JULIA GORIN:Former Albanian PM: WHEN (Still Not a Country) Kosovo Joins UN, Formation of Albanian State will be Finalized…..see note please
http://www.juliagorin.com/wordpress/?p=2999
STUNNING: U.S. takes Serbia’s side over KLA monument; issues “warning” to Albania over NATIONALIST rhetoric as Albanian officials openly call for UNIFICATION of “Albanian lands.” State Dept in bizarre departure from accusing and threatening Serbia over such things….J.G.
Kosovo independence changed Balkans’ status, geopolitical position of [Albanians], says Pandeli Majko (FOCUS News Agency, Feb. 13)
Former Albanian prime minister, Pandeli Majko, said that the independence of Kosovo has changed the status and the geopolitical position of the Albanian nation in the region, KS Reporter informs.
“History is nothing, if nothing is being done. Albanians won independent existence, but they lost half of their territory, while Kosovo is the price that had to be paid: In 1919 Albania was divided by Kosovo and it was like the separation of twins with different fates. In 1999 Albanians’ historical battle for Kosovo was won and today Kosovo is officially recognised country. Soon, when Kosovo joins the UN, the historical process of the formation of the Albanian nation will be finalised,” Pandeli Majko remarked.
Wasn’t it just the other day that Reich spokesman in occupied Serbia was desperately parsing, un-parsing and re-parsing his words about Kosovo and UN membership?
But the bigger point today is that here’s the Albanian former prime minister announcing what Washington is still desperately lying about: that the end game will inevitably be a Greater Albania (a.k.a. “Serbian Myth/Propaganda” No. 426)
A week ago Sunday was the “five-year anniversary” of Kosovo’s self-proclaimed independence. Which is like me congratulating myself for winning a second presidential term. (The first term never happened either.) But check out this latest creative Balkan inversion that was born during the five-year anniversary celebrations last weekend. Al Jazeera’s (purposely?) confused headline to be explained further down:
Kosovo’s Unification Flag Reinforces Division (Al Jazeera, Feb. 16)
Kosovo will on Sunday [Feb. 17] mark five years since it declared independence from Serbia.
Most people are expected to wave the black and red Albanian flag, however, rather than the Kosovar flag during celebrations.
[How surprising!]
The new symbol of multi-ethnic Kosovo, bearing stars representing the six main ethnic groups of the republic, is seen by some as dividing the country. […]
Clever obfuscation. The “division” the Albanians are worried about is between Kosovo and Albania, which is why they wave the Albanian flag — the real “unification flag.” They don’t like the new, six-star flag because it reminds them that there are still non-Albanians in Kosovo, and this apparently is “divisive.” Albanians are the ultimate xenophobes. Knowing this but never admitting it, the EU therefore created the six-star flag to “serve as a consistent reminder of the ethnic groupings here,” as the Jazeera reporter puts it. Precisely to remind Albanians that they’re supposed to keep some non-Albanians around and protect them from the Albanian majority, so as to keep up the charade of “multi-ethnic Kosovo.”
Which brings us back to Al Jazeera’s misleading headline. The blue and yellow six-star flag is not a “unification” flag, since “unification” generally refers to that between Kosovo and Albania. Perhaps the intended word was “unity” flag. As in, unity among the six ethnic groups of Kosovo — the fairy tale that Western political elites tell themselves before bed. As already stated, that unity is indeed something an Albanian would find divisive.
In the video above, Self-Determination party (Vetevendosje) leader Albin Kurti is interviewed. Reporter Paul Brennan says Kurti “sees no difference between campaigning for stronger Kosovo independence and eventual unification with Albania.” (Insert 14-year Duhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! here.) Brennan paraphrases Kurti: “The Kosvoan flag will never be loved,” and Kurti adds, “It will never take a proper place in the hearts of the people.”
That’s because the Kosovo war was never about Kosovo, “freedom”, “liberation” or “independence.” It was always about Albania. The Clintons lied. The Bushes lied. John McCain lied. Madeleine Albright lied. Condoleezza Rice lied. And the rest of the clones.
And, lo and behold, just a few days before the “independence” celebrations, a leaked State Dept. memo is revealed. Notice the unprecedented entrance (unprecedented until December 2012) of the word “nationalist” to describe someone in the Balkans other than the Serbs. Indeed, it’s finally being used to describe our clients, the Serbs’ avowed enemy. But, again, don’t expect any reassessments about whether it was this virulent nationalism that the “nationalist” Serbs were fighting in the first place. Notice also the “danger to regional stability” charge now finally being applied to the actual danger, whereas for the past two decades we’ve been told that not giving Albanians what they want (a.k.a. “Serbian intransigence”) is the “danger to regional stability.”
Leaked Memo Condemns Albanian PM Sali Berisha’s Nationalist Rhetoric, Calling it Danger to Regional Stability (Balkan Insight, Feb. 15)
Albanian Prime Minister Sali Berisha (Who wouldn’t trust a mug like this?)
The undated memo seems to have been sent to Prime Minister Sali Berisha after Serbia took down a memorial to ethnic Albanian fighters in the southern Serbian town of Presevo in January.
The State Department says that Albanian leaders are veering away from their traditional constructive role in the region. [Ha ha ha ha ha! The role we called “constructive” because we were going along with the Albanian program.]
“Recent public statements made by Albanian politicians on the Presevo monument have crossed the line from responsible political discussion to counterproductive, potentially dangerous rhetoric,” the memo reads.
“They not only promote more inflammatory behavior and distract from the region’s priorities but also potentially incite violence, erode peace and stability and impact our relationship,” it adds.
Albanian politicians? Inciting violence? Nawwwwwwww! And could it be that our notion of “the region’s priorities” differed from our clients’ — again?
…Berisha declared that the removal of the monument showed that Serbia was a racist state, adding that ethnic Albanians in the Balkans ought one day to unite in one country.
“This act shows once more that there is only one way, the unification of the Albanian nation, for Albanians to enjoy the freedom they earned by shedding blood,” the Prime Minister said.
Gloves and masks are off, Baby! One also notes that the part about Serbia being a “racist state” would normally have elicited head-nodding from Washington and Brussels, along with additional demands, threats, carrots and sticks aimed at Serbia. Has some sort of line finally been crossed by the Albanian side? Who knew there was a line to cross? Especially since even pogroms and grave-scattering hadn’t crossed it.
The memo downplays the importance of the monument, noting that it was erected illegally and that it was meant to provoke the Serbian authorities.
WASHINGTON PARROTING SERBIAN PROPAGANDA??!!!!!! Who knew the day would come?! Normally we hear such sentences from the Serbian side in self-defense against Albanian provocations and criminality, which are then followed by condemnations of Belgrade’s unconstructive role in the region, its “regression to Milosevic-era nationalism.” What’s going on? Why is Washington suddenly treating Serbs and Serbia as part of the human family? And why is it finally talking back to Albanians?
It also highlights efforts by the OSCE mission in Belgrade and the US Embassy to negotiate an agreement between Presevo Albanians and the government of Serbia on the dispute.
The memo underlines that Berisha’s statement made negotiations harder and they were an intervention into Serbia’s internal affairs.
WHAT?????????????????????? Did Prince Lazar himself write this memo from the grave? Or Milosevic himself? Or perhaps Vojislav Kostunica — that other U.S.-promoted-then-dismissed-as-”nationalist” leader who succeeded Milosevic? Or could it be, is it possible, did we ever dream…that…maybe…these people weren’t nationalists at all — and we’re in the process of witnessing the entire U.S.-German edifice of Balkan lies and the policies constructed thereupon…fall apart? I mean, gosh, Albania’s sponsoring the KLA’s war against Serbia in 1998-99 wasn’t an intervention into Serbia’s internal affairs, nor was a full-on bombardment by U.S.-led NATO, but this little old quote by Berisha is? Does Foggy Bottom realize the colossal admission it’s just made on all counts? Oh wait, don’t tell me, “A” can equal “B”, but “A” and “A” cannot. Just like the Kosovo session being “a unique case” and therefore not a precedent for any other secessions.
Two nationalist parties, the Red and Black Alliance and the Party for Justice, Integration and Unity, PDIU, have appeared lately on the political scene in Albania.
The PDIU, which is a junior government partner, represents the Cham minority, Albanians expelled from Greece at the end of World War Two, and targets its rhetoric at Athens.
The Red and Black Alliance focuses on the potential unification of all ethnic Albanian lands and has lashed out both against Albania’s neighbours and against Berisha, calling him an autocrat and a traitor.
Under attack, and with few successes to show off before the June 2013 parliamentary elections, Berisha has increasingly appealed to pan-Albanian sentiment.
The State Department memo says the upcoming election should not serve as an excuse for “irresponsible rhetoric and negative political messages”.
It urges Albania’s political elite to stay out of Serbia’s affairs and concentrate on its EU integration process, holding free and fair elections and on improving the economy.
“You are not making a good impression just as we prepare for a new State Department leadership,” the memo says. “Don’t make us condemn you publicly,” it warns.
Because it’s all about impressions and timing. i.e. “Shhhh! Too soon We know we’ve dug a hole with you, and we’re happy to dig it deeper, but you’re letting the cat out of the bag too soon. We can’t work with a light shone on what we’re doing; the whole beauty of the Balkans is that no one ever looks there to expose what you’re up to.
“Don’t make us condemn you”? I’m sure the Albanians are shaking in their boots. Talk about a role reversal. Yet this is the second time I’m hearing of the U.S. “warning” the Albanians since 2000, when we first dared to “warn” them as they caught us off-guard by their expanding the war beyond Kosovo. We were counter-warned then, and have been on-program ever since. What’s going on now?
U.S. warns Albania against stoking nationalism (Reuters, Feb. 15)
The United States has warned leaders in NATO ally Albania in no uncertain terms to stop stoking nationalism in the run-up to an election because they risk destabilizing the region.
…
Last November, the foreign minister of neighboring Greece boycotted Albanian centenary festivities in Tirana after Berisha hailed a town over the border as “Albanian lands”. The president of Macedonia, where a quarter of the population are ethnic Albanians, also stayed away.In a memo to the Albanian Foreign Ministry reported on Friday by a number of newspapers [A number of newspapers? Really? What the hell is going on?! It all relates to FORMER Yugoslavia — no one ’s supposed to give a damn what we did with it], the U.S. State Department said Albania’s leaders were wading into “potentially dangerous” territory, given the history of ethnic conflicts in the Balkans.
…
Even more bluntly, it told Albanian politicians to “stay out of the affairs of Serbia”, which is in delicate European Union-mediated talks aimed at normalizing ties with Kosovo….
See what I’m saying? Our real worry is that Albania could screw up our Albanian-pushed screw-over of Serbia.
…Berisha has repeatedly complained of foreign “Albanophobia”, and raised eyebrows in Serbia last month when he referred to ethnic Albanian former guerrillas there as “heroes of the Albanian nation”.
Ethnic Albanians waged insurgencies in both southern Serbia and Macedonia in 2000 and 2001. Those conflicts were a spillover of the 1998-99 war in Kosovo….
Wow, note the mention of both wars in a single news item — as if the media people knew all along — and let us know — that those aggressive Albanian wars happened, and that they were a spillover of the Kosovo war, which they’re still trying to believe was *not* an aggressive war. (And still trying to get us to believe that Clinton’s war “contained the conflict,” as promised, rather than spilling it over — as they’ve just admitted it did.)
Kosovo declared independence in 2008. But poverty, unemployment and a lack of integration continue to fuel discontent among ethnic Albanians across the region.
This is the MSM’s continued insistence on believing that Albanian nationalism and irredentism has more to do with economic discontent than with the year 1878, when plans were decided on to unite “all Albanian lands,” an ambition that Albanians take in with mother’s milk and which has caused over a century of Slav-slaughter and alignment with fascist and communist forces. The question bears asking about ourselves, their latest sponsor: Which are we?
Washington was the driving force behind Albania’s accession to NATO in 2009, and is pressing Tirana to ensure that its election is free of the violence and fraud allegations of previous votes, so that its bid to join the EU can move ahead.
Please keep up appearances, since we’ve married you! And introduced you to society, with all kinds of club memberships.
…But Berisha defended his approach.
“This nationalism does not have territorial claims,” he told a session of parliament on Friday marking Kosovo’s fifth year of statehood. “This nationalism is not based on doctrines of extermination, like the nationalisms around us.”
Yet another Albanian who doesn’t know Albanians very well. Or Serbs, if that’s whom the latter accusation is aimed at.
In the midst of all this, no sooner did Sec. of State John Kerry congratulate Serbia for its National Day (Feb 15), than on Feb. 15th he congratulated Kosovo for its National Day, causing one to wonder whether the choice of Feb. 17th in 2008 wasn’t intentionally picked so closely to Serbia’s day as yet another insult to Serbian identity:
Press Statement
John Kerry
Secretary of State
Washington, DC
February 15, 2013
On behalf of President Obama and the people of the United States, I am delighted to send best wishes to the people of the Republic of Kosovo as you celebrate your fifth anniversary of independence on February 17.
This past year has been one of great milestones for Kosovo, including the end of Kosovo’s supervised independence, membership of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and progress in the dialogue with Serbia to normalize relations. The United States remains firmly committed to supporting an independent, sovereign, and multiethnic Kosovo. I congratulate Kosovo’s [mafia] leaders for their dedication to building stronger democratic institutions, advancing new economic opportunities, promoting the rule of law, and reinforcing Kosovo’s European integration path. Continued work in these areas serves to secure lasting regional stability and prosperity for your country.
As you celebrate this special day, know that the United States stands with Kosovo as a partner and friend. I congratulate all the people of Kosovo on this holiday and wish you great success in the year to come.
Now, what one can deduce from a guy who says he’s your friend and then tells your enemy he’s also his friend, is that this guy is nobody’s friend.
The accolades for “multi-ethnic” Kosovo “democracy” continued on Feb. 22nd, with this bit of similar-sounding pre-packaged dribble from Reich Jr. — Hungary — lapping up and disseminating all that the Kosovo government representative had to say:
Kosovo, the youngest nation in Europe
A success story of democratic and multi-ethnic state building: Ambassador Shkendije Geci Sherifi in interview (The Budapest Times, Feb. 22, By Christopher Maddock)
Kosovo’s National Day this week was only the fifth one since the declaration of independence on 17 February 2008, making it the continent’s newest state. Ambassador of Kosovo to Hungary, Shkendije Geci Sherifi brings us up to date on progress and on ties with Hungary
[Sherifi:]…As it is approaching the fifth year of statehood, the Republic of Kosovo is proving to be a success story of democratic and multi-ethnic state building. In this journey of success, Kosovo is not alone, it is widely supported by its allies, the US and the majority of EU states, as well as other friendly countries from all over the world. The number of international recognitions is approaching 100.
[Maddock:] Hungary quickly recognised the Republic of Kosovo in March 2008 while wishing to remain committed to developing bilateral relations with Serbia. Is there any awkwardness in the three-way relationship?
[Sherifi:] Hungary was among the first states to recognise the independent state of Kosovo while its foreign policy reflects a clear position on Kosovo: independence of Kosovo serves peace and long-term stability, regional development and other integration processes…Hungary is determined in developing bilateral relations with Serbia but with Kosovo as well, claiming that the recognition of the latter should not hinder its relationship with Serbia. [Just because I’ve cut off your limb doesn’t mean we can’t be friends!] Hungary, among others, as a neighbouring country of Serbia is fully committed to support Serbia’s path towards European integration, but at the same time it supports the integration of Kosovo and that of the Western Balkans countries in general. […]
That is, Serbia is to accept the adage “The friend of my enemy is my friend.”
Then last Friday — the next day after the puff above — came the same warning message to Albania that Washington had, from Reich Sr.:
Germany warns Albania against nationalist rhetoric (B92, Tanjug, Feb. 23)
TIRANA — Germany has warned Albanian leaders to refrain from using inflammatory nationalist rhetoric amid international concern over growing talk of the Greater Albania.
…
“No changes of borders are allowed in the Balkans,” [Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle during a visit to Tirana on Friday] said, urging politicians to refrain from escalating nationalist rhetoric during the campaign for parliamentary polls due in June.“Conflicts in the Balkans have to be resolved through cooperation, rather than by powerful rhetoric,” German ARD Radio cited Westerwelle as saying. [Sure could have fooled us. As Liz, who circulated this item, notes: 1999 brought changes of borders through the powerful rhetoric of U.S./German-led NATO bombs laden with depleted uranium.]
“To see all the states of the region joining the European Union one day has to be a common goal,” he added.
Over the past few months, Albanian Prime Minister Sali Berisha and other officials have spoken about the creation of the Greater Albania, sparking concern among neighboring countries with Albanian minorities, said AFP.
The U.S. recently warned Tirana it was playing a “dangerous game”…Berisha irked his country’s neighbors when he spoke of “Albanians from all Albanian lands,” referring to ethnic Albanian populations in Greece, Macedonia, Serbia and Montenegro.
Even as Berlin and Washington are suddenly given pause, 14 years into digging the hole, the media continue to run with the narrative originally sold, which has legs and a life of its own. On this point, THE PRIZE GOES TO NY DAILY NEWS for being the first mainstream U.S. media outlet to run a story — before officialdom has given the go-ahead for such transition — referring to Kosovo by its Albanian pronunciation, “Kosova.” The Bronx dateline helps explain the Albanian-English being used by the reporter who has to cover that beat, given that Bronx is the American extension of Greater Albania (recall: “ ‘policemen from Bern and Brussels and all the way to Bronx’ are well aware about the insurmountable difficulties when it comes to the attempts to investigate Albanian organized crime”):
Bronx
Local Kosova people mark 5th anniversary of independence from Serbia with weeklong festivities (Feb. 12)
About 10,000 Kosovars live in New York City, most of them in the Bronx
By Tanyanika Samuels / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Fireworks light the sky of Pristina, Kosovo, as people gathered to celebrate independence from Serbia in 2008.
Like many local Kosovars, Besim Malota can remember the day Kosovo officially declared independence from Serbia.
“I was watching TV all night, and talking with my friends back home,” he said of that fateful day, Feb. 17, 2008. “Then I finally went to Times Square. There were hundreds, maybe thousands of people there. Everybody was happy that day. After 96 years of occupation, we were finally free.”
Five years later, that joy has not dimmed as local Kosovars ready again to celebrate independence all week long with a variety of festivities in the Bronx and citywide.
“It’s a proud day for Kosova people and Albanian Americans throughout the world,” said Assemblyman Mark Gjonaj, the first Albanian-American elected to state office. He will be presenting a resolution to commemorate the anniversary in the state assembly Tuesday.
More than 10,000 Kosovo people live in the city, mostly in the Bronx.
…
Illyria Newspaper is hosting a formal dinner on Saturday in Manhattan; the Bronx non profit, Vatra Federation, will present a luncheon at Maestro’s in Morris Park on Sunday; and the local group, Bashkimi Kombetar, will host a formal dinner also at Maestro’s Sunday night.The Republic of Kosovo, home to approximately 2 million people, is the youngest country in the Balkan region.
[It’s so young that it’s not even a country.]
Following World War II, Kosovo had been an autonomous province of Serbia in the former Republic of Yugoslavia. In the 1980s, Kosovo Albanians started calling for independence. Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic revoked Kosovo’s status in 1989 [I could have sworn it was the Albanian Yugoslav officials there, freaked out by the agenda of the racist-nationalist separatists in their midst] and launched brutal attacks against ethnic Albanians [gee, against random innocent civilians] in the late 1990s that resulted in massacres [by the KLA, she fails to mention] and displaced more than 750,000 people. [Back to the old numbers, I see.]
…
For more information visit albanianevents.com.tsamuels@nydailynews.com
I made a futile attempt last year to contact The News’ resident KLA mouthpiece, Tanyanika Samuels, the last time she was suckered in by Albanian propaganda. This was the letter I sent her in March of last year, naturally to no response:
Dear Ms. Samuels,
I’ve been meaning to email you about the propaganda play you plugged in January. I understand that Americans know very little about Albanians, as we are not yet up to the intimate familiarity with them that Europe suffers from, and so you would have had no idea that the one-act play you covered, “Why Did You Kill My Parents?” was simply milking the American-spawned politically correct notion of the Albanian as victim in Kosovo. But for every Albanian child that lost his or her parents in that conflict — usually because at least one of them was fighting as KLA — I can show you at least one Serb or Roma child that lost one or both parents, or was killed together in a slaughter of the entire family by Albanians. Pre, post, and during the conflict. At some point, one must ask herself how it came to be that an area that was 60% Serb at the turn of the 20th Century came to be 10% Serb by 1999. Who was bullying whom out of the province? I have piles of documented substantiation in answer to that. The truth is what’s been diligently kept from the American public — even by papers such as The NY Times which had been reporting that truth throughout the 80s but didn’t dig those articles up when it came time for Bill Clinton to demonstrate ’strength’ and have his war.
And so for 13 years, since we bombed Christians on behalf of ostensibly oppressed Muslims in ’99, I’ve been trying to get the word out that the Serb-demonization we were treated to and which persists to this day was a necessary foundation being laid in order to accomplish our geopolitical goals in the Balkans…A similar stunt was played on the Czech people (demonization by governments and media) in 1938 regarding their “oppressed German minority” in the Sudetenland, when the great powers wanted to appease Hitler by giving him the Sudetenland. This is of course known as the infamous Munich surrender, and the Kosovo surrender has been a much bloodier and messier version of that — involving even more lies and cover-ups.
One such cover-up was the discovery by us in 1999 that there were as many Serb-filled mass graves as Albanian ones. In an area that was only 10% Serb, that revelation spoke volumes about the possible inversion of victim and villain, and risked removing our cause for war. And so an appointee named Clint Williamson hushed it up. Astonishingly, today he has been put in charge of the investigation of the Albanian-run murder-for-organs-scandal. Our KLA pals, now the “legitimate,” U.S.-backed government of Kosovo — and cheered as heroes by Albanians everywhere — were removing organs from Serbs, Albanians, Roma, and ‘retired’ prostitutes of varying nationalities, to help fund the cause and fill Hashim Thaci’s coffers (he is now prime minister); Williamson himself destroyed evidence at the scene of some of the holding pens.
Anyway, Tanyanika, I just wanted to send you the letter that I wrote to The News, albeit too late, in response to your write-up. My 13-year efforts are clearly not effective enough, except in earning me the expected “pro-Serb propagandist” title. (I’m an American Jew who didn’t even know what a Serb was until we were bombing them in ’99, but the course that this set me on has made me sympathetic to that vilified people who were never a threat to us — indeed they were our allies in WWI and II — and a people who were responding to attacks by those who today threaten us now too. Recall the Fort Dix plot involving four Albanians, as well as the Tampa plot by an Albanian which was disrupted in January, not to mention last year’s murder of two American servicemen in Frankfurt by a Kosovo Albanian. That’s to name just a few. And yet it’s still the Serbs we’re supposed to reserve our politically correct, entrenched animus toward. I don’t send you this to convert your thinking, but in the hopes that in the future you might have a more skeptical eye toward the usual wares being sold about the Yugoslav conflicts.
OK, so the letter follows below, in blog form since that’s all I could do after it was too late for publication. Forgive my (by now) exasperated and put-off tones. Yours, Julia
Instead of internalizing, or at least digesting, my letter, Tanyanika has now upped the ante, from “Kosov” to “Kosova.” A rather typical response, actually, to my appeals for fairness.
Having said that NY Daily News is the first mainstream media outfit to use “Kosova,” I must point out at least one very early exception: writer Timothy Garton Ash, who as early as 2000 was using it, but explaining the context. Two choice excerpts from his articles:
American special forces work first covertly and then overtly with the Kosovo Liberation Army. We secure them effective independence from Serbia, under an international protectorate. As a result, one day there will either be a little state called Kosova (the Albanian spelling) or a greater Albania. …[B]ecause these people live in several neighbouring countries as well, giving them autonomy here would be destabilising there. Which it was, and will be. Our support for the Kosovo Liberation Army mightily encouraged the Albanian insurgency in neighbouring Macedonia.
– Timothy Garton Ash, The Guardian, March 26, 2003
…the place we should now, realistically, call Kosova…Malisevo, once the capital of the KLA and “the most dangerous place in Europe”…In the trashed bazaar of what used to be the Serbian city of Pec and is now the Albanian city of Pejë, children have painted the ruins with brightly colored frescoes. There’s a thriving market and even a couple of jewelers’ shops. Young girls stand in the mud, distributing calendars for Ramadan….
Thanks to us, Kosova ends with an a — the Albanian as opposed to the Serbian spelling. A stands for Albanian. It also, at the moment, stands for Anarchy. Take A for Albanian first. It’s now entirely clear that the NATO intervention has decisively resolved, in favor of the Albanians….This was neither the stated nor the real intention of Western policymakers.
Although most Serbs don’t believe it, the representatives of the so-called international community are genuine and even passionate in their desire to see a future for the Serbs in Kosova. [That may have been the case in 2000, but they’ve long since gotten with the Albanian program. See the six closing quotes here.] Dr. Klaus Reinhardt, the impressive German general who now commands the multilateral, NATO-led military force (KFOR), thumps his right fist into his left palm as he tells me that he will bring Serbs back to live again in their homes, even though those homes have been torched and plundered by Albanians since KFOR marched in… “Before and during the war, Kosovars kept assuring me that Kosova would not be like Albania: corrupt, anarchic, ruled by the gun and the gang. Increasingly, it is.
– Timothy Garton Ash, Hoover Institution, April 30, 2000
Closing with one of my favorite sentences about “Kosova”:
[I]t became fashionable for American and, alas, for some British politicians to say the word “Kosovo” in a funny way — thought to reflect local Albanian pronunciation — and to call the inhabitants “Kosovars”.
– BBC world affairs editor John Simpson, The Telegraph, Feb. 18, 2001
Comments are closed.
