jakojako777
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Serbia to formally sue Croatia for genocide
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jakojako777
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jakojako777
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THE NEW WORLD DISORDER
U.N. troops accused of abetting genocide
source: WorldNetDaily.com
American Council for Kosovo documents 8 years of ethnic cleansing against Serbs
Friday, 31 August 2007
The cross that sat high atop St. Andrew the First-Called in Podujevo was torn down in one of many acts of vandalism designed to terrorize the Christian Serb community
WASHINGTON United Nations forces moved into Kosovo in 1999 to "stop genocide."
But, according to a blistering new report from the American Council for Kosovo, U.N. troops have aided and abetted the deliberate, systematic and nearly complete ethnic cleansing of the mostly Christian Serb population by mostly Muslim ethnic Albanians.
"Every facet of the way of life of the Serbs of Kosovo is threatened by the new reality established since June 1999 under KFOR (the NATO Kosovo Force) and the U.N. and therefore the very existence of the Serbs there is threatened," says the report "Hiding Genocide in Kosovo."
"All kinds of persecution using all types of methods have been adopted," the report says. "Throughout the territory of Kosovo, the Serbs have been persecuted, a persecution that is happening on their own territory, in their own country. They are denied basic human rights and are not equal to their Muslim counterparts under the law. Even though the Serbs were the main targets, they were not the only ones. Consider the situation of the Croats who now number less than 500, or the Roma who have been banished to the edges of the Serb enclaves by persistent terrorization, or the Gorani, Slavic Muslims, who reside in the south west tip of Kosovo in the mountains and whose numbers dwindle every year."
Using a combination of eyewitness reports, diaries of the dead and interviews with survivors, the report pieces together a harrowing narrative about eight years of mostly low-intensity genocide by the Muslim ethnic Albanians now demanding independence for Kosovo.
A Serb home in Svinjare burns
The U.N., in conjunction with Western powers, has been working toward this end, which they term "the final status."
"The biggest lie: the internationals claimed they were coming to stop a genocide," writes James George Jatras, director of the American Council for Kosovo. "In reality, they are facilitating one. For the Serbs in Kosovo 'final status' can only mean a final solution."
Ethnic and religious violence between Albanians and Serbs in the Serbian province of Kosovo was not unusual leading up to 1999 when the Albanian majority drew NATO onto their side in an effort to tip the scales in the balance of terror.
Kosovo has been occupied by the U.N. ever since the war ended. But the new report attempts to document the U.N.'s continuing partiality toward the Albanians, who have turned more and more Kosovo Serbs into refugees, virtually emptying out many Serb-dominated villages and burning and defacing churches along the way.
Thirteen months of international talks on the future of Kosovo ended in stalemate earlier this year. Now, three diplomats from the U.S., Russia and the European Union are set to start afresh.
St. George Cathedral near Prizren was burned and vandalized
While ethnic Albanians see their independence movement on the verge of success, Serbia turned to its Russian ally to veto U.N. adoption of any independence plan.
Meanwhile, the report on Kosovo violence looks at 12 municipalities, all of which had sizable Serbian Christian populations as recently as 1999. Today, the tiny Serb remnants are composed mainly of elderly and infirm simply incapable of moving.
Still, the carnage continues, right under the noses of U.N. KFOR authorities.
In Cernica, 45 Serb homes have been destroyed since the war ended in 1999. Since the middle of 2003, 12 Serbs have been killed, with no one being charged for the crimes.
Often, says the report, acts of violence against Serbs result in the arrest or detention of the victims. For instance, on Aug. 5, 2001, a hand grenade was thrown at the house of Vladimir Savic, records the diary of a Cernica Serb who himself was later killed by Albanians. Initially, Savic was reported killed in the blast. The grenade exploded just two meters from the main door and seriously wounded Savic and his wife, Stanica.
But when KFOR personnel arrived at the scene, they refused to provide the victims with first aid. Instead, they attempted to arrest their son, Miomor, who had been in the house with his wife and two children at the time of the explosion.
"Since the soldiers refused to help the wounded, their son carried them to his car and drove them without escort to the Greek military base in Bartes, where he was refused any help as well," says the report. "Not knowing what to do, he proceeded to the American base Bondstil."
The base personnel refused initially to admit the civilians. But, given the grave condition of the wounded, they admitted them to the hospital. After three days of medical treatment, they were transferred to Kosovoska Mitrovica.
At the ruins of Holy Archangels Monastery near Prizren, an Albanian mob left their messages: "Death to Serbs" and "Down with UNMIK" the U.N. police who offered minimal resistance for the attackers. German U.N. forces, meanwhile, watched the monastery destroyed without taking action
"Both victims have been mutilated for life and are invalids today," says the report. "The perpetrator has never been found."
Similar horror stories are recounted in the towns of Novo Brdo, Devet Jugovica, Pristina, Letnica, Urosevac, Kosovo Polje, Vitina and Banjska.
U.N. forces are also charged with a kind of ethnic profiling that directly aided the cause of Albanian ethnic cleansing. U.N. authorities overseeing the ethnic and religious balance in towns frequently identified Serbian Christian homes and Albanian Muslim homes. Sometimes yellow crosses were placed on the Christian homes which helped identify targets for the persecutors, according to the Kosovo genocide report.
"On the White House lawn on 7 May 2007, while welcoming British Queen Elizabeth, George W. Bush stated that both their countries were 'defending liberty against terror while resisting those who murder the innocent to advance a hateful ideology,'" concludes the report. "Is it possible in this information age of high technology, where the media daily bombards us with news and information, that these two leaders do not know what has really taken place in Kosovo? Can it be possible that they do not know that their troops were aiding and abetting terrorists in Kosovo and stood by as whole communities were wiped out?"
American Council for Kosovo - Violence Against Christian Serbs and Their Holy Places
U.N. troops accused of abetting genocide
source: WorldNetDaily.com
American Council for Kosovo documents 8 years of ethnic cleansing against Serbs
Friday, 31 August 2007
The cross that sat high atop St. Andrew the First-Called in Podujevo was torn down in one of many acts of vandalism designed to terrorize the Christian Serb community
WASHINGTON United Nations forces moved into Kosovo in 1999 to "stop genocide."
But, according to a blistering new report from the American Council for Kosovo, U.N. troops have aided and abetted the deliberate, systematic and nearly complete ethnic cleansing of the mostly Christian Serb population by mostly Muslim ethnic Albanians.
"Every facet of the way of life of the Serbs of Kosovo is threatened by the new reality established since June 1999 under KFOR (the NATO Kosovo Force) and the U.N. and therefore the very existence of the Serbs there is threatened," says the report "Hiding Genocide in Kosovo."
"All kinds of persecution using all types of methods have been adopted," the report says. "Throughout the territory of Kosovo, the Serbs have been persecuted, a persecution that is happening on their own territory, in their own country. They are denied basic human rights and are not equal to their Muslim counterparts under the law. Even though the Serbs were the main targets, they were not the only ones. Consider the situation of the Croats who now number less than 500, or the Roma who have been banished to the edges of the Serb enclaves by persistent terrorization, or the Gorani, Slavic Muslims, who reside in the south west tip of Kosovo in the mountains and whose numbers dwindle every year."
Using a combination of eyewitness reports, diaries of the dead and interviews with survivors, the report pieces together a harrowing narrative about eight years of mostly low-intensity genocide by the Muslim ethnic Albanians now demanding independence for Kosovo.
A Serb home in Svinjare burns
The U.N., in conjunction with Western powers, has been working toward this end, which they term "the final status."
"The biggest lie: the internationals claimed they were coming to stop a genocide," writes James George Jatras, director of the American Council for Kosovo. "In reality, they are facilitating one. For the Serbs in Kosovo 'final status' can only mean a final solution."
Ethnic and religious violence between Albanians and Serbs in the Serbian province of Kosovo was not unusual leading up to 1999 when the Albanian majority drew NATO onto their side in an effort to tip the scales in the balance of terror.
Kosovo has been occupied by the U.N. ever since the war ended. But the new report attempts to document the U.N.'s continuing partiality toward the Albanians, who have turned more and more Kosovo Serbs into refugees, virtually emptying out many Serb-dominated villages and burning and defacing churches along the way.
Thirteen months of international talks on the future of Kosovo ended in stalemate earlier this year. Now, three diplomats from the U.S., Russia and the European Union are set to start afresh.
St. George Cathedral near Prizren was burned and vandalized
While ethnic Albanians see their independence movement on the verge of success, Serbia turned to its Russian ally to veto U.N. adoption of any independence plan.
Meanwhile, the report on Kosovo violence looks at 12 municipalities, all of which had sizable Serbian Christian populations as recently as 1999. Today, the tiny Serb remnants are composed mainly of elderly and infirm simply incapable of moving.
Still, the carnage continues, right under the noses of U.N. KFOR authorities.
In Cernica, 45 Serb homes have been destroyed since the war ended in 1999. Since the middle of 2003, 12 Serbs have been killed, with no one being charged for the crimes.
Often, says the report, acts of violence against Serbs result in the arrest or detention of the victims. For instance, on Aug. 5, 2001, a hand grenade was thrown at the house of Vladimir Savic, records the diary of a Cernica Serb who himself was later killed by Albanians. Initially, Savic was reported killed in the blast. The grenade exploded just two meters from the main door and seriously wounded Savic and his wife, Stanica.
But when KFOR personnel arrived at the scene, they refused to provide the victims with first aid. Instead, they attempted to arrest their son, Miomor, who had been in the house with his wife and two children at the time of the explosion.
"Since the soldiers refused to help the wounded, their son carried them to his car and drove them without escort to the Greek military base in Bartes, where he was refused any help as well," says the report. "Not knowing what to do, he proceeded to the American base Bondstil."
The base personnel refused initially to admit the civilians. But, given the grave condition of the wounded, they admitted them to the hospital. After three days of medical treatment, they were transferred to Kosovoska Mitrovica.
At the ruins of Holy Archangels Monastery near Prizren, an Albanian mob left their messages: "Death to Serbs" and "Down with UNMIK" the U.N. police who offered minimal resistance for the attackers. German U.N. forces, meanwhile, watched the monastery destroyed without taking action
"Both victims have been mutilated for life and are invalids today," says the report. "The perpetrator has never been found."
Similar horror stories are recounted in the towns of Novo Brdo, Devet Jugovica, Pristina, Letnica, Urosevac, Kosovo Polje, Vitina and Banjska.
U.N. forces are also charged with a kind of ethnic profiling that directly aided the cause of Albanian ethnic cleansing. U.N. authorities overseeing the ethnic and religious balance in towns frequently identified Serbian Christian homes and Albanian Muslim homes. Sometimes yellow crosses were placed on the Christian homes which helped identify targets for the persecutors, according to the Kosovo genocide report.
"On the White House lawn on 7 May 2007, while welcoming British Queen Elizabeth, George W. Bush stated that both their countries were 'defending liberty against terror while resisting those who murder the innocent to advance a hateful ideology,'" concludes the report. "Is it possible in this information age of high technology, where the media daily bombards us with news and information, that these two leaders do not know what has really taken place in Kosovo? Can it be possible that they do not know that their troops were aiding and abetting terrorists in Kosovo and stood by as whole communities were wiped out?"
American Council for Kosovo - Violence Against Christian Serbs and Their Holy Places
jakojako777
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Sorting Through the Lies of the Racak Massacre and other Myths of Kosovo
by Stephen Gowans
Remember why NATO spent 78-days bombing Yugoslavia in the spring of 1999?
There was the ethnic cleansing. The atrocities. The refugees chased out of Kosovo by the Serb army. The mass graves. The heaps of bodies tossed into vats of sulphuric acid at the Trepca mines.
NATO spokesman Jamie Shea said there were 100,000 Kosovars unaccounted for.
Remember?
If you're like most people, you have at least a vague recollection of something that seemed to approach a modern-day Holocaust.
Problem is, none of it happened.
NATO's original estimate of 100,000 ethnic Albanians slaughtered, later revised downward to 10,000, turns out to be considerably exaggerated.
Dr. Peter Markesteyn, a Winnipeg forensic pathologist, was among the first war crimes investigators to arrive in Kosovo after NATO ended its bombing campaign.
"We were told there were 100,000 bodies everywhere," said Dr. Markesteyn. "We performed 1,800 autopsies -- that's it."
Fewer than 2,000 corpses. None found in the Trepca mines. No remains in the vats of sulphuric acid. Most found in isolated graves -- not in the mass graves NATO warned about. And no clue as to whether the bodies were those of KLA fighters, civilians, even whether they were Serbs or ethnic Albanians.
No wonder then that of all the incidents on which Slobodan Milosevic has been indicted for war crimes, the total body count is not 100,000, not 10,000, not even 1,800 -- but 391!
That's 109 lives fewer than the 500 Yugoslav civilians Human Rights Watch estimates were killed by NATO bombs -- and far fewer than what the death toll will eventually be once those who have yet to die from cancers induced by the terrible environmental devastation of the war are finally carried off as late -- and unaccounted for -- casualties.
And it's equal to the number of Palestinians who have been killed so far by the IDF -- the Israeli army -- in the latest Palestinian uprising. The difference is that the IDF, under the direction of Ehud Barak and now Ariel Sharon, is an occupying army, while the Yugoslav security forces, under Slobodan Milosevic, were conducting an counterinsurgency operation within their own borders.
But Barak, mistakenly portrayed as a peace-nik, and Sharon, the architect of a long string of atrocities, including the infamous Sabra and Shatila massacres, aren't under indictment for war crimes. Nor are they ever likely to be -- not as long as the United States wields a veto at the UN.
What's more, there's some question as to whether at least one of the war crimes Milosevic is accused of ever happened. And then there's the revealing issue of when they happened.
It seems that all of Milosevic's war crimes, but one, happened after the bombing -- highly curious, since the bombing was said to be necessary to stop a genocide, that, it seems now, NATO had no evidence of. (If they did, why haven't they brought it forward?)
Moreover, the one pre-bombing incident, the Racak massacre -- which the United States cited as a major reason for the bombing campaign -- is more likely to have been faked by the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), the guerilla army the Serbs were ensnared in a bloody civil war with, than to have represented the cold-blooded killing of ethnic Albanian non-combatants, as the KLA, and Washington's man in Kosovo at the time, William Walker, alleged.
It was Walker, at the time head of the Kosovo Verification Mission (KVM) who, on the morning of January 16, 1999, led the press to the Kosovar village of Racak, a KLA stronghold. There some 20 bodies were found in a shallow trench, and 20 more were found scattered throughout the village. The KLA, and Walker, alleged that masked Serb policemen had entered the village the previous day, and killed men, women and children at close range, after torturing and mutilating them. Chillingly, the Serb police were said to have whistled merrily as they went about their work of slaughtering the villagers.
It was a horrible tableau, sure to whip up the indignation of the world -- and it did.
Clinton's Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, as eager to scratch her ever itchy trigger finger as her boss was to scratch his illimitable sexual itches, demanded that Yugoslavia be bombed immediately. Albright, like a kid agonizingly counting down the hours to Christmas, would have to wait until after Milosevic's rejection of NATO's ultimata at Rambouillet to get her wish.
Bill Clinton, not to be surpassed in expressing indignation, said, "We should remember what happened in the village of Racak...Innocent men, women, and children were taken from their homes to a gully, forced to kneel in the dirt, sprayed with gunfire -- not because of anything they had done, but because of who they were."
But not everyone was so sure that Walker's story was to be believed. The French newspaper La Monde had some trouble swallowing the story. It reported on Jan. 21, 1999, a few days after the incident, that an Associated Press TV crew had filmed a gun battle at Racak between Serb police and KLA guerillas. Indeed, the crew was present because the Serbs had tipped them off that they were going to enter the village to arrest a man accused of shooting a police officer. Also present were two teams of KVM monitors.
It seems unlikely that if you're about to carry out a massacre that you would invite the press -- and international observers -- to watch.
The film showed that as soon as the Serbs entered Racak they came under heavy fire from KLA guerillas positioned in the surrounding hills. The idea that the police could dig a trench and then kill villagers at close range while under attack troubled La Monde. So too did the fact that, entering the village after the fire fight to assess the damage and interview the villagers, the KVM observers saw no sign of a massacre. What's more, the villagers said nothing about a massacre either.
Yet, when Walker returned the next day with the press -- at the KLA's invitation -- there was the trench with the bodies.
Could the police have returned later on and carried out the massacre under cover of darkness?
That seems unlikely. Racak is a KLA stronghold. Serb police had already discovered that if they were going to enter the village they would have to deal with the guerillas. How could they torture, mutilate and cold-bloodedly kill villagers at close range while harassed by KLA gunfire?
And why, wondered La Monde, were there few signs of spent cartridges and blood at the trench?
And now there's a report that the Finnish forensic pathologists who investigated the incident on behalf of the European Union, say there was no evidence of a massacre. In an article to be published in Forensic Science International at the end of February, the Finnish team writes that none of the bodies were mutilated, there was no evidence of torture, and only one was shot at close range.
Thirty-seven of the corpses had gunpowder residue on their hands, suggesting that they had been using firearms, and only one of the corpses was a woman, and only one was under 15 years of age. Not the picture Clinton painted of innocent men, women and children, dragged from their homes, and sprayed with gunfire.
The pathologists say Walker was quick to come to the conclusion that there was a massacre, even though the evidence was weak.
And they point out that there is no evidence that the deceased were from Racak.
The KLA, the Serbs charge, faked the massacre by laying out their fallen comrades in the trench they, themselves, prepared, and the United States used the staged massacre as a pretext for the bombing.
The Washington Post said, "Racak transformed the West's Balkan policy as singular events seldom do. The atrocity...convinced the administration and then its NATO allies that a six year effort to bottle up the ethnic conflict in Kosovo was doomed."
We'll never know for sure what really happened at Racak, but the evidence linking Milosevic to a brutal massacre is pretty slim.
"The first casualty of war is the truth," says Paul Buteux, a political scientist at the University of Manitoba, echoing a clich that is sententiously uttered after every war, but never learned from.
"It gets very murky. I have no doubt that whoever was putting those intelligence reports together prior to the NATO air campaign would be under pressure to put things in the worst possible light. There was a point when the spin doctors came in."
Putting things in the worst possible light? There's a big difference between putting things in the worst possible light and turning 1,800 corpses into 100,000, between arguing that a genocide had to be stopped by a bombing campaign, and being able to adduce only one incident of a war crime -- and a doubtful one at that -- occurring before the bombing.
That's not putting things in the worst possible light. It's doing what the leaders of NATO countries do repeatedly -- lie.
And yet, the press, uncritically conveying official lies, acts as if it trusts politicians not to lie about war. It behaves as if the latest war, unlike every other, is free of propaganda, distortion, manipulation and lies.
Is it the media's patriotic duty to turn off its bullshit detectors whenever a king's ransom of high-tech military equipment is pressed into service to beat the tar out of yet another weakling country?
There's a belief that in times of war patriotism demands that we rally around our leaders.
But as the American historian Howard Zinn points out, the most patriotic act in times of war is to ask questions, not to blindly follow leaders we know to be skilled and inveterate liars.
Since the media can't be depended on to ask questions, it's up to the rest of us.
And the first question patriots should ask themselves is why our leaders lied about Kosovo -- and why they continue to lie about it today?
Mr. Steve Gowans is a writer and political activist who lives in Ottawa, Canada.
Sorting Through the Lies of the Racak Massacre.. (by Stephen Gowans) - Media Monitors Network
by Stephen Gowans
Remember why NATO spent 78-days bombing Yugoslavia in the spring of 1999?
There was the ethnic cleansing. The atrocities. The refugees chased out of Kosovo by the Serb army. The mass graves. The heaps of bodies tossed into vats of sulphuric acid at the Trepca mines.
NATO spokesman Jamie Shea said there were 100,000 Kosovars unaccounted for.
Remember?
If you're like most people, you have at least a vague recollection of something that seemed to approach a modern-day Holocaust.
Problem is, none of it happened.
NATO's original estimate of 100,000 ethnic Albanians slaughtered, later revised downward to 10,000, turns out to be considerably exaggerated.
Dr. Peter Markesteyn, a Winnipeg forensic pathologist, was among the first war crimes investigators to arrive in Kosovo after NATO ended its bombing campaign.
"We were told there were 100,000 bodies everywhere," said Dr. Markesteyn. "We performed 1,800 autopsies -- that's it."
Fewer than 2,000 corpses. None found in the Trepca mines. No remains in the vats of sulphuric acid. Most found in isolated graves -- not in the mass graves NATO warned about. And no clue as to whether the bodies were those of KLA fighters, civilians, even whether they were Serbs or ethnic Albanians.
No wonder then that of all the incidents on which Slobodan Milosevic has been indicted for war crimes, the total body count is not 100,000, not 10,000, not even 1,800 -- but 391!
That's 109 lives fewer than the 500 Yugoslav civilians Human Rights Watch estimates were killed by NATO bombs -- and far fewer than what the death toll will eventually be once those who have yet to die from cancers induced by the terrible environmental devastation of the war are finally carried off as late -- and unaccounted for -- casualties.
And it's equal to the number of Palestinians who have been killed so far by the IDF -- the Israeli army -- in the latest Palestinian uprising. The difference is that the IDF, under the direction of Ehud Barak and now Ariel Sharon, is an occupying army, while the Yugoslav security forces, under Slobodan Milosevic, were conducting an counterinsurgency operation within their own borders.
But Barak, mistakenly portrayed as a peace-nik, and Sharon, the architect of a long string of atrocities, including the infamous Sabra and Shatila massacres, aren't under indictment for war crimes. Nor are they ever likely to be -- not as long as the United States wields a veto at the UN.
What's more, there's some question as to whether at least one of the war crimes Milosevic is accused of ever happened. And then there's the revealing issue of when they happened.
It seems that all of Milosevic's war crimes, but one, happened after the bombing -- highly curious, since the bombing was said to be necessary to stop a genocide, that, it seems now, NATO had no evidence of. (If they did, why haven't they brought it forward?)
Moreover, the one pre-bombing incident, the Racak massacre -- which the United States cited as a major reason for the bombing campaign -- is more likely to have been faked by the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), the guerilla army the Serbs were ensnared in a bloody civil war with, than to have represented the cold-blooded killing of ethnic Albanian non-combatants, as the KLA, and Washington's man in Kosovo at the time, William Walker, alleged.
It was Walker, at the time head of the Kosovo Verification Mission (KVM) who, on the morning of January 16, 1999, led the press to the Kosovar village of Racak, a KLA stronghold. There some 20 bodies were found in a shallow trench, and 20 more were found scattered throughout the village. The KLA, and Walker, alleged that masked Serb policemen had entered the village the previous day, and killed men, women and children at close range, after torturing and mutilating them. Chillingly, the Serb police were said to have whistled merrily as they went about their work of slaughtering the villagers.
It was a horrible tableau, sure to whip up the indignation of the world -- and it did.
Clinton's Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, as eager to scratch her ever itchy trigger finger as her boss was to scratch his illimitable sexual itches, demanded that Yugoslavia be bombed immediately. Albright, like a kid agonizingly counting down the hours to Christmas, would have to wait until after Milosevic's rejection of NATO's ultimata at Rambouillet to get her wish.
Bill Clinton, not to be surpassed in expressing indignation, said, "We should remember what happened in the village of Racak...Innocent men, women, and children were taken from their homes to a gully, forced to kneel in the dirt, sprayed with gunfire -- not because of anything they had done, but because of who they were."
But not everyone was so sure that Walker's story was to be believed. The French newspaper La Monde had some trouble swallowing the story. It reported on Jan. 21, 1999, a few days after the incident, that an Associated Press TV crew had filmed a gun battle at Racak between Serb police and KLA guerillas. Indeed, the crew was present because the Serbs had tipped them off that they were going to enter the village to arrest a man accused of shooting a police officer. Also present were two teams of KVM monitors.
It seems unlikely that if you're about to carry out a massacre that you would invite the press -- and international observers -- to watch.
The film showed that as soon as the Serbs entered Racak they came under heavy fire from KLA guerillas positioned in the surrounding hills. The idea that the police could dig a trench and then kill villagers at close range while under attack troubled La Monde. So too did the fact that, entering the village after the fire fight to assess the damage and interview the villagers, the KVM observers saw no sign of a massacre. What's more, the villagers said nothing about a massacre either.
Yet, when Walker returned the next day with the press -- at the KLA's invitation -- there was the trench with the bodies.
Could the police have returned later on and carried out the massacre under cover of darkness?
That seems unlikely. Racak is a KLA stronghold. Serb police had already discovered that if they were going to enter the village they would have to deal with the guerillas. How could they torture, mutilate and cold-bloodedly kill villagers at close range while harassed by KLA gunfire?
And why, wondered La Monde, were there few signs of spent cartridges and blood at the trench?
And now there's a report that the Finnish forensic pathologists who investigated the incident on behalf of the European Union, say there was no evidence of a massacre. In an article to be published in Forensic Science International at the end of February, the Finnish team writes that none of the bodies were mutilated, there was no evidence of torture, and only one was shot at close range.
Thirty-seven of the corpses had gunpowder residue on their hands, suggesting that they had been using firearms, and only one of the corpses was a woman, and only one was under 15 years of age. Not the picture Clinton painted of innocent men, women and children, dragged from their homes, and sprayed with gunfire.
The pathologists say Walker was quick to come to the conclusion that there was a massacre, even though the evidence was weak.
And they point out that there is no evidence that the deceased were from Racak.
The KLA, the Serbs charge, faked the massacre by laying out their fallen comrades in the trench they, themselves, prepared, and the United States used the staged massacre as a pretext for the bombing.
The Washington Post said, "Racak transformed the West's Balkan policy as singular events seldom do. The atrocity...convinced the administration and then its NATO allies that a six year effort to bottle up the ethnic conflict in Kosovo was doomed."
We'll never know for sure what really happened at Racak, but the evidence linking Milosevic to a brutal massacre is pretty slim.
"The first casualty of war is the truth," says Paul Buteux, a political scientist at the University of Manitoba, echoing a clich that is sententiously uttered after every war, but never learned from.
"It gets very murky. I have no doubt that whoever was putting those intelligence reports together prior to the NATO air campaign would be under pressure to put things in the worst possible light. There was a point when the spin doctors came in."
Putting things in the worst possible light? There's a big difference between putting things in the worst possible light and turning 1,800 corpses into 100,000, between arguing that a genocide had to be stopped by a bombing campaign, and being able to adduce only one incident of a war crime -- and a doubtful one at that -- occurring before the bombing.
That's not putting things in the worst possible light. It's doing what the leaders of NATO countries do repeatedly -- lie.
And yet, the press, uncritically conveying official lies, acts as if it trusts politicians not to lie about war. It behaves as if the latest war, unlike every other, is free of propaganda, distortion, manipulation and lies.
Is it the media's patriotic duty to turn off its bullshit detectors whenever a king's ransom of high-tech military equipment is pressed into service to beat the tar out of yet another weakling country?
There's a belief that in times of war patriotism demands that we rally around our leaders.
But as the American historian Howard Zinn points out, the most patriotic act in times of war is to ask questions, not to blindly follow leaders we know to be skilled and inveterate liars.
Since the media can't be depended on to ask questions, it's up to the rest of us.
And the first question patriots should ask themselves is why our leaders lied about Kosovo -- and why they continue to lie about it today?
Mr. Steve Gowans is a writer and political activist who lives in Ottawa, Canada.
Sorting Through the Lies of the Racak Massacre.. (by Stephen Gowans) - Media Monitors Network
jakojako777
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Kosovo Albanian, six others, arrested in US over terror plot
American authorities have arrested Hysen Sherifi, Kosovo Albanian, and six other persons suspected of planning terrorist attacks oversees, including in Kosovo
(KosovoCompromise Staff) Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Prosecutors claim Sherifi visited Kosovo in July 2008 "to engage in violent jihad", before returning to the US in April 2009 to raise "funds and personnel to support the mujihadeen".
According to the indictment, the leader of the group is Daniel Patrick Boyd, who used his experience from Afghanistan and Pakistan, where he was from 1989 to 1992, to form his own group for training fighters, gathering money and planning and committing terrorist acts abroad.
His two sons Dylan, 22, and Zakariya, 20, are also suspects, along with Sherifi, 24, Anes Subasic, 33, Mohammad Omar Aly Hassan, 22, and Ziyad Yaghi, 21.
The seven, who could face life in prison if found guilty, are accused of traveling to Gaza, Israel, Jordan, Pakistan and Kosovo in order to plan or contract people for attacks.
They have all been charged with conspiring to provide material support to terrorists and conspiring to murder, kidnap and injure of persons abroad.
According to the indictment, the group has been active since late 2006, though they have not been charged for any attacks.
One U.S. officials told reporters that there is not indication that Boyd's group had ties to any international militant organization or that they were planning any attacks in America.
Kosovo Compromise :: Kosovo Albanian, six others, arrested in US over terror plot
American authorities have arrested Hysen Sherifi, Kosovo Albanian, and six other persons suspected of planning terrorist attacks oversees, including in Kosovo
(KosovoCompromise Staff) Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Prosecutors claim Sherifi visited Kosovo in July 2008 "to engage in violent jihad", before returning to the US in April 2009 to raise "funds and personnel to support the mujihadeen".
According to the indictment, the leader of the group is Daniel Patrick Boyd, who used his experience from Afghanistan and Pakistan, where he was from 1989 to 1992, to form his own group for training fighters, gathering money and planning and committing terrorist acts abroad.
His two sons Dylan, 22, and Zakariya, 20, are also suspects, along with Sherifi, 24, Anes Subasic, 33, Mohammad Omar Aly Hassan, 22, and Ziyad Yaghi, 21.
The seven, who could face life in prison if found guilty, are accused of traveling to Gaza, Israel, Jordan, Pakistan and Kosovo in order to plan or contract people for attacks.
They have all been charged with conspiring to provide material support to terrorists and conspiring to murder, kidnap and injure of persons abroad.
According to the indictment, the group has been active since late 2006, though they have not been charged for any attacks.
One U.S. officials told reporters that there is not indication that Boyd's group had ties to any international militant organization or that they were planning any attacks in America.
Kosovo Compromise :: Kosovo Albanian, six others, arrested in US over terror plot
jakojako777
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Bosnia
WATCH AND LEARN ABOUT CLASSIC EXAMPLE MODERN WARFARE PROPAGANDA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jkHp_0SxTQQ
Do you remember Bosnia? All the false reporting, all the lies perpetrated by the Clinton administration against the public. Like the Iraq war, it was all conjured up in Washington and London by a criminal class and their PR firms. The result being a destroyed country and one hundred thousand dead.
.
WATCH AND LEARN ABOUT CLASSIC EXAMPLE MODERN WARFARE PROPAGANDA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jkHp_0SxTQQ
Do you remember Bosnia? All the false reporting, all the lies perpetrated by the Clinton administration against the public. Like the Iraq war, it was all conjured up in Washington and London by a criminal class and their PR firms. The result being a destroyed country and one hundred thousand dead.
.
jakojako777
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- Joined
- Oct 27, 2009
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Tudjman’s Police Minister Admits Croatia Started the War by Attacking Serbs
Feb 13th, 2009 | By De-Construct.net | In Croatia, Earlier, Former Yugoslavia, Interview
Josip Boljkovac, Franjo Tudjman's minister of police
“According to Tuđman’s concept, Serbs had to disappear from Croatia”, Josip Boljkovac, Franjo Tuđman’s minister of police
Serbs and Yugoslavia were Under Attack, Not Croatia
In the exclusive interview, Franjo Tuđman’s Internal Affairs Minister Josip Boljkovac admitted Croat leadership carried out planned attacks on Croatia Serbs in 1991, in order to start a war. “Tuđman wanted the war at any cost, following the concept according to which Serbs must disappear from Croatia,” Boljkovac said.
Croat media censored reports from Boljkovac’s testimony at the trial against former Osijek mayor Branimir Glavaš, war criminal responsible for horrific crimes against the local Serbs, concealing parts of his testimony which charge Croatia with instigating the war.
“During the testimony, Glavaš accused me of persecuting him because he destroyed the bridge on river Drava in Osijek [Croatia]. He claimed he had destroyed the bridge to protect the town from JNA [Yugoslav National Army] tanks, and I responded that, at the time, JNA was a regular army of an internationally recognized state, while Croatia, which was not recognized, was part of Yugoslavia. Then I explained who started armed conflicts in that part of Slavonija,” Boljkovac told Frankfurt-based daily Vesti.
In a sensational interview published on February 12 and carried by the several media outlets in Serbia, Croatia’s war-time minister of police said it was the Serbs and Yugoslavia who were being attacked in 1991, and not Croatia.
“Back then, in 1991, Serbs and Yugoslavia were under attack, not Croatia. Gojko Šušak, Branimir Glavaš and Vice Vukojević launched antitank rockets on Borovo Selo in order to provoke a war. The bridge in Osijek was destroyed for the same reason,” Boljkovac said.
He explained Croat war-time leader Franjo Tudjman “wanted the war at any cost”:
“The war was not a necessity — it was an intention. According to Tudjman’s concept, Serbs had to disappear from Croatia,” Boljkovac stressed, adding he was against the war and didn’t allow Serbs who were serving in the police in Croatia to be fired which, in turn, made him a target for assassination by Croat emigration.
Boljkovac believes there was a secret “deal” between former Yugoslav and Serbian President Slobodan Milošević and Franjo Tuđman, Croatia’s war leader, “to divide Bosnia and Herzegovina and exchange the population through ethnic cleansing.” According to his theory, “Tuđman handed over Bosnian Posavina to Milošević, and Milošević helped Tuđman to get rid of Krajina Serbs”.
FULL ARTICLE
Tudjman’s Police Minister Admits Croatia Started the War by Attacking Serbs - De-Construct.net
Feb 13th, 2009 | By De-Construct.net | In Croatia, Earlier, Former Yugoslavia, Interview
Josip Boljkovac, Franjo Tudjman's minister of police
“According to Tuđman’s concept, Serbs had to disappear from Croatia”, Josip Boljkovac, Franjo Tuđman’s minister of police
Serbs and Yugoslavia were Under Attack, Not Croatia
In the exclusive interview, Franjo Tuđman’s Internal Affairs Minister Josip Boljkovac admitted Croat leadership carried out planned attacks on Croatia Serbs in 1991, in order to start a war. “Tuđman wanted the war at any cost, following the concept according to which Serbs must disappear from Croatia,” Boljkovac said.
Croat media censored reports from Boljkovac’s testimony at the trial against former Osijek mayor Branimir Glavaš, war criminal responsible for horrific crimes against the local Serbs, concealing parts of his testimony which charge Croatia with instigating the war.
“During the testimony, Glavaš accused me of persecuting him because he destroyed the bridge on river Drava in Osijek [Croatia]. He claimed he had destroyed the bridge to protect the town from JNA [Yugoslav National Army] tanks, and I responded that, at the time, JNA was a regular army of an internationally recognized state, while Croatia, which was not recognized, was part of Yugoslavia. Then I explained who started armed conflicts in that part of Slavonija,” Boljkovac told Frankfurt-based daily Vesti.
In a sensational interview published on February 12 and carried by the several media outlets in Serbia, Croatia’s war-time minister of police said it was the Serbs and Yugoslavia who were being attacked in 1991, and not Croatia.
“Back then, in 1991, Serbs and Yugoslavia were under attack, not Croatia. Gojko Šušak, Branimir Glavaš and Vice Vukojević launched antitank rockets on Borovo Selo in order to provoke a war. The bridge in Osijek was destroyed for the same reason,” Boljkovac said.
He explained Croat war-time leader Franjo Tudjman “wanted the war at any cost”:
“The war was not a necessity — it was an intention. According to Tudjman’s concept, Serbs had to disappear from Croatia,” Boljkovac stressed, adding he was against the war and didn’t allow Serbs who were serving in the police in Croatia to be fired which, in turn, made him a target for assassination by Croat emigration.
Boljkovac believes there was a secret “deal” between former Yugoslav and Serbian President Slobodan Milošević and Franjo Tuđman, Croatia’s war leader, “to divide Bosnia and Herzegovina and exchange the population through ethnic cleansing.” According to his theory, “Tuđman handed over Bosnian Posavina to Milošević, and Milošević helped Tuđman to get rid of Krajina Serbs”.
FULL ARTICLE
Tudjman’s Police Minister Admits Croatia Started the War by Attacking Serbs - De-Construct.net
jakojako777
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Croat State Genocide Supported by Vatican, Germany and US
Nov 23rd, 2008 | By De-Construct.net | In Croatia, Current, Earlier
In October 1991 Croats slaughtered 510 Krajina Serbs in Gospić, the very same region Croat Ustashi have flooded by the blood of innocent Serbs during WWII
A Case Serbia Cannot Lose
Smilja Avramov: If the Court governs itself by the law, Serbia’s chances to prove Croat state genocide are at full hundred percent.
“Croatia has absolutely no chance of proving the alleged genocide it wants to pin Serbia with. It was indeed Croatia that has committed a horrific genocide against the Serbs under the auspices of Vatican, Germany and the United States. If the Court is going to govern itself exclusively by the law, Serbia has an ironclad case against Croatia,” Smilja Avramov, an International Law expert, told Belgrade daily Glas Javnosti.
She emphasized that Serbia should file a lawsuit, rather than a counter lawsuit against Croatia.
“This is an ideal opportunity to clearly prove the continuity of genocide [by the Croat state], of varying intensity, since 1941 until today”, Professor Avramov said.
There is a common belief that Serbia will legally have an easy task of proving the genocide Croat state has been carrying out against its Serbian population for decades, from Starčević, through Pavelić and Tuđman, down to Mesić, who brags that the genocidal “Storm”, a full-fledged pogrom over the Krajina Serbs, was a “legitimate action”.
Hundred Years of Unsurpassed Croat Cruelty to their Serbian Population
Milivoje Ivanišević, Director of the Center for Investigating the Crimes against the Serbian nation said his Center will provide the legal team representing Serbia before the International Court of Justice with a comprehensive documentation of chronologically confirmed Croat war crimes, ethnic cleansing and genocide against the Serbs.
“By the cruelty and bloodthirstiness Croats were a great role model for the Germans themselves and for their crimes in World War II. The lawsuit should include the killings of Serbs, it should list all the Croat concentration camps, deportations and destruction of property. It would be good to point out the data from the ledgers, beside the demographic one, as well as to highlight the continuous discrimination against the Serbs, especially between the two world wars,” Ivanišević stressed.
Prime Minister of Republic of Serbian Krajina in Exile Milorad Buha hopes the International Court of Justice will make it clear in its verdict that the Croat state had committed the crime of ethnic cleansing and genocide over the Krajina Serbs.
Serbs killed by Croat Ustashi during WWII
Slaughter of Croatia’s Serbs by the Croat Ustashi during World War Two
“Croat actions cannot be qualified in any other way. Croatia had expelled so many Serbs [in the 1990s] that, when both the territory of the Republic of Serbian Krajina and the territory of Croatia where there were no war activities are taken into account, the numbers are reaching 800,000. After the Court’s just verdict, the only thing left for the European Union, the United States and the Holy See will be to explain why have they used all the means to support and help Croat unconstitutional degradation of the constitutive nation of Croatia’s Serbs into an ethnic minority, and why did they aid Croatia in ethnically cleansing the Serbs — gradually since 1990, and then finally in the atrocious military aggression against the Republic of Srpska Krajina,” Buha said.
FULL ARTICLE
Croat State Genocide Supported by Vatican, Germany and US - De-Construct.net
Nov 23rd, 2008 | By De-Construct.net | In Croatia, Current, Earlier
In October 1991 Croats slaughtered 510 Krajina Serbs in Gospić, the very same region Croat Ustashi have flooded by the blood of innocent Serbs during WWII
A Case Serbia Cannot Lose
Smilja Avramov: If the Court governs itself by the law, Serbia’s chances to prove Croat state genocide are at full hundred percent.
“Croatia has absolutely no chance of proving the alleged genocide it wants to pin Serbia with. It was indeed Croatia that has committed a horrific genocide against the Serbs under the auspices of Vatican, Germany and the United States. If the Court is going to govern itself exclusively by the law, Serbia has an ironclad case against Croatia,” Smilja Avramov, an International Law expert, told Belgrade daily Glas Javnosti.
She emphasized that Serbia should file a lawsuit, rather than a counter lawsuit against Croatia.
“This is an ideal opportunity to clearly prove the continuity of genocide [by the Croat state], of varying intensity, since 1941 until today”, Professor Avramov said.
There is a common belief that Serbia will legally have an easy task of proving the genocide Croat state has been carrying out against its Serbian population for decades, from Starčević, through Pavelić and Tuđman, down to Mesić, who brags that the genocidal “Storm”, a full-fledged pogrom over the Krajina Serbs, was a “legitimate action”.
Hundred Years of Unsurpassed Croat Cruelty to their Serbian Population
Milivoje Ivanišević, Director of the Center for Investigating the Crimes against the Serbian nation said his Center will provide the legal team representing Serbia before the International Court of Justice with a comprehensive documentation of chronologically confirmed Croat war crimes, ethnic cleansing and genocide against the Serbs.
“By the cruelty and bloodthirstiness Croats were a great role model for the Germans themselves and for their crimes in World War II. The lawsuit should include the killings of Serbs, it should list all the Croat concentration camps, deportations and destruction of property. It would be good to point out the data from the ledgers, beside the demographic one, as well as to highlight the continuous discrimination against the Serbs, especially between the two world wars,” Ivanišević stressed.
Prime Minister of Republic of Serbian Krajina in Exile Milorad Buha hopes the International Court of Justice will make it clear in its verdict that the Croat state had committed the crime of ethnic cleansing and genocide over the Krajina Serbs.
Serbs killed by Croat Ustashi during WWII
Slaughter of Croatia’s Serbs by the Croat Ustashi during World War Two
“Croat actions cannot be qualified in any other way. Croatia had expelled so many Serbs [in the 1990s] that, when both the territory of the Republic of Serbian Krajina and the territory of Croatia where there were no war activities are taken into account, the numbers are reaching 800,000. After the Court’s just verdict, the only thing left for the European Union, the United States and the Holy See will be to explain why have they used all the means to support and help Croat unconstitutional degradation of the constitutive nation of Croatia’s Serbs into an ethnic minority, and why did they aid Croatia in ethnically cleansing the Serbs — gradually since 1990, and then finally in the atrocious military aggression against the Republic of Srpska Krajina,” Buha said.
FULL ARTICLE
Croat State Genocide Supported by Vatican, Germany and US - De-Construct.net
jakojako777
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JIHAD IN BOSNIA - JIHAD YOU NEVER HEARD ABOUT !
Muslim brigade "El-Mujahideen" in Zenica/Bosnia
Serbia: The Hoax Goes On…. Centurean2’s Weblog
Muslim brigade "El-Mujahideen" in Zenica/Bosnia
Serbia: The Hoax Goes On…. Centurean2’s Weblog
jakojako777
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- Oct 27, 2009
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Crisis over Kosovo
Escalating tensions are compounding EU division over recognition of Kosovo a year after it declared independence
One year on from its unilateral declaration of independence, the issue of Kosovo's status remains contested and contorted. Deficient levels of recognition, particularly the stern opposition of five EU member states, combined with Serbia's pursuit of an International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling on the legality of Kosovo's declaration, suggest that without renewed negotiations over its status, the question will continue to linger over the entire western Balkans; stalling the region's progress towards membership of the EU. Simmering tensions in the north of Kosovo, meanwhile, inflamed by the establishment of a Kosovo security force (KSF), indicate the potential for further destabilisation in the forthcoming period.
The EU continues to be beset by a lack of consensus over Kosovo, with Spain, Slovakia, Greece, Romania and Cyprus – each deeply aware of their own respective internal national self-determination quandaries – firmly withholding recognition. Though the European parliament recently passed a resolution urging a change of stance, each country quickly reiterated their previously stated opposition. Ignacio De Palacio Espana, Spain's ambassador to Serbia, remarked that, "most UN members do not recognise Kosovo's independence", while Dora Bakoyannis, Greece's foreign minister, reaffirmed how Greece would continue to formulate its foreign policy "based on international law, taking into account its national interests, the region's stability and European values". It is highly unlikely that any of this group of five will retreat from this position any time soon.
The basis of Serbia's diplomatic approach towards Kosovo remains the framework of UN security council resolution 1244, which emphasises Serbia's sovereignty over Kosovo, and the UN's neutrality. Future talks over technical matters will focus on implementation of UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon's six-point plan – which ultimately allowed for the deployment of the long-delayed EU rule of law, or Eulex, mission, but which was rejected by the government in Kosovo – not the Ahtisaari plan, which failed to secure UN security council approval. Furthermore, these discussions will take place between Serbia and UN officials, not between Serbia and the government in Pristina. As Goran Bogdanovic, Serbia's minister for Kosovo, insisted, Serbia will "talk to Pristina only about status".
The recent establishment of the KSF, meanwhile, has created a new security dilemma; one that only further antagonises relations between Kosovo Albanians and minority communities. Envisaged by the Ahtisaari plan and trained by Nato, the force will consist of 2,500 active recruits and 800 reservists. Though described by Nato as a "lightly armed formation", initially tasked with dealing with crisis situations, civil protection and de-mining operations, Kosovo's president, Fatmir Sejdiu, has expressed his hopes that it will provide the "foundations of a future army of Kosovo". Claims that the force will take part in international peace-keeping operations only serve to reinforce this concern.
In response, Bogdanovic has called for the demilitarisisation of Kosovo as the main precursor to security throughout the region; a view echoed by Serbia's president, Boris Tadic, who described the formation of a KSF as "unacceptable". Kosovo Serbs have protested at the move almost daily, while the Serbian government has vowed to use diplomatic and legal means to block the KSF's formation, claiming that it contravenes UN security council resolution 1244, according to which KFOR is the only permitted armed formation in Kosovo.
Simmering inter-ethnic tensions, combined with sporadic outbreaks of violence, in the north of Kosovo, particularly in the divided town of Mitrovica, underscore the extent of the challenges facing the recently deployed Eulex mission; which, along with KFOR, has been accused of not reacting quickly enough to protect Kosovo's Serbs. The international community has an extremely poor record of protecting the rights of non-Albanian communities in Kosovo, as demonstrated by the large number of refugees and internally displaced persons post-1999, rendering proclamations about multi-ethnicity and minority rights protection both hollow and disingenuous. Deepening socio-economic problems, compounded by the global economic crisis, which has also impacted remittances and donor support, threaten to ignite more severe manifestations of this lingering discontent.
Serbia's diplomatic course throughout 2009 will focus on deterring future recognitions and encouraging submissions to the ICJ from countries supporting the motion that Kosovo's unilateral declaration of independence was not in line with international law. Though the ICJ's ruling is non-binding, a verdict in Serbia's favour would reignite calls for further talks over Kosovo's status and possible retractions of recognition, particularly by countries such as the Czech Republic, where the issue prompted deep domestic divisions, and Costa Rica, which insists that it will act in accordance with international law. Serbia's foreign policy will, however, become increasingly delicate, and at times contradictory, as its pursuit of EU membership is tested by the EU's definition and interpretation of conditionality relating to "good neighbourly relations".
guardian.uk
Ian Bancroft: The EU is still divided over Kosovo's status, one year on from its declaration of independence | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk
jakojako777
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Bosnia-Herzegovina: New Book Investigates Presence Of Al-Qaeda
June 1, 2007 (RFE/RL) -- Six men -- all foreign-born Muslims -- were arrested in May in the United States, accused of involvement in a terrorist plot to attack soldiers at Fort Dix, a U.S. Army training center in New Jersey. Four of the suspects are ethnic Albanians from the former Yugoslavia, while one is from Jordan and one is from Turkey.
The arrests served again to focus attention on the issue of Islamic terrorists allegedly using the former Yugoslavia as a base of operations, as well as the impact of their radical views on the region's historically moderate form of Islam.
Vlado Azinovic is a senior editor with RFE/RL's South Slavic and Albanian Languages Service. Azinovic explores these issues in his new book, "Al-Qaeda In Bosnia-Herzegovina: Myth Or Present Danger?"
MORE: A sample chapter of Vlado Azinovic's "Al-Qaeda In Bosnia-Herzegovina: Myth Or Present Danger" (.pdf format).
IN BOSNIAN: The complete book and other materials.
"The research for this book was prompted by a series of media reports and research papers that in recent years claimed that Bosnia was, and still is, a staging area and safe haven for Islamic terrorists traveling between the Middle East and Europe," says Azinovic. "My book arose out of a desire to investigate the validity of these claims."
Azinovic says he decided to focus on several key questions:
* What is Al-Qaeda and the ideology behind it?
* Does Al-Qaeda enjoy any support in Bosnia?
* If so, how did it get there?
* Are Bosnian Muslims being recruited to fight its cause?
He says his research established that, as of 1992, Bosnia had, indeed, become a meeting point for members of militant groups who had arrived either from training camps in Afghanistan or from Western Europe, where they had been recruited in mosques and Islamic centers. These militants felt that genocide was taking place in Bosnia and that a new jihad was required. Once they reached Bosnia, they became mujahedin and adopted new identities.
Mujahedin Remain
"In short, [Bosnia-Herzegovina] is an ideal breeding ground for militant ideologies, while Wahhabism provides extreme, yet simple, answers to almost every challenge that arises from Bosnia's postwar reality." -- Vlado Azinovic
Azinovic says the number of mujahedin who fought in Bosnia from 1992 to 1995 is estimated at 3,000 to 4,000. Initially, they were not under the control of the Bosnian military but fought beside Bosnian Muslims, or Bosniaks. In September 1993, however, the mujahedin were integrated into the Bosnian Army’s Third Corps under the name El-Mujahedin Unit.
A few hundred mujahedin remained in Bosnia after the war, Azinovic says. A few dozen still remain. He says they have enjoyed protection and support from the highest ranks of the Bosniak political and intelligence establishment. Some of them are believed to have links to Al-Qaeda.
The arrival of the mujahedin, he says, introduced two important factors into Bosnia's security and social landscape.
One was short-term: the physical presence of people trained to commit terrorist acts.
The other factor was long-term. Along with the mujahedin came a rather narrow, puritanical, and confrontational interpretation of Islam, commonly known as Wahhabism.
From the outset, Wahhabism caused tensions in traditional Bosnian-Muslim society, which has always been religiously moderate. These tensions have escalated in recent months, Azinovic says, and have led to a struggle between "traditionalists" and Wahhabis for the control of mosques and Islamic centers.
Source Of Instability
"My book maintains that the presence of Wahhabism and of the remaining mujahedin do not qualify Bosnia as a particular threat to international security," Azinovic says. "More of a threat, I believe, is the fact that Bosnia is becoming a failed state. The Dayton peace agreement may have ended the armed conflict, but through the establishment of the Serb Republic (Republika Srpska), it incorporated, rather than resolved, the fundamental dispute over which the war was originally fought -- namely, whether Bosnia is a united or divided country."
Vlado Azinovic (RFE/RL)
Vlado Azinovic (RFE/RL)
He says this dichotomy provides a permanent source of instability. It prevents the establishment of a viable state structure and a self-sustaining economy. It destabilizes democratic institutions and creates internal frictions, hindering the reconciliation process. As a result, he says, the state's borders are porous and susceptible to human and drug trafficking, while weapons and ammunition are still readily available.
"In short, the country is an ideal breeding ground for militant ideologies," Azinovic says, "while Wahhabism provides extreme, yet simple, answers to almost every challenge that arises from Bosnia's postwar reality."
In addition, since 2002, the West -- and in particular the United States -- has been shifting resources and political energy from Bosnia to other regions in the world where security threats appear more imminent.
While discussing the alleged propensity of Bosniaks to join the global jihadist movement, Azinovic says, "we should look not just at whether there are individuals in Bosnia ready to put on suicide vests, but also at the factors that inspire people to embrace extremist ideologies."
Ideology Gaining Ground
While Al-Qaeda-linked groups and individuals in Bosnia remain elusive, he says, overwhelming evidence indicates that the ideology behind the movement is gaining ground rapidly.
"No one is born a terrorist; terrorists are bred. The social, economic, and political origins of terrorism must be addressed with equal resolve." -- Vlado Azinovic
"But Bosnian society does not seem capable of dealing with this problem decisively," says Azinovic, "while international involvement is often more of a hindrance than a help, for it typically deals with the consequences, instead of the root causes, of the problem."
The "war on terror," he says, cannot be successful if fought solely against those already indoctrinated with jihadist ideology.
"No one is born a terrorist; terrorists are bred. The social, economic, and political origins of terrorism must be addressed with equal resolve," Azinovic concludes. "My book argues that by helping accelerate its transformation into a nation of entrepreneurship, political responsibility, and popular sovereignty, Bosnia could be used by the West to promote a vision of modern and moderate Islam."
(MORE: In March 2006, RFE/RL's South Slavic and Albanian Languages Service spoke with moderate Bosnian Muslim leader Reisu-UI-ulema Mustafa Ceric.)
Bosnia-Herzegovina: New Book Investigates Presence Of Al-Qaeda - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty 2009
June 1, 2007 (RFE/RL) -- Six men -- all foreign-born Muslims -- were arrested in May in the United States, accused of involvement in a terrorist plot to attack soldiers at Fort Dix, a U.S. Army training center in New Jersey. Four of the suspects are ethnic Albanians from the former Yugoslavia, while one is from Jordan and one is from Turkey.
The arrests served again to focus attention on the issue of Islamic terrorists allegedly using the former Yugoslavia as a base of operations, as well as the impact of their radical views on the region's historically moderate form of Islam.
Vlado Azinovic is a senior editor with RFE/RL's South Slavic and Albanian Languages Service. Azinovic explores these issues in his new book, "Al-Qaeda In Bosnia-Herzegovina: Myth Or Present Danger?"
MORE: A sample chapter of Vlado Azinovic's "Al-Qaeda In Bosnia-Herzegovina: Myth Or Present Danger" (.pdf format).
IN BOSNIAN: The complete book and other materials.
"The research for this book was prompted by a series of media reports and research papers that in recent years claimed that Bosnia was, and still is, a staging area and safe haven for Islamic terrorists traveling between the Middle East and Europe," says Azinovic. "My book arose out of a desire to investigate the validity of these claims."
Azinovic says he decided to focus on several key questions:
* What is Al-Qaeda and the ideology behind it?
* Does Al-Qaeda enjoy any support in Bosnia?
* If so, how did it get there?
* Are Bosnian Muslims being recruited to fight its cause?
He says his research established that, as of 1992, Bosnia had, indeed, become a meeting point for members of militant groups who had arrived either from training camps in Afghanistan or from Western Europe, where they had been recruited in mosques and Islamic centers. These militants felt that genocide was taking place in Bosnia and that a new jihad was required. Once they reached Bosnia, they became mujahedin and adopted new identities.
Mujahedin Remain
"In short, [Bosnia-Herzegovina] is an ideal breeding ground for militant ideologies, while Wahhabism provides extreme, yet simple, answers to almost every challenge that arises from Bosnia's postwar reality." -- Vlado Azinovic
Azinovic says the number of mujahedin who fought in Bosnia from 1992 to 1995 is estimated at 3,000 to 4,000. Initially, they were not under the control of the Bosnian military but fought beside Bosnian Muslims, or Bosniaks. In September 1993, however, the mujahedin were integrated into the Bosnian Army’s Third Corps under the name El-Mujahedin Unit.
A few hundred mujahedin remained in Bosnia after the war, Azinovic says. A few dozen still remain. He says they have enjoyed protection and support from the highest ranks of the Bosniak political and intelligence establishment. Some of them are believed to have links to Al-Qaeda.
The arrival of the mujahedin, he says, introduced two important factors into Bosnia's security and social landscape.
One was short-term: the physical presence of people trained to commit terrorist acts.
The other factor was long-term. Along with the mujahedin came a rather narrow, puritanical, and confrontational interpretation of Islam, commonly known as Wahhabism.
From the outset, Wahhabism caused tensions in traditional Bosnian-Muslim society, which has always been religiously moderate. These tensions have escalated in recent months, Azinovic says, and have led to a struggle between "traditionalists" and Wahhabis for the control of mosques and Islamic centers.
Source Of Instability
"My book maintains that the presence of Wahhabism and of the remaining mujahedin do not qualify Bosnia as a particular threat to international security," Azinovic says. "More of a threat, I believe, is the fact that Bosnia is becoming a failed state. The Dayton peace agreement may have ended the armed conflict, but through the establishment of the Serb Republic (Republika Srpska), it incorporated, rather than resolved, the fundamental dispute over which the war was originally fought -- namely, whether Bosnia is a united or divided country."
Vlado Azinovic (RFE/RL)
Vlado Azinovic (RFE/RL)
He says this dichotomy provides a permanent source of instability. It prevents the establishment of a viable state structure and a self-sustaining economy. It destabilizes democratic institutions and creates internal frictions, hindering the reconciliation process. As a result, he says, the state's borders are porous and susceptible to human and drug trafficking, while weapons and ammunition are still readily available.
"In short, the country is an ideal breeding ground for militant ideologies," Azinovic says, "while Wahhabism provides extreme, yet simple, answers to almost every challenge that arises from Bosnia's postwar reality."
In addition, since 2002, the West -- and in particular the United States -- has been shifting resources and political energy from Bosnia to other regions in the world where security threats appear more imminent.
While discussing the alleged propensity of Bosniaks to join the global jihadist movement, Azinovic says, "we should look not just at whether there are individuals in Bosnia ready to put on suicide vests, but also at the factors that inspire people to embrace extremist ideologies."
Ideology Gaining Ground
While Al-Qaeda-linked groups and individuals in Bosnia remain elusive, he says, overwhelming evidence indicates that the ideology behind the movement is gaining ground rapidly.
"No one is born a terrorist; terrorists are bred. The social, economic, and political origins of terrorism must be addressed with equal resolve." -- Vlado Azinovic
"But Bosnian society does not seem capable of dealing with this problem decisively," says Azinovic, "while international involvement is often more of a hindrance than a help, for it typically deals with the consequences, instead of the root causes, of the problem."
The "war on terror," he says, cannot be successful if fought solely against those already indoctrinated with jihadist ideology.
"No one is born a terrorist; terrorists are bred. The social, economic, and political origins of terrorism must be addressed with equal resolve," Azinovic concludes. "My book argues that by helping accelerate its transformation into a nation of entrepreneurship, political responsibility, and popular sovereignty, Bosnia could be used by the West to promote a vision of modern and moderate Islam."
(MORE: In March 2006, RFE/RL's South Slavic and Albanian Languages Service spoke with moderate Bosnian Muslim leader Reisu-UI-ulema Mustafa Ceric.)
Bosnia-Herzegovina: New Book Investigates Presence Of Al-Qaeda - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty 2009
jakojako777
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In 1999, the newspaper, 'Dani,' announced that bin Laden had been issued a Special Passport from the Washington-Backed Bosnian Government in 1993. Two weeks ago, the Bosnian government issued a denial. Given that this denial took two years and came immediately after September 11th, we suggest it be taken with a grain of salt.
"BIN LADEN WAS GRANTED BOSNIAN PASSPORT"
"Agence France Presse September 24, 1999
"SARAJEVO
"Osama bin Laden, the Saudi billionaire wanted by the United States for organising bloody terrorist attacks, was granted a Bosnian passport in 1993 by the country's [i.e., Bosnia]embassy in Vienna, an independent weekly reported Friday.
"'The Bosnian embassy in Vienna granted a passport to bin Laden in 1993,' Dani magazine said, quoting anonymous sources, emphasizing that files and traces linked to his case have recently been destroyed by the [Bosnian] government.
"However, Bin Laden 'did not personally collect his Bosnian passport,' Dani said, without elaborating or explicitly stating that his passport was ever collected.
"'High Muslim officials of the Bosnian foreign ministry agreed that it [the destruction of files linked to bin Laden] was the top priority. It was even more important than investigating a person responsible for granting a passport to the most wanted terrorist in the world,' Dani reported.
"According to the article, Muslim political circles claim that six years ago officials at the Bosnian embassy in Vienna could not have known who bin Laden was.
"During the 1992-1995 Bosnia's war, the Vienna embassy has been 'making contacts with many Arab-world people seeking aid' for the mainly Muslim Bosnian army, the article said.
"The foreign ministry issued no comments on the article. Bin Laden, believed to be in Afghanistan, is accused by the United States of masterminding bloody bomb attacks against its embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in August of last year. Over 200 people were killed in these attacks. Washington has offered a reward of five million dollars for information leading to his arrest.
"Earlier this week the Bosnian government confirmed it had granted citizenship and passport to a Tunisian-born senior aide of bin-Laden in 1997. The government said citizenship was given to Mahrez Amduni, known in Sarajevo as Mehrez Amdouni, on the basis of his Bosnian army membership, stressing that there was no Interpol arrest warrant against him at that time.
"Amduni was arrested by Turkish police at Istanbul airport on September 13, in an operation in which Interpol also took part.
"During the Bosnia 1992-95 war some Islamic fighters battled alongside Muslim soldiers in central Bosnia against Bosnian Serbs and Croats. Most of them left the country after a US-brokered peace deal was signed in 1995. Some of them gained Bosnian citizenship as members of the Bosnian army or by marrying Bosnian women.
"The government has never revealed how many foreign fighters were granted Bosnian citizenship."
Copyright 1999 Agence France Presse
Excerpts from News Reports - Bin Laden in the Balkins
"BIN LADEN WAS GRANTED BOSNIAN PASSPORT"
"Agence France Presse September 24, 1999
"SARAJEVO
"Osama bin Laden, the Saudi billionaire wanted by the United States for organising bloody terrorist attacks, was granted a Bosnian passport in 1993 by the country's [i.e., Bosnia]embassy in Vienna, an independent weekly reported Friday.
"'The Bosnian embassy in Vienna granted a passport to bin Laden in 1993,' Dani magazine said, quoting anonymous sources, emphasizing that files and traces linked to his case have recently been destroyed by the [Bosnian] government.
"However, Bin Laden 'did not personally collect his Bosnian passport,' Dani said, without elaborating or explicitly stating that his passport was ever collected.
"'High Muslim officials of the Bosnian foreign ministry agreed that it [the destruction of files linked to bin Laden] was the top priority. It was even more important than investigating a person responsible for granting a passport to the most wanted terrorist in the world,' Dani reported.
"According to the article, Muslim political circles claim that six years ago officials at the Bosnian embassy in Vienna could not have known who bin Laden was.
"During the 1992-1995 Bosnia's war, the Vienna embassy has been 'making contacts with many Arab-world people seeking aid' for the mainly Muslim Bosnian army, the article said.
"The foreign ministry issued no comments on the article. Bin Laden, believed to be in Afghanistan, is accused by the United States of masterminding bloody bomb attacks against its embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in August of last year. Over 200 people were killed in these attacks. Washington has offered a reward of five million dollars for information leading to his arrest.
"Earlier this week the Bosnian government confirmed it had granted citizenship and passport to a Tunisian-born senior aide of bin-Laden in 1997. The government said citizenship was given to Mahrez Amduni, known in Sarajevo as Mehrez Amdouni, on the basis of his Bosnian army membership, stressing that there was no Interpol arrest warrant against him at that time.
"Amduni was arrested by Turkish police at Istanbul airport on September 13, in an operation in which Interpol also took part.
"During the Bosnia 1992-95 war some Islamic fighters battled alongside Muslim soldiers in central Bosnia against Bosnian Serbs and Croats. Most of them left the country after a US-brokered peace deal was signed in 1995. Some of them gained Bosnian citizenship as members of the Bosnian army or by marrying Bosnian women.
"The government has never revealed how many foreign fighters were granted Bosnian citizenship."
Copyright 1999 Agence France Presse
Excerpts from News Reports - Bin Laden in the Balkins
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The Trail of Tears
by Jared Israel
[Posted 2 August 2004]
The photograph below shows the Serbian families, mainly farmers, who fled the Croatian invasion of the Serbian Krajina that began 4 August 1995. Croatian forces were led by 'retired' US officers from MPRI, a corporation set up as a private-sector agency of the US military and State Department
FULL ARTICLE
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Bosnian Muslim Waffen-SS, "Handschar"\"Handzar"
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...7-20,_Bosnische_SS-Freiwillige_beim_Gebet.jpg
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Muslim Waffen SS Handzar (Handzar(Turk language) =Sword)
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On the right, Kosovar Albanian Muslim Nazir Hodic, a member of the Nazi SS Division Handzar in Bosnia. On the left is Rudi Sommemer, the commander of the Nazi SS Albanian Battalion, 6/28 in Handzar. Hodic is shown wearing the Albanian skull cap issued by the SS with a Nazi swastika on his collar.
Students Supporting a Secure Israel: November 2005
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Croat NAZI Ustase WW2
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BILL POSTER INVITING TO VOLUNTEER (THAT WAS OBLIGATORY!) TO SS
-SS WERE ELITE NAZI TROOPS NOT ACCESSIBLE FOR NATIONS CONSIDERED
"LOWER RACE" I.E. RUSSIANS, SERBS,JEWS,ROMANI etc.
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WAFFEN SS Handzar
ORIENTAL SWORD "HANDZAR" (Turk word)
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GERMANS with some members of HANDZAR WAFFEN SS
