. He was reelected earlier this month in a close campaign in which extreme right-wing nationalists who backed Milosevic were narrowly defeated. Needless to say they are hoping that Kosovo goes it own way so they can stir up national (ie. ‘patriotic’) feelings in Serbia that could possibly lead to an assault on an elected government that wants peace. What a tragedy that would be!

Tadic and his people tried to come up with a plan for autonomy based largely on the successful bargaining process that led Hong Kong to maintain its autonomy while becoming part of China. It was called “One country, two systems.” The Serbs took a what seems to be reasonable approach stopping just short of the independence favored by Pristina and their backers on the American right who represent interests with economic designs on Kosovo.

Tadic wants to work with and for people in Kosovo and has already said Serbia will not respond violently. That does not mean that other forces in Serbia won’t. And that’s part of what’s at stake here and not being talked about.

I know this has dragged on but what’s the rush? Is anyone thinking of the consequences? Could independence for Kosovo lead to the overthrow of Serbia’s new democracy? Will it plunge the country and its new democracy back into chaos or into a low intensity war?

It’s not my role to tell others what to do—and the Balkans have always been complex. I, for one have been very critical of Serbia in the past, but that’s an old story. It is important for our media to rethink this development, investigate this story from all sides and explain it in context.

What deals have already been cut, and with whom? Who will profit? Who will lose? My colleagues in the media should be doing what media is supposed to do: follow the money.

Who is pushing for Kosovo Independence—in Washington, Europe and Albania? Notice that the EU already has a flotilla of experts, judges and administrators on the tarmac about to be airlifted there because Kosovo does not have the expertise or an infrastructure in place to run the country. It feels like it could be more like an occupation than independence.

Will “Independence” mean real independence or will it lead to more DEpendence on western interests? Perhaps that’s why Serbia’s Prime Minister Kostunica is already calling an independent Kosovo a “puppet state.” The West seems to be provoking Serbia rather than strengthening its democracy.

Will this “independence” promote stability or instability? Will a pro-western Serbia then have to break relations with countries that recognize Kosovo to save face? To them, this is a humiliation. Are “we” forcing them back into the hands of the Russians.

Already, this UDI has been compared by some Serbs to Alaska breaking away from the USA. How would Washington react to that?


In fact, even now, at this late hour, under international law,there can be a pause. Like in football, they can stop the clock. The UN runs Kosovo and can freeze this risky maneuver in its tracks. It has a responsibility to do so. Does anyone remember the war that followed Rhodesia’s Unilateral Declaration of Independence? Do we need more bloodshed or confrontation?

In short, this “independence” maneuver in the name of independence in a country now considered a backwater could ignite a new tinderbox of ethnic hatred just as the fires of the old one were extinguished. As President Tadic told the UN, “Real peace is not just the lack of conflict but the triumph of freedom and democratic values.”

 

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