What did Serbia and Kosovo sign in Washington?

 

Source: European Western Balkans

By Sandra Maksimović

Sept 17 2020

Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić and Kosovo Prime Minister Avdullah Hoti pledged to normalize economic relations on 4 September, signing an agreement in the presence of US President Donald Trump in Washington. However, issues such as what exactly was signed, what are the consequences of this agreement for Belgrade and Pristina, as well as what is the future of the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue that is being conducted in Brussels, have remained unresolved.

Instead of economic cooperation, the provision concerning the relocation of the Serbian embassy to Jerusalem, which opposes the EU’s foreign policy, and the mutual recognition between Israel and Kosovo attracted the most attention.

Assistant professor at the Faculty of Political Sciences in Belgrade Milan Krstić explained that Belgrade and Pristina have not signed a legally binding agreement in Washington, or any bilateral agreement, either with the United States, as claimed by Serbian government officials, or with each other, as Richard Grenell suggested.

“A political document was signed, a legally non-binding statement of will which assumes certain political obligations. Formally, legally, it is not an international document. This does not mean that the document does not have political weight and political implications, especially having in mind the place where the document was signed, which is the White House “, Krstić pointed out in EWB Screening show.

Executive Director of the Belgrade Fund for Political Excellence (BFPE) Marko Savković stated earlier for EWB that it is still being discussed whether this agreement is actually an international agreement that produces obligations.

“I think this is a kind of declaration of will, or political commitment to this administration, not the next one. We will see whether Biden will insist on the agreement sponsored by Grenell. However, there are points that will be interesting to him or “his people”, which represent a reflection of broader and long-term American interests – in the field of energy security (diversification, less reliance on Russia) and cyber security (5G technology, less reliance on China)”, said Savković, adding that it is not clear how this will be implemented, and that is why he thinks that we should still wait for November.

On the other hand, Krstić pointed out that even if Trump does not win the elections, the spirit of the agreement will remain.

“The agreement is not formally legally binding even now, so nullity in the formal legal sense is not an issue either. In essence, politically, I do not believe that the spirit of the agreement will be annulled, and it implies economic cooperation and economic rapprochement between Belgrade and Pristina. And that element will be something that the Biden administration would use and insist on. After all, economic integration was not invented by Trump,” said Krstić.

Going against the EU?

Shortly after the meeting in Washington, the EU warned Serbia and Kosovo that their decision to move their embassies to Jerusalem could undermine their EU membership prospects.

According to EU Spokesperson for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Peter Stano, the embassy move goes against the official policy of the EU which states that the status of Jerusalem has to be worked out between Israel and the Palestinians and that it should be part of the peace negotiations between the two parties.

“There is no EU member state with an embassy in Jerusalem”, stressed Stano.

He added that Kosovo and Serbia’s decision to open and move their embassies to Jerusalem is not aligned with EU’s common position on Jerusalem.

“Since Kosovo and Serbia identified EU accession or EU integration as their strategic priority, the EU expects both to act in line with this commitment, so the European perspective is not undermined,” Stano highlighted.

Professor at the University of Graz and member of Balkans in Europe Policy Advisory Group (BiEPAG) Florian Bieber stated earlier for EWB that Kosovo might be forced to follow through with the decision to move the embassy to Jerusalem, but Serbia might change its position, depending on who wins the presidential elections in the US in November.

“Overall, I doubt that there will be much left from the agreement”, concluded Bieber.

Apart from the provision on Israel, the document also contains other clauses that are difficult to connect with the process of normalization of relations between Belgrade and Pristina. Such clauses include banning the use of 5G equipment supplied by “unreliable suppliers”, diversifying energy sources, and classifying Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. However, these clauses may be linked to the political activities of members of the Trump administration.

Krstić explains that the Israel clause was set for the needs of Donald Trump’s campaign for the US presidential elections in November.

“It served him for the needs of the inner public. Nor is it a question of the embassy in Jerusalem, the attitude towards Hezbollah, the 5G network, the diversification of energy sources or the decriminalization of homosexuality in connection with the relations between Belgrade and Pristina. The primary goal was to achieve short-term benefits for the needs of the campaign for the US presidential elections”, said Krstić for EWB Screening.

Concrete results

As for immediate issues in Serbia-Kosovo relations, Kosovo agreed to a one-year moratorium on seeking membership in international organizations, while Serbia agreed to also suspend the campaign against Kosovo’s recognition for a year, which took effect immediately.

Both sides agreed to implement the railway and highway agreements from February, as well as open and manage the joint Merdare crossing.

Also, Belgrade and Pristina will join the “mini-Schengen” zone, which Serbia, Albania and North Macedonia declared in October 2019, and will take full advantage of it. In addition, the signatories will mutually recognize diplomas and professional certificates.

Serbia and Kosovo pledged to speed up efforts to locate and identify the remains of missing persons, but also to identify and implement long-term, lasting solutions for refugees and internally displaced persons.

Krstić said that economic normalization is something that everyone should stand for.

“It is something that is good for ordinary citizens, it is in their interest. This is a good development opportunity for the economy, both for Serbia and for Albanians in Kosovo, and we often forget that it is in the interest of Serbs in Kosovo too,” underlined Krstić.

Bieber said that he believes that neither Serbia or Kosovo have gained a lot in Washington, but that it was much more of a win for Trump and for Israel.

“Kosovo gained one recognition, by Israel, and both sides got the moratorium on Kosovo seeking membership in international organisations for Serbia, and for Kosovo, Serbia stopping the derecognition campaign. This is all very modest and the economic side is just a set of declarations, without concrete goals and timelines. Unless there is a follow-up it will be of little significance”, stressed Bieber.

Report identifies Hashim Thaci as 'big fish' in organised crime

Kosovo's Prime Minister Hashim Thaci identified in secret Nato reports as having involvement in criminal underworld. Photograph: Valdrin Xhemaj/EPA

Πηγή: The Guardian
By Paul Lewis
Jan 24 2011

Kosovo's prime minister, Hashim Thaçi, has been identified as one of the "biggest fish" in organised crime in his country, according to western military intelligence reports leaked to the Guardian.

The Nato documents, which are marked "Secret", indicate that the US and other western powers backing Kosovo's government have had extensive knowledge of its criminal connections for several years.

They also identify another senior ruling politician in Kosovo as having links to the Albanian mafia, stating that he exerts considerable control over Thaçi, a former guerrilla leader.

Marked "USA KFOR", they provide detailed information about organised criminal networks in Kosovo based on reports by western intelligence agencies and informants. The geographical spread of Kosovo's criminal gangs is set out, alongside details of alleged familial and business links.

The Council of Europe is tomorrow expected to formally demand an investigation into claims that Thaçi was the head of a "mafia-like" network responsible for smuggling weapons, drugs and human organs during and after the 1998-99 Kosovo war.

The organ trafficking allegations were contained in an official inquiry publishedlast month by the human rights rapporteur Dick Marty.

His report accused Thaçi and several other senior figures who operated in the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) of links to organised crime, prompting a major diplomatic crisis when it was leaked to the Guardian last month.

The report also named Thaçi as having exerted "violent control" over the heroin trade, and appeared to confirm concerns that after the conflict with Serbia ended, his inner circle oversaw a gang that murdered Serb captives to sell their kidneys on the black market.

The Council's of Europe's parliamentary assembly in Strasbourg will debate Marty's findings and vote on a resolution calling for criminal investigations. The vote is widely expected to be passed.

Kosovo functioned as a UN protectorate from the end of the Kosovo war until 2008, when it formally declared independence from Serbia.

Thaçi, who was re-elected prime minister last month, has been strongly backed by Nato powers. His government has dismissed the Marty report as part of a Serbian and Russian conspiracy to destabilise the fledgling state.

However, the latest leaked documents were produced by KFOR, the Nato-led peacekeeping force responsible for security in Kosovo. It was KFOR military forces that intervened in the Kosovo war in 1999, helping to put an end to a campaign of ethnic cleansing by Slobodan Milosevic's Serbian forces.

Nato said in a statement tonight that it had instigated an "internal investigation" into the leaked documents, which are intelligence assessments produced around 2004, shortly before tensions with ethnic Serbs fuelled riots in Kosovo.

In the documents, Thaçi is identified as one of a triumvirate of "biggest fish" in organised criminal circles. So too is Xhavit Haliti, a former head of logistics for the KLA who is now a close ally of the prime minister and a senior parliamentarian in his ruling PDK party. Haliti is expected to be among Kosovo's official delegation to Strasbourg tomorrow and has played a leading role in seeking to undermine the Marty report in public.

However, the Nato intelligence reports suggest that behind his role as a prominent politician, Haliti is also a senior organised criminal who carries a Czech 9mm pistol and holds considerable sway over the prime minister.

Describing him as "the power behind Hashim Thaçi", one report states that Haliti has strong ties with the Albanian mafia and Kosovo's secret service, known as KShiK. It suggests that Haliti "more or less ran" a fund for the Kosovo war in the late 1990s, profiting from the fund personally before the money dried up. "As a result, Haliti turned to organised crime on a grand scale," the reports state.

They state that he is "highly involved in prostitution, weapons and drugs smuggling" and used a hotel in the capital, Pristina, as an operational base. Haliti also serves as a political and financial adviser to the prime minister but, according to the documents, is arguably "the real boss" in the relationship. Haliti uses a fake passport to travel abroad because he is black-listed in several countries, including the US, one report states.

Haliti is linked to the alleged intimidation of political opponents in Kosovo and two suspected murders dating back to the late 1990s, when KLA infighting is said to have resulted in numerous killings.

One was a political adversary who was found "dead by the Kosovo border", apparently following a dispute with Haliti. A description of the other suspected murder – of a young journalist in Tirana, the Albanian capital – also contains a reference to the prime minister by name, but does not ascribe blame.

Citing US and Nato intelligence, the entry states Haliti is "linked" the grisly murder, going on to state: "Ali Uka, a reporter in Tirana, who supported the independence movement but criticised it in print. Uka was brutally disfigured with a bottle and screwdriver in 1997. His roommate at the time was Hashim Thaçi."

Haliti is also named in the report by Marty, which is understood to have drawn on Nato intelligence assessments along with reports from the FBI and MI5.

Marty's report includes Haliti among a list of close allies of Thaçi said to have ordered – and in some cases personally overseen – "assassinations, detentions, beatings and interrogations" during and immediately after the war.

Haliti was unavailable for comment. However, in an interview with the media outlet Balkan Insight last week he dismissed the Marty report as "political" and designed to "discredit the KLA". "I was not surprised by the report. I have followed this issue for years and the content of the report is political," he said.

But he accepted that the Council of Europe was likely to pass a resolution triggering investigations by the EU-backed justice mission in the country, known as EULEX.

"I think it's a competent investigating body," he said, "It's a European investigation body. I think that there is no possibility that EULEX investigation unit to be affected by Kosovo or Albanian politics."

Responding to the allegations in the NATO intelligence reports tonight, a Kosovo government spokesman said: "These are allegations that have circulated for over a decade, most recently recycled in the Dick Marty report. They are based on hearsay and intentional false Serbian intelligence.

"Nevertheless, the prime minister has called for an investigation by EULEX and has repeatedly pledged his full cooperation to law enforcement authorities on these scandalous and slanderous allegations.

"The government of Kosovo continues to support the strengthening of the rule of law in Kosovo, and we look forward to the cooperation of our international partners in ensuring that criminality has no place in Kosovo's development."

Road to Strasbourg

It has taken more than two years for an inquiry into organ trafficking in Kosovo to reach the Palace of Europe, a grand building in Strasbourg that serves as the headquarters of the Council of Europe.


The formal inquiry into organ trafficking in Kosovo was prompted by revelations by the former chief war crimes prosecutor at The Hague, Carla Del Ponte, who said she had been prevented from properly investigating alleged atrocities committed by the Kosovo Liberation Army.

Her most shocking disclosure – unconfirmed reports the KLA killed captives for their organs – prompted the formal inquiry by human rights rapporteur Dick Marty.

His report, published last month, suggested there was evidence that KLA commanders smuggled captives across the border into Kosovo and harvested the organs of a "handful" of Serbs.

His findings, which will be subject to a parliamentary assembly vote tomorrow, went further, accusing Kosovo's prime minister and several other senior figures of involvement in organised crime over the last decade.

President of Kosovo may end up in the Constitutional Court

Πηγή: Independent Balkan News Agency
By Elton Tota
29 Feb 2016

The election of the head of the Democratic of Kosovo, Hashim Thaci in the post of the president can end up in the Constitutional Court. Kosovo’s opposition is analyzing the legal aspects of assessing the constitutionality of the election of the new president.

Self Determination MP, Ilir Deda says that the election of the president has only deepened the political crisis in Kosovo.

“I think that Thaci’s election will be contested at the Constitutional Court. We shall see how this contest will go and what political consequences it will generate. However, it is clear that as president, we have the less unifying person in the country. As far as the international arena is concerned, we’re seeing that Thaci is not being congratulated”, Deda declared.

Law Professor, Muhamet Kelmendi says that the election of the president of the country is anti constitutional. According to him, Thaci’s election as the head of the state may be annulled by the Constitutional Court.

“120 MPs must be present in the parliamentary session. Otherwise, the session is not held. Only those MPs who are sick or have taken leave are allowed to be absent. The fact that a number of MPs were not present makes the election anti-constitutional”, he said.

"Recognition of Kosovo condition for Greece" - daily

Πηγή: b92
By BLIC, DANAS, TANJUG
Aug 14 2015

Greece is one of five EU countries that do not recognize the unilateral declaration of independence made by ethnic Albanians in 2008.

Dacic, Serbia's foreign minister, and Tsipras met last week in Egypt for the opening of a new section of the Suez Canal, when Dacic said Tsipras told him he would "come to Belgrade in the fall."

But Blic thinks "the increasingly frequent articles in Greek media" and "announcements by politicians there that Kosovo is a lost battle for Serbia" all have their background - and that Greece's vulnerable financial situation means "it will have to dance to the tune of western financiers."

"It would take a miracle for Greece not to recognize Kosovo in the next few months, a year at the most. A serious undertaking will have to be done by the Serbian diplomacy for Athens to give up on recognizing Kosovo, or at least to prolong it," the paper quoted an unnamed source.

They said that conditions that Athens will have to fulfill to get the sorely needed money are not merely economic, but also political.

Political analyst Dusan Janjic told the daily that "Kosovo's recognition will arrive as early as in the fall," and added:

"Tsipras will play pragmatically. He will recognize Kosovo in order to delay the issue of Macedonia's name. Due to the bad situation he won't be able to conduct his own policy. He will have to make concessions, and in this case it will be recognizing Kosovo."

The same analyst added that such a move "would be useful for establishing ties between Greece and Albania and Albanians in the region."

Another Belgrade-based daily, Danas, writes on Friday that its "well informed sources in Athens" said Tsipras "thinks he should not travel to Belgrade."

The reason, said the sources, is "the dominant position within his Syriza party" that Serbian PM Aleksandar Vucic's policy is "adolescent-like."

However, continued the article, the sources "did not wish to specify what Athens was unhappy with when it comes to Vucic's moves."

Earlier this summer, Greece's foreign minister said that his country would support Kosovo's membership in international bodies and security organizations. The Greek ambassador in Belgrade then stated that Greece does not recognize Kosovo's unilaterally declared independence and that this position would not change.

Kosovo ex-PM Ramush Haradinaj cleared of war crimes

Πηγή: BBC
Nov 29 2012

A UN tribunal has cleared Kosovo's former Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj of war crimes from the 1998-99 conflict, after a retrial in The Hague.

Mr Haradinaj, a rebel commander during the war, was accused of overseeing a campaign of torture and murder against Serbs and suspected collaborators.

But four years after the last acquittal the UN court ruled again that the prosecution had not proved the case.

Serbian officials reacted angrily, denouncing the UN tribunal.

President Tomislav Nikolic said in a statement that the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia was formed "to try the Serbian people".

He said the verdict would increase Euroscepticism in Serbia.

Mr Haradinaj's 2008 acquittal was overturned and a retrial ordered after appeal judges ruled that there had been witness intimidation.

But the ICTY's trial chamber once again cleared Mr Haradinaj and co-defendants Idriz Balaj and Lahi Brahimaj of all charges.

The indictment alleged the three men had been involved in a joint criminal enterprise to establish Kosovo Liberation Army control in western Kosovo through detention camps.

Ethnic Serbs, Roma and Albanians who were deemed to have collaborated with Serbs were allegedly tortured and killed.

Judge Bakone Moloto said the evidence established that Serbs and their suspected supporters were beaten at a KLA compound in Kosovo, and at least one of them had died of his injuries.

However, he said there was no evidence Mr Haradinaj or his co-defendants were involved in the attacks or a conspiracy to mistreat civilians.Political ambitions

Mr Haradinaj, who is the most senior ethnic Albanian indicted by the ICTY, has many supporters among the Kosovo Albanian community.

He served as prime minister for 100 days before he stepped down in early 2005 to deal with his first trial.

Many in Kosovo regard Ramush Haradinaj as a hero and celebrated his acquittal

Crowds in the capital Pristina watched the latest verdict on a giant screen, and celebrated his acquittal by letting off fireworks and cheering.

Mr Haradinaj's lawyer, Ben Emmerson, said his client now wants to restart his political career.

"With the consent of the people, he will soon be resuming his rightful position as the political leader of the country," Mr Emmerson told reporters at the court.

His face is splashed across vast billboards in Kosovo, accompanied by slogans like "the leader who keeps his word" and "forward with a clean slate".

However, he is still considered a war criminal in Belgrade, and an arrest warrant has been issued against him by Serbia's war crimes prosecutor.

Kosovo unilaterally declared independence from Serbia in 2008, but Belgrade has enlisted the support of ally Russia to block any move for international recognition.

Many Serbs feel there has been little accountability for crimes committed against them during the wars of the 1990s.

Missions in Afghanistan, Kosovo and Allied Defense Capabilities top NATO DMs meeting

Πηγή: Diplonews
Oct 9 2012

Missions in Afghanistan, Kosovo and improving defence capabilities top the agenda of a two-day NATO defence ministerial meeting which starts on Tuesday (9 October) at Alliance headquarters.

On Afghanistan, Defence Ministers are expected to discuss the progress made in the mission with ISAF partners on Wednesday, 10 October .

The ministers are expected to endorse the first phase of planning for NATO’s post-2014 training, advice and assistance mission to the Afghan forces. They are to approve the broad framework for the mission, which will serve as guidance for military experts as they take the planning process ahead. NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen has set a goal to reach agreement on a detailed outline of the mission by early next year and to finalise the operational plan well before the end of 2013.

Plans to hand over full responsibility for security to the Afghans by the end of 2014 remain on course. "Our strategy is to build up the capacity of the Afghan security forces and gradually hand over to them lead responsibility for the security across the country," the Secretary General said ahead of the ministerial. The timeline is to complete this transition by the end of 2014 . At that time, the current ISAF combat mission will end. From 2015 it will be followed by the NATO-led training, assist and advice mission.

The first working session on Tuesday, 9 October will focus on improving defence capabilities. The Secretary General has highlighted the need for NATO member states to make sure they have the right forces, structures and capabilities in place to make sure they can meet the security challenges of the 21st century. The ministers are expected to keep up the momentum on Smart Defence, finding more ways to become more efficient in defence spending with multinational projects. Allies have already started to implement a list of multinational projects which were approved at the Chicago Summit. The projects give Allies more access to crucial capabilities covering areas such as clearing roadside bombs, sharing smart munitions and pooling maritime patrol aircraft.

Ministers will also review NATO’s mission in Kosovo.

Turkey Pledges Military Aid For Kosovo

The KSF is having training from Army of Turkey for Supporting Peaceful Operation

Πηγή: Balkan Insight
Sept 20 2012

Turkey has pledged to help Kosovo raise its military capacity, by aiding the Kosovo Security Forces, KSF, to reach its full operational potential.

The Commander of Turkish Ground Forces, General Hayri Kivrikoglu, who is visiting Kosovo, conveyed the message to the KSF Commander, General Kadri Kastrati.

On Wednesday he went to visit the teaching facilities of the KSF in Ferizaj. In a statement after visiting KSF headquarters and the teaching facilities on Wednesday, General Hivrikoglu was quoted as saying that “the Turkish Army will support the further development of Kosovo’s Security Forces”.

Kosovo declared independence from Serbia on February 17, 2008. Since then 89 states, including 22 EU member states and the US, have recognized it.

The Kosovo Security Force is a lightly armed, uniformed force that is subject to democratic, civilian control. Its mission is to conduct crisis response operations in Kosovo and neighbouring countries.

Turkey has recently increased its economic presence in Kosovo, investing in a wide range of concerns.

Turkish companies have bought the power distribution company and the country's only airport and are currently building the highway from Kosovo to Albania.

Turks are also present in the banking sector. A Turkish firm has also pre-qualified, along with four other companies, to buy 75 per cent of the shares of Kosovo’s state owned post and telecom company, PTK.

By the end of the year, Kosovo expects to hear from the North Atlantic Council whether its security forces have reached their full operational potential.

After that decision, parliament will have to debate the mandate of the force, and whether it wants to transform the security forces into a conventional army.

NATO’s Kosovo Force, KFOR, has supported the creation of KSF, which replaced the former Kosovo Protection Corps, KPC.

The territory's first quasi-military body was set up after the end of the 1998-99 war between ethnic Albanians and the Serbian police and military, and overwhelmingly comprised ethnic Albanian war veterans.

Kosovo's "Mafia State" and Camp Bondsteel: Towards a Permanent US Military Presence in Southeast Europe

Πηγή: Global Research
by F. William Engdahl
April 13 2012

In one of the more bizarre foreign policy announcements of a bizarre Obama Administration, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has announced that Washington will “help” Kosovo to join NATO as well as the European Union. She made the pledge after a recent Washington meeting with Kosovan Prime Minister Hashim Thaci in Washington where she praised the progress of the Thaci government in its progress in “European integration and economic development.” 1

Her announcement no doubt caused serious gas pains among government and military officials in the various capitals of European NATO. Few people appreciate just how mad Clinton’s plan to push Kosovo into NATO and the EU is.

Basic Kosovo geopolitics

The controversial piece of real estate today called Kosovo was a part of Yugoslavia and tied to Serbia until the NATO bombing campaign in 1999 demolished what remained of Milosevic’s Serbia and opened the way for the United States, with the dubious assist of EU nations, above all Germany, to carve up the former Yugoslavia into tiny, dependent pseudo states. Kosovo became one, as did Macedonia. Slovenia and Croatia had earlier split off from Yugoslavia with a strong assist from the German Foreign Ministry.

Some brief review of the circumstances leading to the secession of Kosovo from Yugoslavia will help locate how risky a NATO membership or EU membership would be for the future of Europe. Hashim Thaci the current Kosovo Prime Minister, got his job, so to speak, through the US State Department and not via free democratic Kosovo elections. Kosovo is not recognized as a legitimate state by either Russia or Serbia or over one hundred other nations. However, it was immediately recognized when it declared independence in 2008 by the Bush Administration and by Berlin.

Membership into the EU for Kosovo would be welcoming another failed state, something which may not bother US Secretary Clinton, but which the EU at this juncture definitely can do without. Best estimates place unemployment in the country at as much as 60%. That is not just Third World level. The economy was always the poorest in Yugoslavia and today it is worse. Yet the real issue in terms of the future of EU peace and security is the nature of the Kosovo state that has been created by Washington since the late 1990’s.

Mafia State and Camp Bondsteel

Kosovo is a tiny parcel of land in one of the most strategic locations in all Europe from a geopolitical standpoint of the US military objective of controlling oil flows and political developments from the oil-rich Middle East to Russia and Western Europe. The current US-led recognition of the self-declared Republic of Kosovo is a continuation of US policy for the Balkans since the illegal 1999 US-led NATO bombing of Serbia—a NATO “out-of-area” deployment never approved by the UN Security Council, allegedly on the premise that Milosevic’s army was on the verge of carrying out a genocidal massacre of Kosovo Albanians.

Some months before the US-led bombing of Serbian targets, one of the heaviest bombings since World War II, a senior US intelligence official in private conversation told Croatian senior army officers in Zagreb about Washington’s strategy for former Yugoslavia. According to these reports, communicated privately to this author, the Pentagon goal already in late 1998 was to take control of Kosovo in order to secure a military base to control the entire southeast European region down to the Middle East oil lands.

Since June 1999 when the NATO Kosovo Force (KFOR) occupied Kosovo, then an integral part of then-Yugoslavia, Kosovo was technically under a United Nations mandate, UN Security Council Resolution 1244. Russia and China also agreed to that mandate, which specifies the role of KFOR to ensure an end to inter-ethnic fighting and atrocities between the Serb minority population, others and the Kosovo Albanian Islamic majority. Under 1244 Kosovo would remain part of Serbia pending a peaceful resolution of its status. That UN Resolution was blatantly ignored by the US, German and other EU parties in 2008.

Germany’s and Washington’s prompt recognition of Kosovo’s independence in February 2008, significantly, came days after elections for President in Serbia confirmed pro-Washington Boris Tadic had won a second four year term. With Tadic’s post secured, Washington could count on a compliant Serbian reaction to its support for Kosovo.

Immediately after the bombing of Serbia in 1999 the Pentagon seized a 1000 acre large parcel of land in Kosovo at Uresevic near the border to Macedonia, and awarded a contract to Halliburton when Dick Cheney was CEO there, to build one of the largest US overseas military bases in the world, Camp Bondsteel, with more than 7000 troops today.

The Pentagon has already secured seven new military bases in Bulgaria and Romania on the Black Sea in the Northern Balkans, including the Graf Ignatievo and Bezmer airbases in Bulgaria and Mihail Kogalniceanu Air Base in Romania, which are used for "downrange" military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. The Romanian installation hosts the Pentagon's Joint Task Force–East. The US's colossal Camp Bondsteel in Kosovo and the use and upgrading of Croatian and Montenegrin Adriatic harbors for US Navy deployments complete the militarization of the Balkans.[ii]

The US strategic agenda for Kosovo is primarily military, secondarily, it seems, narcotics trafficking. Its prime focus is against Russia and for control of oil flows from the Caspian Sea to the Middle East into Western Europe. By declaring its independence, Washington gains a weak state which it can fully control. So long as it remained a part of Serbia, that NATO military control would be politically insecure. Today Kosovo is controlled as a military satrapy of NATO, whose KFOR has 16,000 troops there for a tiny population of 2 million. Its Camp Bondsteel is one of a string of so-called forward operating bases and "lily pads" as Donald Rumsfeld called them, for military action to the east and south. Now formally bringing Kosovo into the EU and to NATO will solidify that military base now that the Republic of Georgia under US protégé Saakashvili failed so miserably in 2008 to fill that NATO role.

Heroin Transport Corridor

US-NATO military control of Kosovo serves several purposes for Washington’s greater geo-strategic agenda. First it enables greater US control over potential oil and gas pipeline routes into the EU from the Caspian and Middle East as well as control of the transport corridors linking the EU to the Black Sea.

It also protects the multi-billion dollar heroin trade, which, significantly, has grown to record dimensions in Afghanistan according to UN narcotics officials, since the US occupation. Kosovo and Albania are major heroin transit routes into Europe. According to a 2008 US State Department annual report on international narcotics traffic, several key drug trafficking routes pass through the Balkans. Kosovo is mentioned as a key point for the transfer of heroin from Turkey and Afghanistan to Western Europe. Those drugs flow under the watchful eye of the Thaci government.

Since its dealings with the Meo tribesmen in Laos during the Vietnam era, the CIA has protected narcotics traffic in key locations in order partly to finance its covert operations. The scale of international narcotics traffic today is such that major US banks such as Citigroup are reported to derive a significant share of their profits from laundering the proceeds.

One of the notable features of the indecent rush by Washington and other states to immediately recognize the independence of Kosovo is the fact that they well knew its government and both major political parties were in fact run by Kosovo Albanian organized crime.

Hashim Thaci, Prime Minister of Kosovo and head of the Democratic Party of Kosovo, is the former leader of the terrorist organization which the US and NATO trained and called the Kosovo Liberation Army, KLA, or in Albanian, UCK. In Kosovo crime circles he is known as Hashim “The Snake” for his personal ruthlessness against opponents.

In 1997, President Clinton’s Special Balkans Envoy, Robert Gelbard described the KLA as, “without any question a terrorist group.” It was far more. It was a klan-based mafia, impossible therefore to infiltrate, which controlled the underground black economy of Kosovo. Today the Democratic Party of Thaci, according to European police sources, retains its links to organized crime.

A February 22, 2005 German BND report, labeled Top Secret, which has since been leaked, stated, “Über die Key-Player (wie z. B. Haliti, Thaci, Haradinaj) bestehen engste Verflechtungen zwischen Politik, Wirtschaft und international operierenden OK-Strukturen im Kosovo. Die dahinter stehenden kriminellen Netzwerke fördern dort die politische Instabilität. Sie haben kein Interesse am Aufbau einer funktionierenden staatlichen Ordnung, durch die ihre florierenden Geschäfte beeinträchtigt werden können.“ (OK=Organized Kriminalität). (Translation: “Through the key players—for example Thaci, Haliti, Haradinaj—there is the closest interlink between politics, the economy and international organized crime in Kosovo. The criminal organizations in the background there foster political instability. They have no interest at all in the building of a functioning orderly state that could be detrimental to their booming business.”3

The KLA began action in 1996 with the bombing of refugee camps housing Serbian refugees from the wars in Bosnia and Croatia. The KLA repeatedly called for the “liberation” of areas of Montenegro, Macedonia and parts of Northern Greece. Thaci is hardly a figure of regional stability to put it mildly.

The 44 year old Thaci was a personal protégé of Clinton Secretary of State Madeleine Albright during the 1990s, when he was a mere 30-year old gangster. The KLA was supported from the outset by the CIA and the German BND. During the 1999 war the KLA was directly supported by NATO. At the time he was picked up by the USA in the mid-1990s, Thaci was founder of the Drenica Group, a criminal syndicate in Kosovo with ties to Albanian, Macedonian and Italian organized mafias. A classified January 2007 report prepared for the EU Commission, labeled “VS-Nur für den Dienstgebrauch” was leaked to the media. It detailed the organized criminal activity of KLA and its successor Democratic Party under Thaci.

A December 2010 Council of Europe report, released a day after Kosovo's election commission said Mr Thaci's party won the first post-independence election, accused Western powers of complicity in ignoring the activities of the crime ring headed by Thaci: "Thaci and these other 'Drenica Group' members are consistently named as 'key players' in intelligence reports on Kosovo's mafia-like structures of organised crime," the report said. "We found that the 'Drenica Group' had as its chief – or, to use the terminology of organised crime networks, its 'boss' – the renowned political operator ... Hashim Thaci." 4

The report stated that Thaci exerted "violent control" over the heroin trade. Dick Marty, the European Union investigator, presented the report to European diplomats from all member states. The response was silence. Washington was behind Thaci.5

The same Council of Europe report on Kosovo organized crime accused Thaci’s mafia organization of dealing in trade in human organs. Figures from Thaçi's inner circle were accused of taking captives across the border into Albania after the war, where a number of Serbs are said to have been murdered for their kidneys that were sold on the black market. In one case revealed in legal proceedings in a Pristina district court in 2008 organs were said to have been taken from impoverished victims at a clinic known as Medicus – linked to Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) organ harvesting in 2000.6

The question then becomes, why are Washington, NATO, the EU and inclusive and importantly, the German Government, so eager to legitimize the breakaway Kosovo? A Kosovo run internally by organized criminal networks is easy for NATO to control. It insures a weak state which is far easier to bring under NATO domination. Combined with NATO control over Afghanistan where the Kosovo heroin controlled by Prime Minister Thaci originates, the Pentagon is building a web of encirclement around Russia that is anything but peaceful.

The Thaci dependence on US and NATO good graces insures Thaci’s government will do what it is asked. That, in turn, assures the US a major military gain consolidating its permanent presence in the strategically vital southeast Europe. It is a major step in consolidating NATO control of Eurasia, and gives the US a large swing its way in the European balance of power. Little wonder Moscow has not welcomed the development, nor have numerous other states. The US is literally playing with dynamite, potentially as well with nuclear war in the Balkans.

*F. William Engdahl is author of Full Spectrum Dominance: Totalitarian Democracy in the New World Order. He may be contacted via his website, www.engdahl.oilgeopolitics.net

Notes

1 RIA Novosti, US to Help Kosovo Join EU NATO: Clinton, April 5, 2012, accessed in
http://en.rian.ru/world/20120405/172621125.html.

2 Rick Rozoff, Pentagon and NATO Complete Their Conquest of The Balkans, Global Research, November 28, 2009, accessed in
www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=16311.

3 Tom Burghardt, The End of the Affair: The BND, CIA and Kosovo’s Deep State, accessed in
http://wikileaks.org/wiki/The_End_of_the_Affair%3F_The_BND%2C_CIA_and_Kosovo%27s_Deep_State.

4 The Telegraph, Kosovo's prime minister 'key player in mafia-like gang,' December 14, 2010, accessed in
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/kosovo/8202700/Kosovos-prime-minister-key-player-in-mafia-like-gang.html.

5 Ibid.

6 Paul Lewis, Kosovo PM is head of human organ and arms ring Council of Europe reports, The Guardian, 14 December 2010.

Kosovo Citizens Protest World Bank's Plan to Build Coal Plant

Πηγή: Treehugger

Brian Merchant

March 30 2012

It's a stark contrast: Polluting, greenhouse gas-spewing coal power is dying out across the U.S., thanks in part to new, better clean air standards imposed by the federal government.

But the federal government is also simultaneously backing an effort to install a brand new coal plant in Kosovo, one of Europe's poorest nations. Here's a dispatch from Nezir Sinani of the Kosovar Institute for Development Policy and Mary Ann Hitt, a campaign adviser with the Sierra Club:

local Kosovars are fed up with an increasingly corrupt process to push forward an unnecessary and polluting new coal-fired power plant. They are sick and tired of being steamrolled by the World Bank and U.S. government, which came to the country with a decade-old project in tow that they refuse to update to reflect 21st century realities.

This refusal is all the more damning with recent allegations of corruption being heaped upon this already controversial project. With official venues for communication broken, locals have decided they have no option but to resort to protest. On March 30, the people of Obiliq gathered with civil society organizations to protest the inherent corruption driving the environmental and health impacts their town will face if the plant is built.The project has been extremely controversial in Kosovo and has caused ripples in Europe, yet few have heard of the project in the US. But it's a sufficiently egregious case—the World Bank foisting an old school, pollution-heavy coal plant, on a nation desirous of alternatives, that commentators are beginning to take note. Here's Daniel M. Kammen, a professor of energy at UC Berkeley, and an energy advisor to the Obama administration, writing an op-ed in the SF Chronicle:

The clean-versus-dirty debate is also playing out in Europe's poorest nation, Kosovo, which suffers hours of power outages each day, and which is well endowed with a particularly dirty form of brown coal, lignite. To some, this seems to mean that Kosovars are wedded to coal for decades to come. This is where the experience in California, and in the United States more broadly, is so important.

The U.S. government and the World Bank can aid Kosovo with funding and technical support that will permit them to develop a holistic approach to energy diversity and security. By contrast, investing in coal forces Kosovo (which aspires to join the European Union) to live with less job creation than a clean energy path would bring ... There are increasingly strident calls from civil society to found the young country's future on clean alternatives that will provide far more jobs and ensure energy access for all Kosovars.Indeed. The World Bank wields an enormous influence on the energy future of Kosovo—to invest in a coal plant (and an extremely polluting one, at that) instead of cleaner sources of energy is to tether the developing nation to fossil fuels, to pass up an opportunity to foster a clean energy economy, and to inflict health woes upon its population. It also bears noting that those health woes will be expensive, will burden the nation's GDP, and will work to cancel out some of the alleged economic progress the coal plant will bring.

All of which could be avoided if the World Bank would listen to the protesting citizens, and invest in cleaner, more modern energy technologies.

Kosovo Parliament Urged To Probe Former Secret Agency

 Florin Krasniqi, member of the Kosovo Parliament from the Vetevendosje party

Πηγή: Balkan Insight
By Fatmir Aliu
March 30 2012

An opposition Self-Determination MP has started gathering signatures to get parliament to fully investigate the workings of the ruling party's former secret agency.

Self-determination (Vetevendosje) Movement MP Florin Krasniqi presented the request on Wednesday to parliament, saying the public needed the full facts about the workings and legacy of the Shërbimi Informativ i Kosovës, or SHIK.

Krasniqi said an inquiry would also handle claims that other political parties had their own secret services.

The SHIK emerged from the ranks of the Kosovo Liberation Army, KLA, following the end of the war with Serbia in 1999, and then became the intelligence arm of the now ruling Democratic Party of Kosovo, PDK.

The secret service is widely believed to have eliminated political rivals to the PDK during 2000 and 2001, though this was not proven in court.

Two alleged former SHIK agents, Nazim Bllaca, a self-proclaimed hit-man and Naim Miftari, an investigator, have already confessed their roles in the service.

Krasniqi has asked other MPs to sign his initiative and so force parliament to shed light on the way that SHIK functioned and who financed it.

By law he needs at least 40 signatures to table the initiative to the legislature, which will then formalize the commission.

“We need to find out what the structures and the hierarchy of this service were, who financed it, how much people were paid, and what they did with the money," he said.

"Did it compile files and for whom did it compile these dossiers? These are the most important elementary questions for the people and state of Kosovo,” Krasniqi added.

The former head of SHIK, Kadri Veseli, in a TV appearance in 2009, said that different businesses financed the SHIK and denied any links to political murders. SHIK claimed in June 2008 that it had officially disbanded.

But a US expert on Albanian issues, David Phillips, released a report back in 2010 on the agency, quoting an anonymous source claiming that the supposedly defunct body was still receiving $200 million a year from bribery, extortion, racketeering, and protection services.

The report by the former senior advisor at the US State Department’s Bureau for European Affairs has since been published by the National Committee on American Foreign Policy.

Krasniqi, a former gunrunner and fundraiser for the KLA, who was then living in New York, has been widely fingered as the source of the information.

Libya Seeks Kosovo's Help in Peace Transition

Guerrillas in the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA). 

Πηγή: Balkaninsight
March 21 2012

A delegation from Tripoli has visited Pristina as it believes Kosovo's post-conflict transition process could serve as a useful model for Libya, a government official told Balkan Insight.

Kosovo's Deputy Security Forces Minister, Shemsi Veseli, told Balkan Insight that a delegation from Tripoli had visited Pristina recently to learn about Kosovo's experience in reintegrating former Kosovo Liberation Army, KLA, fighters after the conflict in Kosovo ended in 1999.

“They wanted to know... what we did first after the end of the war, how we transformed the KLA into the Kosovo Protection Corps and then the Kosovo Security Forces, and how the transition period, the amnesty and disarmament processes went,” he said.

The KLA was formed in the 1990s to fight for an independent Kosovo. By 1997 the new formation was taking on the Serbian police and military, prompting a brutal crackdown by Slobodan Milosevic’s regime.

In 1999 NATO intervened with an air campaign aimed at forcing Serbia to withdraw its police and military, while the UN installed an interim administration, which lasted until March 2008 when the former province formally seceded from Serbia.

Since then 98 countries, including 22 of the 27 EU countries and the US, have recognized Kosovo’s independence. Serbia still considers the province its sovereign territory and is backed by Russia and China, among others.

Shemsi Veseli said the Libyan delegation was also interested in getting training from Kosovo Security Forces, an emergency response force built up by NATO.

He said the Kosovo government has expressed its readiness to help Libya with the experience it had gained throughout the transition period.

“We were asked [by the Libyan delegation] if we could help Libya in training their future forces, and said 'Yes',” Veseli said.

“We even said we were ready to send our troops on a peacekeeping mission to Libya as we have expertise in demining, search and rescue operations, and paramedics. Whether NATO will allow that, we don’t know,” he added.

The Kosovo Security Force is a professional, multi-ethnic, lightly armed and uniformed force that is subject to democratic and civilian control. It numbers 2,000 soldiers.

Its primary mission is to conduct crisis response operations in Kosovo and abroad; civil protection operations within Kosovo; and assist the civil authorities in responding to natural disasters and other emergencies.

The government has announced a possible further transformation of the force by the end of this year, making the KSF into a regular army.

Conflict with Kosovo: An obstacle to Serbia’s EU candidacy

Serbian President Boris Tadic smiles during a news conference in Belgrade on Dec. 9, 2011

Πηγή: Sundays Zaman
By Sabine Freizer
Feb 5 2012

Turkish-Serbian relations have never been better. For the third time in as many months, Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu met his Serbian counterpart, Vuk Jeremić, in Belgrade this week before attending a meeting of the Southeast European Cooperative Initiative (SECI).

In addition to discussing bilateral Turkey-Serbia issues and the Muslim majority region of Sandžak in Serbia, it is highly likely that the pair talked about Serbia’s EU candidacy and Serbia-Kosovo relations, the main obstacle in the way of next month’s EU decision on Serbia’s candidacy bid.

The ongoing conflict between Serbia and Kosovo escalated on July 25, 2011, when Pristina sent police to two customs gates along the border with Serbia to reassert control over a boundary on which they had maintained no presence since independence in 2008. Local Serbs surrounded the police and forced them to retreat. One officer was killed in an ambush and a border post was burned. Since then, Kosovo Serbs have blocked the EU Rule of Law Mission (EULEX) from using most roads leading to the border through northern Kosovo, preventing the mission from helping Kosovo officials to reach the customs points by road and forcing them to be airlifted. As the Crisis Group explained in a report published yesterday, titled “Kosovo and Serbia: A little goodwill could go a long way,” the dispute over customs is only a symptom of Serbia and Kosovo’s disagreement over sovereignty, especially with respect to the North. Belgrade is loath to take steps that could be interpreted as recognition of its southern neighbor, making normalization extremely difficult. Pristina feels Serbia has increased its influence over the North since Kosovo’s declaration of independence, despite a 2010 ruling by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) that the declaration did not violate international law. Consequently, Pristina believes it needs to demonstrate now that it controls its borders, lest partition take root. Northern Kosovo Serbs do not want to live under Pristina’s authority, whose declaration of independence they consider to be unilateral and anti-constitutional. They see the deployment of customs officials and police as the first step toward dismantling their institutions and way of life.

In December, EU member states imposed three conditions on Belgrade in order to qualify for candidacy status in March which, on the eve of parliamentary elections, will be a serious test for Serbia’s pro-European government. Serbia has not yet met those conditions a month before the meeting of the EU heads of state and severe tensions remain in northern Kosovo.

Treating Kosovo like a normal country

The EU expects Serbia to treat Kosovo like a normal country and reach certain agreements with it, even if Serbia has not formally recognized Kosovo. For instance, Kosovo is not even allowed to be a member of SECI, which Davutoğlu traveled to Belgrade to participate in this week. Brussels is facilitating technical talks between Kosovo and Serbia and one of its conditions for Serbian EU candidacy is that the two countries agree on a compromise that would allow Kosovo to participate in regional meetings like SECI and sign official documents. Serbia and Kosovo must implement previous agreements on customs, cadastres, university diplomas and freedom of movement. Belgrade should also show that it is actively cooperating with EULEX and the Kosovo Force (KFOR), the NATO mission on the ground. It will be difficult to measure whether Serbia has met these conditions in full by the early March meeting of EU member states. Instead, it will become a question of degree: Will Serbia have done enough to demonstrate its political will to make agreements with Kosovo and begin normalizing relations? Some countries, especially Germany and the United Kingdom, want Belgrade to take clear steps to show its commitment.

A year ago, the EU was not expecting Serbia to show much willingness to normalize relations with Kosovo in order to get candidacy status. This was expected in later stages of accession. Instead, the focus was on domestic reform and full cooperation with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the arrests of fugitives Ratko Mladić and Goran Hadžić, conditions that were fulfilled in 2011. But developments on the ground in Kosovo since July have changed the calculations of EU member states and they want to make sure that Serbia contributes to stability in Kosovo and does not support any local troublemakers.

As a close friend of both sides, Turkey can help by encouraging Serbia to be flexible and move beyond the past. Turkey was one of the first countries to recognize Kosovo’s independence and supports its economic and political development. But Serbia’s EU candidacy is also important for Ankara, where Serbia is considered Turkey’s bridge to the EU. Economic cooperation, trade and freedom of movement of goods and people are all essential elements in Turkey-Serbia relations. Yet there is not much that Turkey, whose own more advanced EU membership negotiations are stalling, can do directly in this case.

Serbia has taken steps scarcely imaginable in the immediate aftermath of Kosovo’s declaration of independence, but often at the last minute, under intense EU pressure and with the appearance of doing the minimum necessary. For its own sake, Serbia needs a new approach. An inability to treat Pristina with respect raises doubts about how far Serbia has embraced European ideals. Belgrade needs to focus on implementing what has been agreed in the bilateral technical dialogue and show that it is willing to make compromises to meet the other EU conditions. Belgrade should not only talk about wanting broader political talks to start with Kosovo, but should also help lay the groundwork for them in order to achieve a peaceful transition in the North and normalization and recognition between Serbia and Kosovo. If the EU refuses to confer candidate status in March, this would risk the wider strategy of using membership prospects and negotiations to encourage regional stability -- a strategy that has had reasonable success in the western Balkans since the late 1990s. For Serbia, like the EU, the demons of the Yugoslav wars have not yet been completely tamed and moving beyond the era of conflict in northern Kosovo is still essential to fulfilling Serbians’ hopes for a more optimistic future.

Europe: Failure To Curb Organised Crime In Kosovo Muddies EU Image

Πηγή: eGov monitor
Jan 26 2012

The fact that the European Union’s largest police mission to Kosovo has failed to collar any leading suspects on organised crime even after four years has prompted people to question its efficacy as well as the dependability of Kosovo's leaders.

However, the European Union Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo (EULEX) is basking in its own achievements and claims the training it imparted to the Kosovo police and customs has been highly successful. Following its review by the EU in a few weeks time, EULEX intends trimming personnel to allow local officers get engaged in various other mundane daily activities.

Pristina-based EULEX spokesman Nicholas Hawton recounted how the mission has accomplished "clear results" in pursuing criminals amid the region’s war-torn and politically complicated environment. The representative informed that EULEX at present is probing into 350 incidences of criminal activities, with the mission’s judges already pronouncing as many as 220 verdicts. Of them, 15 judgments have been on organised crime and 20 others on war crimes, explained Hawton.

One such investigation involves the accusation that Kosovo Prime Minister Hashim Thaci is involved in operating an organ trafficking gang, said the spokesman. Regarding the murder in 2011 of Kosovar Albanian policeman Enver Zymberi by a Serb sniper, a probe initiated by EULEX has resulted in Interpol issuing six arrest warrants, Hawthon went on to say.

Meanwhile, the EU foreign affairs committee on Tuesday approved a draft European Parliament report and has called on EULEX to "increase its efforts" in north Kosovo’s Kosovar Serb enclave as well as to increase its efforts against organised crime. However, the mission reacted by putting the blame squarely on EU member nations for the hiccups. It said the countries hesitate to dispatch their best judges to the war torn region. The mission also bluntly told France, Italy and Romania to “reconsider” withdrawing the Formed Police Units, or riot control specialists, which are associated with EULEX.

"They should have been quicker. It would have helped the way they are seen in the country to already have indictments on high level corruption cases," was the sharp response of Austria’s Green MEP Ulrike Lunacek, the draft report’s author. But the most contemptuous reaction came from Italian Socialist Pino Arlacchi, who has been credited with playing a key role in creating Italy's Direzione Investigativa Antimafia (DIA).

He pointed out that the annual budget of EULEX is €150 million, which can be equated with what is allocated to the DIA. However, the latter has successfully picked up many mafia bosses in Italy, noted Arlacchi. He said this is in spite of the country being home to 60 million people and with one of the worst organised crime problems globally.

Dozen of Kosovo police injured in clashes with Albanian radicals

Supporter of Self-Determination (VETVENDOSJE!) movement throws back a tear gas canister towards Kosovo police in Podujevo

Πηγή: RIA Novosti
Jan 15 2012

At least 13 Kosovo police officers were injured in clashes with activists of radical Albanian Self-Determination movement, who tried to block checkpoints on the border with Serbia, media in Pristina said.

Kosovo deployed additional police units near the Merdare and Bela Zemlja border crossings with Serbia on Saturday morning following an announcement that Self-Determination activists will try to block imports from Serbia in protest against Belgrade’s trade policy.

Self-Determination holds 14 seats in Kosovo’s 120-seat parliament. The movement’s leader Albin Kurti accused his political opponents of hindering the functioning of the parliamentary republic in Kosovo, “because their interests are linked to imports and sales of Serbian products.”

International KFOR forces under the NATO command, which patrol the border between Serbia and Kosovo, have also been put on alert after the announcement.

Violence erupted when a convoy of about 500 people was stopped several km away from the Merdare border checkpoint.

Police said they had to respond when activists hurled stones, snowballs and “steel objects” at them. The number of protestors injured when police used water cannons and tear gas is currently being verified. Reports suggested that some activists received serious injuries.

"Police actions were in line with the Republic of Kosovo’s constitution and police credentials and were aimed at providing public order and free movement of citizens and goods at those two border checkpoints,” Kosovo police said in a statement.

More than 40 Self-Determination supporters have been taken to police stations throughout the day.

Initial reports said Kurti, one of Kosovo’s most popular politicians, was also arrested, but later reports said he was injured in the clashes and sought medical assistance.

No incidents were reported during another protest, near the Bela Zemlja border crossing.

Kosovo Serbs turn to Russia for protection

Kosovo Serbs sit at a barricade in the village of Zupce, early October 22, 2011 in the Serb-majority northern Kosovo. 

Πηγή: RT

Nov 14 2011

Around 21,000 Serbs from Kosovo have appealed to Russia’s lower house of parliament for help in obtaining Russian citizenship.

“They named protection of their security as the main motive,” says Counsellor Oleg Buldakov of the Russian Embassy in Serbia, adding that the petition was signed by Serbs residing in Kosovo, as well as refugees from the region.

“Since the arrival of the peacekeeping forces, who are supposed to protect us, more than one thousand Serbs have been killed,” states the initiator of the petition. Zlatibor Djordjevic is a former attorney for the Democratic Party of Kosovo and Metohija. “We are completely without rights, we risk elimination. Even in Serbia there are parties calling for recognition of Kosovo’s independence.”

He also said that the amount of people willing to obtain dual citizenship is constantly increasing.

It is not the first time Serbs have appealed to Russia for protection. Last year, a similar initiative was put forward by a group of Serbian leaders.
Serbian State Secretary for Kosovo and Metohija, Oliver Ivanovic believes such steps are wrong.

“It would be much wiser to take part in the coming parliamentary elections, and cast a ballot for those who would protect their interests better,” he noted.
Opposition New Serbia leader Velimir Ilic said the very fact that Serbs are asking for citizenship in another country is “a shame for all of us”.

“The authorities are unable to even agree on a declaration on Kosovo, not to mention doing anything more serious. People from Kosovo say they feel Russia is now protecting them better than Serbia, and that is why they decided to apply for Russian citizenship.”

Tensions between Serbs and Albanians flare up in Kosovo

Mitrovica's Serbs behind their barricade on the Kosovan city's bridge

Πηγή: Independent
By Maryrose Fison

Oct 30 2011

Acrowd stands on tiptoes trying to peer over a 6ft wall of rubble. On the other side, a green tent balances on uneven tarmac. The Serbian tricolour of red, blue and white flutters in the air.

Inside the tent, middle-aged men watch news images of a violent confrontation between soldiers and civilians. The rest of the tent is empty but for a handful of pencil sketches drawn in the wobbly hand of a young child.

To the locals, the wall is a political statement and a physical barrier against a government it does not recognise. Tensions are rising here, for this region is now experiencing the worst level of civil disruption since Kosovo declared independence in 2008.

Ethnically divided Mitrovica in northern Kosovo is home to a population of 60,000 ethnic Serbs. The mountainous region has become one of the last remaining Serb enclaves in Kosovo since the mainly Albanian government in Pristina declared the former Serbian province independent.

International opinion is still divided over the legal basis for Kosovo's status. The US, the UK and Germany are among the 70-plus countries that have recognised it. But five EU countries as well as China and Russia steadfastly refuse. While Pristina considers northern Kosovo a part of Kosovo, the area has remained under the de facto control of Serbia since the war in 1999.

The currency of exchange for food and taxis is the Serbian dinar, as opposed to the euro used in the rest of Kosovo. Serbian, rather than Albanian, is the lingua franca, and public institutions such as hospitals are funded by Serbia's public sector.

Though unpalatable to the Kosovo government, this situation came to be understood as the unofficial compromise necessary to ensure widespread stability in a volatile region. Yet a single political decision made three months ago now threatens to unravel this fragile peace arrangement.

The trouble began when Kosovo's Prime Minister, Hashim Thaci – himself the subject of allegations ofinvolvement in organ trafficking, which he has always denied – deployed the country's mainly Albanian riot police and customs officers to checkpoints in northern Kosovo. Mr Thaci justified the move as necessary to enforce a trade ban on goods from Serbia, responding to an equivalent ban on goods from Kosovo in Serbia. But it was interpreted differently by the local populace, which saw the move as an affront to civil liberties and a precedent with the potential to result in submission to Albanian rule.

A 100-strong mob of angry Serbs stormed the two customs checkpoints where the Albanian officers had been deployed, setting fire to one and vandalising another. One Albanian police officer was killed.

Swift diplomatic action brought the area under control again, but over the past three months the locals have erected a different form of civil protest. More than a dozen roadblocks have gone up, the most prominent of which stands on Mitrovica's main bridge dividing the Serbian north of the city from the Albanian south. "I am willing to die for this cause," Brajan Vukicevic, a Serbian father of three, says outside the barricade. "I do not give a damn if it's winter or summer. We have fire to keep us warm and we have a heart for Serbia and all we are doing here is defending the state of Serbia."

"Everyone in this world has a right to live in freedom and a right to peace," says Ljubisa Petrovic, 51. "I would die for my children. I want them to live in freedom. Given what has happened in Kosovo over the past 13 years, we [have] decided to live in our motherland. We don't want to live in a country which is built on the misfortune of others. We want to stay included in Serbia as we have been until now."

Yet the Nato peacekeeping troops in Kosovo say the position is not sustainable. The presence of roadblocks along the region's main access routes, they say, impedes access for emergency vehicles and the transport of goods. Last week 40 civilians were reported injured in a violent standoff between Serb protesters and Nato troops as the soldiers attempted to dismantle one barricade in the village of Jagnjenica, outside Mitrovica.

The heightened state of patriotism is visible on almost every street in Mitrovica. On the façade of a shop near the bridge barricade, the Serbian eagle emblem is emblazoned across a plaster wall. Superimposed over it is the silhouette of a crowd looming with outstretched arms.

Yet it is not just Serbs who are agitated. Local Albanians living as a minority in the north speak of their own fears and point to past atrocities. An Albanian who spoke to The Independent on Sunday on condition of anonymity explained that he removes the Kosovo numberplate from his car when travelling in the north to avoid attack.

Isak Beka, a 40-year-old Kosovo Albanian who works on the south side of Mitrovica but lives in the north, says his freedom is also limited. "Albanians are not well received in the north. We can't drive our cars freely. We can't go to the local cafés," he says.

Yet it is perhaps the young generation who could heal age-old grievances. Inside the protesters' tent, the children's drawings flap against the canvas wall. Three faces of different nationalities smile out from the paper. Beneath them, a paper chain of stick figures holding hands encircles a wonkily drawn image of the globe.

Bosnia, Cyprus and Kosovo: America and Islamism in the Balkans

Πηγή: Modern Tokyo Times
By Murad Makhmudov and Lee Jay Walker

Oct 19 2011

The conflicts that engulfed the former Yugoslavia still remain unresolved in the political arena and open to Western political shenanigans and covert meddling from Turkey and Saudi Arabia in Bosnia and Kosovo. Orthodox Christianity faces many attacks and only a naïve individual would claim that America and the hands of Turkey and Saudi Arabia are clean.

America and other Western nations did little to stop Turkey invading Cyprus in 1974 and creating a de-facto nation and altering the demographics of northern Cyprus and using this area for military purposes.

Irrespective of the rights and wrongs of Cyprus you have no vindication of allowing a foreign army to invade another nation and then altering the ethnic and religious nature of the society that was invaded. However, the response by America to this Turkish and Islamic invasion was not only minimal but it clearly wasn’t important enough to the elites who pull the strings.

The invasion was both nationalist in nature and religious because what is left of Orthodox Christianity in northern Cyprus? Also, are Orthodox Christian religious leaders free to convert and spread the faith in northern Cyprus?

In Turkey ethnicity and religion is fused together by the current leader of Turkey but anti-Christian themes run deep within the psyche irrespective of the leader. After all, Turkey is the cradle of Orthodox Christianity and “old Byzantium” but this “cradle” was destroyed by constant Islamic invasions, Turkish migration and Islamization which enslaved and sold European Christian slaves for many centuries.

The one uniting theme of the 1915 Turkish genocide which is still denied by modern day Turkey is that millions of Armenian/Assyrian/Greek Christians were slaughtered and just like “old Byzantium” and modern day northern Cyprus and Kosovo – you have very few traces of Orthodox Christianity.

Therefore, in northern Cyprus, Kosovo and “old Byzantium” the virtual 100% Christian lands have become a graveyard because of past Islamic invasions and because of recent factors. These recent factors apply to the combined forces of America, Turkey, Islamic terrorists, Saudi Arabian funding, and other important areas alongside a distorted media which is anti-Orthodox Christian.

In many Western academia circles and according to Islamic apologists we are told that Islam means peace, but in truth it means “a piece of Christianity to swallow” and then to Islamize. How do virtual 100% Christian areas become “Orthodox Christian graveyards?”

Shaul Shay in his book called Islamic Terror and the Balkans comments on page 191 that “The “Afghan model,” in which an “ad hoc” alliance was forged between radical Islam and the West with the aim of defeating a common adversary – the Soviet Union – has recurred in the arena of confrontation between Islam and its Slav (Orthodox Christian) enemies in the Balkans. In both conflicts in the Balkans – in Bosnia and with even more intensity in Kosovo – radical Islamic factors and Iran (which is defined as a state that supports terror) chose the same side as the United States and the NATO countries.”

On page 192 Shaul Shay comments that “The case of the Balkans proves that radical Islam has apparently succeeded in developing an effective model in which it harnesses the West to realize the objectives of Islam, as reflected in the “Afghan model” and subsequently in the “Balkan model.” With regards to the Afghan case, the West did not comprehend the implications of the success of radical Islam and failed to draw the necessary conclusions, forcing it to pay a heavy toll for its errors (the September 11 offensive).”

Therefore, when Serbian troops tried to stem the tide of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) in their own country, a massive Western media campaign went hand in hand with political elites in America and the United Kingdom. At the same time the Islamic terror networks were welcomed by policy makers in Washington because of past links in Afghanistan. This applies to the CIA, other agencies and government programs which trained radical Sunni Islamists to fight against the secular government of Najibullah in Afghanistan by establishing bases and allowing religious indoctrination in Pakistan.

The same America which didn’t lift a finger to help Orthodox Christians and force Turkey out of northern Cyprus, was involved in Kosovo in a flash and clearly the KLA and Islamic networks had a well-organized plan which had Washington stamped all over it. Therefore, in three wars in the Balkans since the end of World War Two the United States supported the forces of Islam in Bosnia, northern Cyprus and Kosovo.

It mattered not if the Muslims were a minority or a majority or if an area was invaded by Turkish Muslim forces in northern Cyprus. Simply put, America sided with Islamic forces every time irrespective if outright Islamists like Alija Izetbegovic in Bosnia or with nationalist Muslims in Turkey. The end result was the same and this applies to being anti-Orthodox Christian and implementing hypocritical policies.

Alija Izetbegovic was a Bosnian Islamist who worked hand in hand with the Clinton administration. The same Izetbegovic welcomed international Islamic terrorists and clearly in his mind he had a long-term objective. Therefore, while the first phase was military he understood that the second phase was more potent and this applies to Islamization by stealth.

Izetbegovic commented that “… the Islamic movement should and must start taking over the power as soon as it is morally and numerically strong enough to not only overthrow the existing non-Islamic, but also to build up a new Islamic authority. …”

“… In one of the thesis for an Islamic order today we have stated that it is a natural function of the Islamic order to gather all Muslims and Muslim communities throughout the world into one. Under present conditions, this desire means a struggle for creating a great Islamic federation from Morocco to Indonesia, from the tropical Africa to the Central Asia. …”

The second phase is more important because it is long-lasting and based on stealth jihad and this applies to Islamization through the educational sector and other important areas. Shaul Shay comments that “Money from Muslim states serves to fund the dissemination of Islam, mainly through educational frameworks. Some 100,000 Muslim Bosnian youths study in Islamic educational institutions today that advocate the extremist Wahhabi ideology.”

In modern day Kosovo the Orthodox Christian community is facing the brunt of Albanian nationalism and Kosovo Islamism. Ironically, for some Kosovo Albanians they also fear the growing rise of Kosovo Islamism because while Albanian nationalism and Kosovo Islamism share some common themes, it is clear that Kosovo Islamism hopes to swallow Albanian nationalism. Either way, the Orthodox Christian community is fighting for its survival in pockets of Kosovo because the “Orthodox Christian graveyard” is literal in many parts of modern day Kosovo and all in the name of democracy according to Bill Clinton and Tony Blair.

The destruction of Orthodox Christian churches and protection of children by international armed forces from Kosovo Albanian extremists is an ongoing reality. This, and the organ scandal, doesn’t seem to alter anything because Serbian power is all but a distant memory. Therefore, a de-facto nation is being created literally on “the organs of innocents and narcotic trafficking alongside Islamic terrorist networks in Kosovo.”

Paul Lewis in an article published in The Guardian (British newspaper) on Dec 14th, states that “Kosovo’s prime minister is the head of a “mafia-like” Albanian group responsible for smuggling weapons, drugs and human organs through Eastern Europe, according to a Council of Europe inquiry report on organized crime.”

“The report of the two-year inquiry, which cites FBI and other intelligence sources, has been obtained by the Guardian. It names Thaçi as having over the last decade exerted “violent control” over the heroin trade. Figures from Thaçi’s inner circle are also accused of taking captives across the border into Albania after the war, where a number of Serbs are said to have been murdered for their kidneys, which were sold on the black market.”

In another article published by Modern Tokyo Times it is commented that “The report is clearly damning and this applies to not only the PM of Kosovo, Hashim Thaci, but to all nations who have recognized Kosovo. This applies to breaking international law and making clear fabrications about the nature of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) and the reality of what was happening on the ground.”

Paul Lewis continues also stated that “The report paints a picture in which ex-KLA commanders have played a crucial role in the region’s criminal activity. It says: “In confidential reports spanning more than a decade, agencies dedicated to combating drug smuggling in at least five countries have named Hashim Thaçi and other members of his Drenica group as having exerted violent control over the trade in heroin and other narcotics.”

Therefore, the policies of Bill Clinton included the green light for thousands of Islamists to enter Bosnia and in time they would slit the throats of Orthodox Christians. Not content with this, he also supported the terrorist and criminal KLA in Kosovo who have been involved in organ trafficking and heroin alongside destroying Orthodox Christianity.

In an article published by Modern Tokyo Times called Bosnia and Clinton’s Radical Islamists it was stated that “Sky news has obtained clear and proper evidence of a major cover-up and footages of massacres against Serbian Christians. According to the investigation and footages which were shown, it is abundantly clear that thousands of radical Islamists from all over the world were given a free reign in Bosnia.”

“This free-reign meant that innocent Serbian Christians were to meet terrible and disturbing deaths at the hands of radical Islamists who celebrated openly while cutting the heads off innocent civilians. The same Islamic forces which unleashed September 11th and which stone people to death in order to create “year zero,” were welcomed openly by Clinton and by people within his administration.”

In another called The Forgotten Orthodox Christians of Bosnia and Kosovo it was mentioned that “Maybe one day the Serbian Orthodox Christian community in Bosnia will face the same fate which befell their co-religionists in Kosovo. After all, Islamic nations and organizations are funding many Islamic institutions throughout the region and added to the higher Muslim birthrate and pro-American policies towards the Muslims of Bosnia and Kosovo then this could become a future reality.”

Turning back to northern Cyprus then it is clear that de-Orthodox Christianity is a reality and the same applies to the invasion by Turkey being tolerated for so long. This is in stark contrast to America’s intervention in Kosovo and not only this, just look at the hypocrisy of NATO because why isn’t Turkey expelled for violating the sovereignty of Cyprus?

If anybody wants to deny the religious element of northern Cyprus then an article by the Washington Times called Religious artifacts in Cyprus in “great peril” should make you think again. The article highlights the destruction of 500 Orthodox Christian churches which have been pillaged, 133 monasteries desecrated, 15,000 religious paintings have disappeared, 77 churches turned into mosques, 28 converted into military hospitals/camps and 13 have been turned into barns.

The US administration went into a panic over one Koran which was burnt but the systematic destruction of Orthodox Christianity in northern Cyprus doesn’t enter the radar. This is because either allies of America are doing this, like Turkey, and because covert policies by past leaders including Clinton have given the “green light” to Islamists in the Balkans.

It is clear that America’s lack of concern for Orthodox Christianity in northern Cyprus was a clear indicator to events in Bosnia and Kosovo. Killing two million mainly African Christians and Animists in Sudan in the 1980s and early 1990s by Arab Islamists didn’t witness intervention. Also, when Timorese Christians were being massacred by Indonesia this wasn’t deemed to be a crime at the time because America, the United Kingdom, and other nations, kept on selling military arms to Indonesia.

Iraqi Christians should have understood the reality of the Balkans because they have been left to defend themselves and unlike past secular law, they are now governed by Islamic Sharia law. Not surprisingly approximately 50 per cent of all Iraqi Christians have fled and at no time was special protection given to them from the sword of radical Islam.

Therefore, de-Christianization in northern Cyprus was done by an ally of America, the ongoing de-Christianization of Kosovo and Iraq respectively is happening under the watch of international troops and so-called friendly governments in Kosovo and Iraq – and Saudi Arabia is intent on spreading Islam in Bosnia and Europe while not allowing one single Christian church in their own nation.

If history tells us anything then the de-Christianization of Kosovo is a constant theme of America’s anti-Orthodox Christian policies in the Balkans. Therefore, Izetbegovic’s pan-Islamic dream remains a possibility because of America’s collusion, Islamic terrorist networks, Saudi Arabian and Turkish funding of Islamic institutions and if all this fails – then other covert ways will be found.

Macedonia should take note because the gap between events in northern Cyprus and Bosnia is many years apart but pro-Muslim policies remained the same. The current status quo in Macedonia will be put under further strains in the future because of the demographic reality and the rise of Islamism in the Balkans.

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x66b3i_kosovo-150-orthodox-churches-bef-af_news DESTRUCTION OF ORTHODOX CHRISTIANITY IN KOSOVO –

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x40yjg_days-made-of-fear-3-3-kosovo-octob_news#rel-page-3

Killing Kosovo Serbs under so-called international protection

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x40yqu_days-made-of-fear-2-3-kosovo-octob_news#rel-page-1

Attacks against Orthodox Christian Serbs in Kosovo

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x4xwsz_kosovo-kidnapped-butchered-murdered_news#rel-page-7 – Albanian KLA and killing people for organs

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/jul/21/report-warns-about-heavy-loss-of-religious-artifac/

http://www.cyprusembassy.net/home/index.php?module=page&pid=22

http://www.cyprusculturaldestruction.com/

http://www.kosovo.net/destruction.html